DJ Xero, Operative of SeeDarkly™ (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
seedarklyxero) wrote2018-09-02 10:00 am
seedarklyxero) wrote2018-09-02 10:00 am
SeeDarkly Sunday DisCOVERies : Electronically Yours...
Welcome to SeeDarkly Sunday DisCOVERies:
a weekly exploration of goth, industrial, & dark alternative cover songs!
First time here? Click here for details from first entry.
Many like to think of Bauhaus as THE originators of the music that inspired our broader dark musical scene. Their sound unquestionably inspired many, but were they "the first?" Well, that could be a bit subjective depending on your perspectives of goth/industrial music. Last week we explored some additional covers of The Normal's Warm Leatherette, released the year before Bela Lugosi's Dead. While The Normal's impact was clearly more significant on the industrial side of our scene, today's cover is of a track that is another of the earliest pieces of dark electronic music and also may well predate those recognized as the forefathers of goth in its influence on new wave and post-punk artistry!:
Bestial Mouths - Being Boiled (The Human League)
Two of the Human League's founding members, Ian Craig Marsh & Martyn Ware, started their career informally calling themselves The Dead Daughters. Their next project, The Future, ended almost as soon as it began in 1977 when Adi Newton joined them, but left soon after to form Clock DVA. Marsh & Ware then sought an old friend and vocalist, Philip Oakey, to help finalize one of the songs they were working on. Oakey penned the lyrics for Being Boiled in two days and The Human League (the new name derived from Oakey's love of science fiction and the board game Starforce: Alpha Centauri) was born. They released the track as a single in late June 1978. While its B-side, Circus of Death was included on their first album, Reproduction in 1979, Being Boiled was held for their second album, Travelogue, released in 1980. The single's jacket slogan declared The Human League as "Electronically Yours..." possibly due in part to the fact that it was one of the first contemporary British singles of its time to be recorded using only electronic instruments. They may also be among the first to do live shows with a tape recorder to play their rhythm and bass sections, which they found they had to do just to replicate the song on stage.
After their pop success with Don't You Want Me in 1981 they re-released Being Boiled which sold considerably better the second time out. David Bowie is said to have called it, unironically, "the future of music." Vince Clark (DM, Yaz, Erasure) claimed the song as one of his favorites and credits its influence for the formation of Depeche Mode. Many other artists have cited the track as meaningful and over two dozen covers have been released since the original.
One of the most recent covers comes from a post-punk/darkwave electronic rock outfit called Bestial Mouths, who released a version on their latest album, Heartless in March 2016. When asked about the cover, frontwoman Lynette Cerezo said, "I liked the challenge of doing a cover with male vocals, a song that doesn't normally sound like us, the challenge to see if we can keep the integrity of the original but still put our mark on it. The original will always be best, of course, but I do believe we brought a different style to it!"
She also acknowledged that initially it was their label, Cleopatra Records, who wanted them to do a cover song. That's not too much of a surprise since Cleopatra has a long history of packaging such covers from their artists into compilations.
The original song, lyrically an indictment of the Chinese silkworm farming industry, is an ominous piece of transcendental dark electronica that was clearly breaking new ground in the late seventies. Cerezo, who also previously worked in the fashion industry, remarked on that she "also agreed with the subject matter, it's about being against the process of killing of silk worms for silk, humans' abuse of innocent victims for our own exploitation."
Bestial Mouths gives the track a more aggressive, crunchy, and infectious sound no less otherworldly than the original but emphatically distinctive coupled with Cerezo's deeply alluring vocals.
The Human League may have moved away from their original sound to take up a more mainstream pop sensibility, but there is no doubt that their early work was embraced and built upon by many carrying on in the traditions of dark music.:
The Cover:
Find on Bandcamp
The Original:
Next week:
One of possibly the hardest working artists in industrial music is in need. So our Second Sunday Slowly edition features a recent downtempo cover of one of his songs and its proceeds go to a chæritæble cæuse!
Feel free to tell me what you think about today's cover! Comments, suggestions, discussions, etc... welcome!
(You do NOT need a Dreamwidth account to comment, but all comments are screened for spam prevention.)
Explore the darkness,
-Xero
Previous DisCOVERies
Aug 26 - 4X4: Suzi Quatro/J.G. Thirlwell/Soft Lighting/Norman Sane - Warm Leatherette (The Normal)
Aug 19 - Billy Idol - [I Forgot] To Be A [Your] Lover (William Bell)
Aug 12 - Noctronyx - Wreath of Barbs (:wumpscut:)
Aug 05 - Das Projekt - Monday, Monday (The Mamas & The Papas)
Jul 29 - Menschliche Energie - New Dress (Depeche Mode)
Directory of All Previous DisCOVERies
a weekly exploration of goth, industrial, & dark alternative cover songs!
