More fringe echoes from another era.
Dutch band Minny Pops formed in 1978 under the tutorship of Wally van Middendorp. This 25th Anniversary LTM Publishing re-release of their Plurex label album debut predates their early 80’s Factory output Sparks In a Dark Room and Secret Stories. They split in 1985.
Electronic experimentation is high on the agenda, curtailing normal song structure and melody. The white noise of ‘Springtime I’, ‘Springtime II’ and ‘New Muzak’ is the sound of David Lynch’s lawnmowers picked up on short-wave radio. ‘Motorcity’ and ‘Flash In The Eye’ could be punk/electronica’s take on free-form jazz. ‘M.D. Mania’ is the closest to a pop song, astonishingly prescient given the subsequent dietary domination by a certain clown's fast-food chain. ‘Minny Pops’, ‘Monica’ and ‘Dolphin’s Spurt’ are psycho-Goth drone dramas, the latter benefiting greatly from a 1983 DJ remix that puts them in the same room as Joy Division, Cabaret Voltaire and The Human League without actually stealing their spotlight. As good as the remix is I can’t shake off the idea that Bowie was doing this on ‘Low’ a few years earlier.
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Also included and far more interesting is their first release, 1979’s ‘Kojak’ EP. The title track is a voyeuristic journey through the mind of an American ‘cop’ with Wally’s monotone voice acting out a crime-busting fantasy. In the light of Schwarzeneger’s 80’s film roles Stateside, his monotonous European accent scripting a hackneyed US TV show is raised to visionary pathos. ‘Footsteps’ is a 2-minute punk jive while ‘Nervous’ is insistent: a scratchy descent into mania.
On this evidence Factory were right to put pen to paper.
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