Associates were a
ScottishScotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
post-punkPost-punk is a rock music movement with its roots in the late 1970s, following on the heels of the initial punk rock explosion of the mid-1970s. The genre retains its roots in the punk movement but is more introverted, complex and experimental...
and
new waveNew Wave is a subgenre of :rock music that emerged in the mid to late 1970s alongside punk rock. The term at first generally was synonymous with punk rock before being considered a genre in its own right that incorporated aspects of electronic and experimental music, mod subculture, disco and 1960s...
band of the early 1980s. They were known for the operatic voice and theatrical antics of singer
Billy MackenzieWilliam MacArthur "Billy" Mackenzie was a Scottish singer, with a distinctive falsetto voice best known as a member of The Associates.- Biography :...
, who committed suicide in 1997.
1979–1982: Associates mk. 1
Mackenzie and guitarist
Alan RankineAlan Rankine played keyboards, and guitars, for the rock band, Associates, which he co-founded with Billy Mackenzie in the late 1970s....
met in
DundeeDundee is the fourth-largest city in Scotland and the 39th most populous settlement in the United Kingdom. It lies within the eastern central Lowlands on the north bank of the Firth of Tay, which feeds into the North Sea...
in 1976 and formed the
cabaretCabaret is a form, or place, of entertainment featuring comedy, song, dance, and theatre, distinguished mainly by the performance venue: a restaurant or nightclub with a stage for performances and the audience sitting at tables watching the performance, as introduced by a master of ceremonies or...
duo The Ascorbic Ones. In 1979 they recorded songs under the name of Mental Torture before finally changing their name to The Associates. They then recorded their debut
singleIn music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...
, a
coverIn popular music, a cover version or cover song, or simply cover, is a new performance or recording of a contemporary or previously recorded, commercially released song or popular song...
of
David BowieDavid Bowie is an English musician, actor, record producer and arranger. A major figure for over four decades in the world of popular music, Bowie is widely regarded as an innovator, particularly for his work in the 1970s...
's "
Boys Keep Swinging"Boys Keep Swinging" is a song by English singer-songwriter David Bowie. It was released as a single from the album Lodger on 27 April 1979.-Recording and release:...
". Their version attracted a good deal of attention, not least from David Bowie, as it was released in June 1979 just six weeks after Bowie's version had hit the UK Top 10 in April. A string of highly regarded singles were released and two albums
The Affectionate PunchThe Affectionate Punch is the first album by Scottish Post-Punk group, Associates. It was released in August 1980.- Style :The album is markedly different from both the Associates darker, more experimental recordings and their later watery dense production style as made famous on Sulk and Fourth...
and
Fourth Drawer DownFourth Drawer Down is the second album by Scottish Post-Punk/New Wave group Associates released in 1981. It is a singles and b-sides compilation from all 6 singles they released that year on Situation Two records...
.
In 1981 Rankine and MacKenzie also released a version of "Kites" under the name "39 Lyon Street" with Christine Beverage on lead vocals, the b-side track "A Girl Named Property" was credited to The Associates. The band's breakthrough came in 1982 with the release of the single "Party Fears Two". Buoyed along by the popularity of
synthpopSynthpop is a genre of popular music that first became prominent in the 1980s, in which the synthesizer is the dominant musical instrument. It was prefigured in the 1960s and early 1970s by the use of synthesizers in progressive rock, electronic art rock, disco and particularly the "Kraut rock" of...
at the time, the song reached number 9 on the
UK Singles ChartThe UK Singles Chart is compiled by The Official Charts Company on behalf of the British record-industry. The full chart contains the top selling 200 singles in the United Kingdom based upon combined record sales and download numbers, though some media outlets only list the Top 40 or the Top 75 ...
. Two other hits soon followed, "Club Country" and "18 Carat Love Affair". That year the band released their most commercially successful album,
SulkSulk is the third album by Scottish New Wave band Associates. It was released in May 1982, and reissued as a CD in 2000 with extra tracks...
.
Martha LadlyMartha Ladly, AOCA RGD MCSD is a Canadian academic, designer and musician. She is currently Associate Professor of interaction design, at OCAD University. Ladly has also had a long career as a musician and achieved international fame as part of Canadian New Wave band Martha & the Muffins...
, of
Martha and the MuffinsMartha and the Muffins are a Canadian new wave band, active from 1977 to the present. Although they only had one major international hit single under their original band name, they had a number of hits in their native Canada, and the core members of the band also charted in Canada and...
, contributed backing vocals and keyboards to this album.
1983–1990: Associates mk. 2 and commercial decline
Rankine left the band in 1982 just before the
Sulk tour. This proved disastrous in terms of the band's career, in particular as the band were being actively courted by
Seymour SteinSeymour Stein is an entrepreneur in the music industry who has been a part of the business since getting his first job as a clerk for Billboard magazine in 1958. Stein is a vice president of Warner Bros...
who thought they could become massive stars in the USA. Mackenzie continued to write and record music under the Associates name until 1990. The albums
PerhapsPerhaps is the fourth album released by the Scottish New Wave band, Associates. It is the first album without founding multi-instrumentalist Alan Rankine.- Development :...