First time here? Click here for details from first entry.
Many like to think of Bauhaus as THE originators of the music that inspired our broader dark musical scene. Their sound unquestionably inspired many, but were they "the first?" Well, that could be a bit subjective depending on your perspectives of goth/industrial music. Last week we explored some additional covers of The Normal's Warm Leatherette, released the year before Bela Lugosi's Dead. While The Normal's impact was clearly more significant on the industrial side of our scene, today's cover is of a track that is another of the earliest pieces of dark electronic music and also may well predate those recognized as the forefathers of goth in its influence on new wave and post-punk artistry!:
Bestial Mouths - Being Boiled (The Human League)
Two of the Human League's founding members, Ian Craig Marsh & Martyn Ware, started their career informally calling themselves The Dead Daughters. Their next project, The Future, ended almost as soon as it began in 1977 when Adi Newton joined them, but left soon after to form Clock DVA. Marsh & Ware then sought an old friend and vocalist, Philip Oakey, to help finalize one of the songs they were working on. Oakey penned the lyrics for Being Boiled in two days and The Human League (the new name derived from Oakey's love of science fiction and the board game Starforce: Alpha Centauri) was born. They released the track as a single in late June 1978. While its B-side, Circus of Death was included on their first album, Reproduction in 1979, Being Boiled was held for their second album, Travelogue, released in 1980. The single's jacket slogan declared The Human League as "Electronically Yours..." possibly due in part to the fact that it was one of the first contemporary British singles of its time to be recorded using only electronic instruments. They may also be among the first to do live shows with a tape recorder to play their rhythm and bass sections, which they found they had to do just to replicate the song on stage.
After their pop success with Don't You Want Me in 1981 they re-released Being Boiled which sold considerably better the second time out. David Bowie is said to have called it, unironically, "the future of music." Vince Clark (DM, Yaz, Erasure) claimed the song as one of his favorites and credits its influence for the formation of Depeche Mode. Many other artists have cited the track as meaningful and over two dozen covers have been released since the original.
One of the most recent covers comes from a post-punk/darkwave electronic rock outfit called Bestial Mouths, who released a version on their latest album, Heartless in March 2016. When asked about the cover, frontwoman Lynette Cerezo said, "I liked the challenge of doing a cover with male vocals, a song that doesn't normally sound like us, the challenge to see if we can keep the integrity of the original but still put our mark on it. The original will always be best, of course, but I do believe we brought a different style to it!"
She also acknowledged that initially it was their label, Cleopatra Records, who wanted them to do a cover song. That's not too much of a surprise since Cleopatra has a long history of packaging such covers from their artists into compilations.
The original song, lyrically an indictment of the Chinese silkworm farming industry, is an ominous piece of transcendental dark electronica that was clearly breaking new ground in the late seventies. Cerezo, who also previously worked in the fashion industry, remarked on that she "also agreed with the subject matter, it's about being against the process of killing of silk worms for silk, humans' abuse of innocent victims for our own exploitation."
Bestial Mouths gives the track a more aggressive, crunchy, and infectious sound no less otherworldly than the original but emphatically distinctive coupled with Cerezo's deeply alluring vocals.
The Human League may have moved away from their original sound to take up a more mainstream pop sensibility, but there is no doubt that their early work was embraced and built upon by many carrying on in the traditions of dark music.:
The Cover:
Find on Bandcamp
The Original:
Next week:
One of possibly the hardest working artists in industrial music is in need. So our Second Sunday Slowly edition features a recent downtempo cover of one of his songs and its proceeds go to a chæritæble cæuse!
Feel free to tell me what you think about today's cover! Comments, suggestions, discussions, etc... welcome!
(You do NOT need a Dreamwidth account to comment, but all comments are screened for spam prevention.)
Explore the darkness,
-Xero
Previous DisCOVERies
Aug 26 - 4X4: Suzi Quatro/J.G. Thirlwell/Soft Lighting/Norman Sane - Warm Leatherette (The Normal)
Aug 19 - Billy Idol - [I Forgot] To Be A [Your] Lover (William Bell)
Aug 12 - Noctronyx - Wreath of Barbs (:wumpscut:)
Aug 05 - Das Projekt - Monday, Monday (The Mamas & The Papas)
Jul 29 - Menschliche Energie - New Dress (Depeche Mode)
Directory of All Previous DisCOVERies