Immun- Bend sinister
Been reading this and been reading lhatand I can hardly believe the avalanche ofsuperlativesthat have greeted this single‘s release. ‘We have seen the future of rock‘n‘ roll and its name is etc, etc.‘ This is the kind of apocalyptic soothsaying that are as much part and packaging of Curve‘s debut single as the actual grooves themselves. 00 ordon‘t believe the type, that is the two-dollar question. So Toni. I‘ve chosen not to listen to your record before this wee chat. If it‘s as earth-quaking as it supposedly is, lfear for my sanity. Tell me, exactly how good isthe Blindfold EP?
‘Well, Dean and l are very happy with the record. otherwise we wouldn‘t have put it out. We‘d done so many things before, and it got to this stage and we said, “fuck if", we‘re not gonna compromise in any otherway. Butwe had no idea it would get this kind of reaction.‘
The EP indubitably (apparently) has all the rightfactors in its favour. Happy Mondays‘ engineer, My Bloody Valentine's producer, a rapper, a wah wah, a drunkylummerbeat, and a crucial pre-release kudos that will either sink or float these two before their(already half-recorded) second EP ever makes it out. Can Curve live up to these hyper-expectations of the media
MUSIC
Curve and an industry desperate lorsome long-life, unit-shifting, boundary-crossing megastars? Or will they be suffocated at birth? Toni — rightly, hopefully—thinks, nay.
“Now that we‘re getting feedback, and people are reacting in a really
fantastic way, it spurs us on to do more.
For the next record, we‘ll just go back into the basement studio, shutthe doors, and we‘re completely cocooned from it all.‘
Good. Now we can listen to that first record. (Craig McLean) The Blindfold EP is on Anxious Records.
Steve Martland: severely miffed
Steve Martland, the current enfant terrible of British composition, is furious over the decision to drop his planned commission from Edinburgh Contemporary Arts Trust‘s recent Queen‘s Hall concert. Martland was invited to write a work for a combined group from two Edinburgh schools, who then refused to acceptthe finished score.
Martland missed the original delivery date in December 1990, but submitted ‘Crossing The Border’ in early February after a strongly worded letter of complaint co-signed by Nigel Murray (forStMary‘s) and Neil Bell (for Broughton). The composer then received another letter in February rejecting the piece as it stood, and refusing payment of the £1,750 still
32 The List 32 March 7 4 April 1991
due to him.
ECAT secretary Hazel Sheppard, who also acts as publicist for St Mary‘s, said that it had been rejected because Martland “had notwrltten the workfor the instruments which the commission specified‘, thereby breaking theterms of his contract. Martland, however, insists that the information supplied to him suggested that the wind players would not be of sufficient standard to perform the music. Accordingly, he submitted a work for string orchestra, a compromise previously rejected during earlierdiscussions.
‘When I firstexplainedfhe change to Nigel Murray at St Mary‘s, he simply said he was disappointed,‘ Martland said. ‘I was astonished to receive the subsequent lettercancelling the commission and my conducting contract for the concert, without any attempt at negotiation or compromise.
‘It is completely outrageousthafthey should attempt to withhold the money they owe me. I took this commission rather than a more lucrative one because I am strongly committed to working with schools. What annoys me most, though, is thatthe arrogant attitude they are taking is robbing the children of the chance to play the piece.‘
Martland, who is currently working on a schools project on the music of Kurt Weill and BertoltBrecht in Aberdeen, is furious aboutwhat he
describes as ‘a scandalous situation‘, and istaking legal advice onthe matter. (Kenny Mathieson)
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Alastair Mabbott grabs the bull (or something) by the horns by talking to Glenn Tipton. guitarist for the devilishly good metal combo Judas Priest.
\Vhen Judas Priest come screaming into town. a vision ofsleek leather and glittering studs. the Mill) fists punching the air w ill have a more concrete message of victory and defiance than usual.
Judas Priest won.
'I'hey didn’t take on the world this time. but ‘two—bit lawyers‘ who fought to extract millions of dollars from them and (‘BS Records in a nightmaristh surreal case in Reno. Nevada last year.
The charge was product liability in the deaths oftwo teenagers. James Vance and Roy Belknap. fans of heavy metal and in particular Judas Priest. who got drunk and stoned one night in December 1%‘5. listening to Priest's Stained ( fussy 'I‘o wind up the evening. Vance stole his father‘s shotgun and the two of them shot themselves in the head. Vance survived. with no lace. exactly three more years. -
'l‘he band and their label were stunned when Judge Jerome Whitehead decided that the case was to go to court. It meant that the
( judge wastaking seriouslythe claims
of attorney Tim Post that there were subliminal messages on the album goading the boys on to commit the act. An enormous amount of attention was paid to an alleged chant of‘do it. do it‘ on the track ‘Better By You. Better Than .‘vle.’ but eventually. last September. the band were acquitted. the judge convinced that this was just the sound of singer Rob Halford breathing.
'I'hat both the boys‘ families had a history of violence — one of the boys had been taken into care for a while as a result — and drug and alcohol abuse. and that one of the fathers
was wanted by police at the time of
the death. didn‘t seem to figure in the equation at all. Attorney Post
laid the blame squarely at Judas
Priest‘s door. "I‘hey were accusing us of having hidden subliminal messages in an
album we did fourteen years ago.‘ guitarist (ilenn 'l‘ipton tells me.
‘when we neither had the time nor the money to waste on any such pursuance. it's just a load of rubbish and an absolute waste of cy'erybody's
time in court. They were jost trying
to get their hands on 30.5 million.
which they failed to do. it's just
typical, and very indicative of America. America is choking on its own legal system. and that's not words of bitterness. its words of being over there for over ten years
and seeing the poor victims of these
ambulance-chasing lawyers have to cough up just to get rid of them.‘ 'We've always been pretty close. that‘s why we‘re still together.” says 'I‘ipton. mulling over the effect the
external pressure on the group.
"there's no ego problems in the