,
The Glamour Chase (which the record company refused to release, considering it not commercially viable) and
Wild and Lonely were made during this period. However, without the guiding hand of Rankine, recordings were sporadic and subsequent Associates records failed to reach the charts in the UK and sold far fewer than their early albums.
1991–present: split and aftermath
The Associates name was put to rest and Mackenzie released the electronica-influenced solo album
Outernational in 1992 with limited success. In 1993 Mackenzie and Rankine began working on new material together: news of an Associates revival generated hype and speculation of a tour and the demos recorded by the two were promising. However Mackenzie was not fully committed to the reunion and especially touring with it so Associates split for a final time. Mackenzie went back to his solo work, signing a deal with
Nude RecordsNude Records was a London based record label, set up in 1992 by Saul Galpern who had previously been involved in the success of artists such as Simply Red, the Fall, Julian Cope, The Triffids, The Slits and The Au Pairs. The label's first success was with Suede. Suede's debut album was the fastest...
and finding a new collaborative partner in Steve Aungle. Between 1987 and 1992 Billy worked with
SwissSwitzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
avant-garde outfit
YelloYello is a Swiss electronica band consisting of Dieter Meier and Boris Blank. They are probably best known for their singles "The Race" and "Oh Yeah", which feature a mix of electronic music and manipulated vocals, as does most of their music....
. MacKenzie wrote the lyrics of the song "The Rhythm Divine" performed by
Shirley BasseyDame Shirley Bassey, DBE , is a Welsh singer. She found fame in the late 1950s and was "one of the most popular female vocalists in Britain during the last half of the 20th century"...
on the album
One SecondOne Second is Yello's fifth original album, having been preceded by a 'new mix' compilation the previous year. Released in 1987, the album is noteworthy for featuring both Billy MacKenzie and Shirley Bassey, the latter singing vocals on "The Rhythm Divine".The song "Call It Love" was used in an...
, with MacKenzie singing backing vocals. MacKenzie contributed to three Yello albums;
One Second (1987),
Flag (1988) and
Baby (1991). Some tracks for
The Glamour Chase and
Outernational were recorded with
Boris BlankBoris Blank is a Swiss artist and musician especially famous for his work in the musical duo Yello with Dieter Meier.-Career:...
at Yello's
recording studioA recording studio is a facility for sound recording and mixing. Ideally both the recording and monitoring spaces are specially designed by an acoustician to achieve optimum acoustic properties...
.
MacKenzie committed
suicideSuicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
in 1997 aged 39, shortly after the death of his mother. He had been suffering from
clinical depressionMajor depressive disorder is a mental disorder characterized by an all-encompassing low mood accompanied by low self-esteem, and by loss of interest or pleasure in normally enjoyable activities...
. He was contemplating a comeback at the time with material co-written with Aungle. The albums
Beyond the Sun (1997) and
Eurocentric (2000) were released posthumously and re-constructed (and expanded with new unreleased songs) in 2004 into two albums:
Auchtermatic and
Transmission Impossible.
Rankine is now a lecturer in music at
Stow College-History:The college is named after David Stow, whose primary teaching seminary was founded close to the college at Dundasvale. Stow was the first purpose-built Further Education college in Glasgow, celebrating its 75th anniversary in 2009....
in
GlasgowGlasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...
, and worked with
Belle & SebastianBelle and Sebastian are an indie pop band formed in Glasgow in January 1996. Belle and Sebastian are often compared with influential indie bands such as The Smiths, as well as classic acts such as Love, Bob Dylan and Nick Drake. The name Belle & Sebastian comes from Belle et Sébastien, a 1965...
on their debut album,
TigermilkTigermilk is the 1996 debut album from Scottish pop group Belle & Sebastian. Originally given a limited release by Electric Honey, the album was subsequently re-released in 1999 by Jeepster Records...
in 1996.
The book
The Glamour Chase by Tom Doyle documented the band's career and MacKenzie's subsequent life.
Legacy
Before Mackenzie's death almost all Associates records had been deleted. Former band member
Michael DempseyMichael Dempsey is a bassist from England, who has performed as a member of several post-punk and New Wave bands including The Cure and Associates.-Early years:...
and the Mackenzie estate began a reissue programme to make sure the band's legacy continued. Almost every Associates album has been re-issued so far, including a 25-Anniversary edition of
The Affectionate Punch in 2005. In addition to the original albums, two
compilation albumA compilation album is an album featuring tracks from one or more performers, often culled from a variety of sources The tracks are usually collected according to a common characteristic, such as popularity, genre, source or subject matter...
s have been released:
Double Hipness (2000), a collection of early tracks with the 1993 reunion demos; and
Singles (2004), an extended version of
Popera - The Singles Collection which caught up with post-1990 material and included the cover of Bowie's "Boys Keep Swinging". In 2002,
The Glamour Chase (recorded in the years 1985-87) was eventually released. Finally,
Wild & Lonely and Mackenzie's solo album
Outernational were repackaged with bonus tracks in 2006.
