Plunder the Tombs: February 2013

Friday, February 1, 2013

Elephant Talk – Ask 7” (Fragile Records, 1983)

Elephant Talk were a pleasingly punky Goth band that appeared out of Cornwall. This last bit surprised me a bit since thanks to my entire knowledge of Cornwall having been gleaned from Ripping Yarns, I naturally understood it to be populated entirely by pirates, smugglers and eccentric innkeepers.

The band seem to have taken their name from a single by Prog rock gods King Crimson (EG, 1981) and several other bands have since followed suit, making research into Elephant Talk ever so slightly awkward.

Sadly, Elephant Talk proved to be a short lived affair and the Ask 7” would be the only thing they would ever release. Sad, because it’s a highly enjoyable listen, especially the A side, but equally sad because managing to get Art Director for The Face magazine, Neville Brody who had also worked with much better known acts including Cabaret Voltaire, Depeche Mode, Clock DVA and Throbbing Gristle, to provide the cover art must have been quite a coup, but doesn’t seem to have translated into success.

I've thought long and hard trying to work out just what this reminds me of, and eventually came to the conclusion of a cross between Joy Division and Bauhaus with Gavin Friday on vocals might come close. But decide for yourself.

Ask (For some inexplicable reason Youtube wrongly calls this song “Alive”)

Burning Halo

After this it’s all over as various members, like opening a sack of cats, explode in all directions, forming numerous new bands and projects.

Short and sweet, just like this post really.

Track Listing

Ask
Burning Halo

Line Up: Ross Reid (vocals), Matthew Watts (guitar), Adam (bass), Andy Copelin (drums)

http://www.discogs.com/Elephant-Talk-Ask/release/703873

A Welcome and Introduction

Plunder the Tombs was started back in 2010 by way of looking back on a musical past that I felt in sore need of curation.

It was a strange and sad time when what passed for “Goth” in clubs seemed a pale imitator of what once was, following first a decade of cookie-cutter Sisters of the Nephilim clone bands and then another decade of industrial dance being palmed off to younger audiences as a type of faux goth. When on rare occasion DJs in “Goth” clubs did finally become brave enough to play something like Bauhaus it was not untypical to have the dance floor clear, and it became obvious that the memory, meaning and legacy of much that had gone before had been lost.

It’s probably safe to say that the boundaries of what was “Goth” were never clearly defined. An absolute blessing for those bands on the original scene before it had a name pinned to the donkey, but an outright curse for those who came later and found rules had been imposed to dictate that which was and that which was not acceptable. Worse still was to come in the 90s from a lazy and unquestioning media who simply assumed that anything that wore black and make up was by definition “Goth”, thus allowing all manner of pretenders licence, and maximising confusion as to what the term actually referred to.

This has gone on for way too long and its time is at an end. Neo Post-Punk bands now proliferate across Europe, old long dead Goth bands rise from their crypts in the UK, and new deathrock bands are breeding like rabbits up the west coast of America. It is time to reclaim our scene back from metal bands and ravers in disguise.

While the Plunder the Tombs of old focused on what had gone before, there are now far too many exciting new things to ignore. We roar back to life in a reboot, covering past , present and things yet to come.

Let us plunder the tombs….