486 Hello Art of Noise - Close ( To The Edit )

Chart  entered :  24  November  1984

Chart  peak : 8

Number  of  hits : 12

The  Art  of  Noise  were  a  unique  group  that  came  together  from  working  on  other  people's  records. They  were  basically  the  production  team  of  Trevor  Horn.

Trevor  was  born  in  Durham  in  1949. He  was  in  school  bands  as  a  bass  player  and   became  a  session  musician  in  the  mid  seventies. He  became  the  regular  bassist  for  Tina  Charles  and  met  keyboard  player  Geoff  Downes   and  guitarist  Bruce  Woolley  in  her  band.  He  wrote  the  B  side  for  a  single  Woolley  put  out  in  Germany  as  part  of  a  duo  called  Boogatti  in  1977. He  invested  his  earnings  in  building  a  home  studio.

Having  played  on  a  number  of  hits  with  Tina,  Trevor   made  his  first  bid  for  fame  as  lead  singer  and  producer  for  the  trio  Big  A  who  put  the  single  "Caribbean  Air  Control" out  in  June  1978.  It's  a  bit  muddled  , mixing  a  Space  Oddity  inspired  lyric  and  episodic  structure   with  Moroder-ish  electronic  disco   ( I'm  not  sure  what's  Caribbean  about  it  ) but  it's  recognisably  Trevor's  work  in  its  major  to  minor  melodic  switches  featuring  his  plaintive  vocals  in  the  latter  sections.  Their  second  single  "Fly  On  UFO"  is  a  more  conventional  European  disco  track  that  , for  all  its  sci-fi  trappings ,  sounds  like  Silver  Convention. The  group  had  already  split  by  the  time  it  was  released  but  Edward  Germano  at  New  York's  HIt  Factory  studio  enjoyed  the  singles  and  offered  Trevor  the  opportunity  to  make  a  disco  album  there. Trevor  rounded  up  Downes, synth  player  Hans  Zimmer  and  pianist  Anne  Dudley  to  fly  to  New  York  and  make  the  album  under  the  name  "Chromium". 

Anne  was  born  in  Beckenham  in  1956. She  was  a  classically  trained  pianist  but  moved  into  the  pop  world  as  a  young  session  musician  in  the  late  seventies.

Chromium's  album  "Star  To  Star"  is  a  skilful  piece  of  work  that  turns  imitation  into  an  art  form  with  facsimiles  of  The  Bee  Gees, Carpenters, Diana  Ross, Chic  melded  into  a  space  age  disco  concept  album  that  sails  perilously  close  to  The  Rah  Band's  Clouds  Across  The  Moon  in  places. There  are  hints  of  what  was  to  come  in  the  melancholic  synth  sweeps  but  it  is  ultimately  high  quality  pastiche  and  it  didn't  sell.

Trevor  then  formed  The  Buggles  with  Downes  and  Woolley  and  began  touting  demos  of  songs  they'd  written. Charles  was  supportive  and  contributed  some  backing  vocals. Trevor  began  a  relationship  with  Jill  Sinclair  co-owner  of  Sarm  Studios . She  arranged  a  deal  with  the  house  label  but  at  the  eleventh  hour  Island  came  in  with  a  better  offer.  Woolley  left  at  this  point  to  form  the  band  Camera  Club  and  watched  as  the  song  he'd  co-written  "Video  Killed  The  Radio  Star "  sailed  to  number  one  in  October  1979.

I've  covered  The  Buggles'  first  LP  "The  Age  Of  Plastic"  on  Clarke  Chronicler's  Albums . Here   I  should  just  note  that  Anne  wasn't  involved  in  the  sessions  but  the  engineer  was  Gary  Langan.  Gary,  from  Surrey, was  a  Sarm  employee  and  had  worked  on  Queen's  big  selling  LPs.

Trevor's  next  move  was  one  of  the  biggest  surprises  of  the  decade. The  duo's  manager  Brian  Lane  suggested  they  both  join  prog-rockers  Yes  to  replace  the  recently-departed  Jon  Anderson  and  Rick  Wakeman. They  took  on  the  challenge  and  hurriedly  recorded  the  LP  "Drama"  to  meet  looming  tour  obligations. Both  had  the  musical  chops  to  live  with  their  new  bandmates  but  part  of the  fanbase  was  understandably  suspicious  of  what  these  newcomers  from  the  pop  world  would  do  to  the  sound  and  Anderson  and  Wakeman  were  hard  acts  to  follow. "Drama"  in  fact  slots  quite  easily  into  the  Yes  canon  and  reached  number  2  in  the  UK.  They  had  more  problems  when  they  toured  it. Trevor  is  an  under-rated  vocalist  but  he  didn't  have  Anderson's  range  and  trying  to  deliver  the  old  material  made  his  voice  more  ragged  as  the  tour  progressed  with  some  hostile  reactions  from  audiences. The  band  dissolved when  the  tour  finished  in  early  1981.

Trevor  was  planning  a  new  Buggles  album  with  Downes  but  the  latter  got  the  call  to  join  Steve  Howe  in  the  supergroup  Asia  instead  and  quit  the  band. Island  felt  the  group  had  no  more  commercial  potential  and  dropped  them. Sinclair  persuaded  Trevor  that  producing  might  be  a  better  way  to  go  and  suggested  he  take  up  a  standing  offer  to  work  with  the  struggling  MOR  duo  Dollar. He  and  Woolley  wrote  the  single  "Hand  Held  In  Black  And  White"   for  them  which  immediately  restored  them  to  the  Top  20  and,  what's  more,  found  favour  with  music  critics  turning  away  from  post-punk's  doom  and  gloom  aesthetic.  A  whole  new  career  opened  up.  The  single  was  also  the  first  time  all  four  musical  members  of  the  Art  of  Noise  worked  together  as  Jonathan  "J. J." Jeczalik  , a  keyboard  technician  from  Banbury  who  had  previously  worked  for  Downes  was  brought  in  for  his  expertise  on  the new  Fairlight  computer / synthesiser. Trevor  had  noted  his  work  on  Kate  Bush's  1981  single  Sat  In  Your  Lap.

Trevor  still  wanted  to  release  a  second  Buggles  album  and  Sinclair  arranged  a  deal  with  the  French  label  Carerre.  "Adventures  In  Modern  Recording"  features  some  work  from  Downes  but  is  largely  a  solo  effort  from  Trevor. Gary  engineered  once  more  and  Anne  features  on  one  track.  It's  a  rewarding  listen , somewhere  between  their  earlier  efforts  and  more  experimental  prog  leanings , but  he  correctly  judged  there  were  no  singles  as  all  three  tracks  released  as  45s  failed  to  make  the  charts. Besides  there  were  other  prettier  acts  for  the  kids  to  buy  , some  of  whom  like  ABC  and  Spandau  Ballet,  Trevor  was  now  producing.

That  now  became  his  bread  and  butter  as  Buggles  were  put  to  bed. Spandau  found  him  too  domineering  and  decamped  to  Swain  and  Jolley  after  the  lifesaving  job  he  did  on  the  1982  single  "Instinction".  ABC  had  no  qualms  and  their  epochal  1982  album  The  Lexicon  Of  Love   made  Trevor, Anne, Gary  and  J.J.  the  hottest  production  team  in  town. Malcolm  McLaren's  Duck  Rock  while  not  selling  at  the  same  level, only  furthered  their  reputation.

Former  associates  came  calling. A  new  line  up  of  Yes  booked  them  to  produce  their  comeback album  90125  while  a   shamefaced  Chris Blackwell  offered  to  finance  a  record  label  Trevor  and  Jill  were  planning  to  set  up. Their  choice  of  business  partner  was  surprising. Paul  Morley  ( born  1957 )  was  a  grammar  school  boy  from  Stockport  whose  assiduous  reporting  on  the  Manchester  music  scene  got  him  a  job  on  the  New  Musical  Express. He  made  his  reputation  by  being  the  first  writer  to  spot  the  potential  of  Joy  Division  and  thereafter  had  carte  blanche  to  write  whatever  he  wanted. His  florid, exceedingly  pretentious  style  came  to  define  the  paper  in  the  early  eighties. He  had  been  very  hostile  to  The  Buggles  during  their  heyday  but  in  mid-1981  he  had  an  epiphany. Discerning  the  sterile  cul-de-sac  post-punk  was  driving  into  he  started  championing  mainstream  musical  values  and  called  for  a  "New  Pop"  based  on  these  and  intelligent  writing. Trevor's  work  with  Dollar  and  ABC  fitted  the  bill  perfectly  and  got  glowing  reviews. A  magnanimous  Trevor  saw  him  as  the  perfect  A &  R  man  and  publicist  for  the  new  label. He  came  up  with  the  name  ZTT  after  the  Italian  futurist  Marinetti's  poem  Zang  Tumb  Tuum.

While   working  on  the  Yes  album , JJ  and  Gary  took  an  unused  Alan  White  drum  break  and  fed  it  in  to  the  Fairlight.  After  playing  around  with  it   in  the  machine  they  took  it  to  Trevor  and  after  he  and  Anne  had  developed  it, the  latter  adding  some  musical  structure  they  had  an  instrumental  track  which  could  hardly  be  credited  to  Yes.  The  solution  was  to  put  it  out  themselves. Paul  came  up  with  the  name  Art  of  Noise  from  an  essay  by   another  of  his  favourite  Italian  theorists  and  was  invited  to  join  the  group  as  conceptual  artist  and  spokesman. The  track  itself  was  given  the  uncompromising  name  of  "Beatbox"  to  match  its  musical  brutalism. It  formed  the  centrepiece  on  Side  A  of  their  debut  EP  "Into  Battle  With  The  Art  of  Noise", the  first   release  on  ZTT  in  September  1983  while  Side  B  highlighted  Anne's  melodic  gifts on  the  sublime  "Moments  In  Love" . Other  tracks  were  built  around   samples  from  Donna  Summer  and  The  Andrews  Sisters.

"Beatbox"  was   released  twice  more  in  reworked  form  as  a  conventional  single  over  the   next  year  but   still   wasn't  a  hit  although  very  popular  with  breakancers  across  the  pond. Paul  did  a  series  of  provocative  interviews  around  the  time  of  its  second  release  in  May  1984 with  the  phenomenal  success  of  Frankie  Goes  To  Hollywood  to  back   up  his  claims . Shortly  afterwards  the  Art  of  Noise  released  their  debut  LP  "Who's  Afraid  of  the  Art  of  Noise"  which  featured  both  "Beatbox"  and  "Moments  In  Love"  again. It  reached  number  8  in  the  charts.

"Close ( To  The  Edit )"  was  released  as  a  belated  second  single  during  a  gap  between  Frankie  Goes  To  Hollywood  singles  and  made  slow  progress  up  the  charts  only  becoming  a  sizeable  hit  after  Christmas. It  started  out  as   yet   another   remix  of  "Beatbox "  but   soon  took  on  a  life  of  its  own. Bursting  with  invention  and  wit  , the  track  wields  a  variety  of  incongruous  samples, that   widely-used ( since )  "Hey! ", a  short  poetry  recitation, a  car  starting  and  chants  of  "Dum"  over  another  crashing  backbeat  and  intermittently  a  melodic  bassline. Trevor  and  Anne  amazingly   manage  to  give  it  enough  of  a  structure  for  the  commercial  success  which  it  eventually  received.