Artists who have covered "Party Fears Two" include
The Divine ComedyThe Divine Comedy are a chamber pop band from Ireland, fronted by Neil Hannon. Formed in 1989, Hannon has been the only constant member of the group, playing, in some instances, all of the non-orchestral instrumentation bar drums. To date, ten studio albums have been released under the Divine...
,
Dan BrykDan Waldemar Bryk is a Canadian-born singer-songwriter and recording artist. Originally from Toronto, Bryk is currently based in New York City...
and Heaven 17. An instrumental section of "Party Fears Two" was used as the
theme musicTheme music is a piece that is often written specifically for a radio program, television program, video game or movie, and usually played during the title sequence and/or end credits...
for the
BBC Radio 4BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
satirical current affairs series
Week EndingWeek Ending... was a satirical radio current affairs sketch show, first broadcast on BBC Radio 4, usually on Friday evenings. It was devised by writer/producers Simon Brett and David Hatch, and was originally hosted by Nationwide presenter Michael Barratt.The show's title was always announced as...
.
The instrumental piano passage from the "Nocturne VII" track (which appeared on the posthumous
Beyond The Sun album) was used in the BBC series
Masterchef in November 2009.
An edited version of "Club Country" appeared in the second series finale of the
BBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
drama
Ashes to AshesAshes to Ashes is a British science fiction and police procedural drama television series, serving as the sequel to Life on Mars.The series began airing on BBC One in February 2008. A second series began broadcasting in April 2009...
, set in 1982.
American electronic pop duo, Microfilm, did a tribute song to Billy Mackenzie in 2009 titled "I'll Sing Like Billy Mackenzie in Heaven" which featured guitar and additional vocals by
Scissor SistersScissor Sisters are an American band "spawned by the scuzzy, gay nightlife scene of New York" who took their name from a sexual position between two women also known as tribadism...
' member
Del MarquisDel Marquis is the lead guitarist for the group Scissor Sisters.-Scissor Sisters:He was introduced to the Scissor Sisters in 2001 at the insistence of a friend who, at the time, was dating Jake Shears. He originally dismissed the band when he first saw them perform at The Cock, a New York City gay...
. It appeared on the 2009 EP "Blips Don't Lie" and the subsequent singles compilation
I Am Curious: Microfilm 2006-2010.
Band members
Note: There are many other instrumentalists who augmented Associates through their tenure but not all are known especially on earlier demos etc.
- Billy Mackenzie
William MacArthur "Billy" Mackenzie was a Scottish singer, with a distinctive falsetto voice best known as a member of The Associates.- Biography :...
- vocals
- Alan Rankine
Alan Rankine played keyboards, and guitars, for the rock band, Associates, which he co-founded with Billy Mackenzie in the late 1970s....
- guitars, keyboards and other instruments (1977–1982, 1993 for reunion)
- John Sweeney - original drummer
- Michael Dempsey
Michael Dempsey is a bassist from England, who has performed as a member of several post-punk and New Wave bands including The Cure and Associates.-Early years:...
(formerly of The CureThe Cure are an English rock band formed in Crawley, West Sussex in 1976. The band has experienced several line-up changes, with frontman, vocalist, guitarist and principal songwriter Robert Smith being the only constant member...
) - bass guitar (1980–1982)
- John Murphy
John Murphy , sometimes credited as "Jonh Murphy", is an Australian drummer, percussionist and multi-instrumental session musician who has played in numerous Australian and British post-punk, ambient and industrial music groups...
(later of SPKSPK, formed in 1978 in Sydney, Australia, was a 1980s and early 1990s industrial music and noise music group. One member, Graeme Revell, would later go on to become a successful Hollywood movie composer.-History:...
and Death In JuneDeath in June are a neofolk group led by English folk musician Douglas Pearce, better known as Douglas P. The band was originally formed in Britain in 1981 as a trio, but after the other members left in 1984 and 1985 to work on other projects, the group became the work of Douglas P. and various...
) - drums (1980–81)
- Steve Goulding
Steve Goulding is an English drummer, best known for his memberships with Graham Parker and The Rumour, The Associates, Poi Dog Pondering and The Mekons. With the Associates he had a UK #9 hit single with "Party Fears Two"...
(formerly of Graham ParkerGraham Parker is a British rock singer and songwriter, who is best known as the lead singer of the popular British band Graham Parker & the Rumour.-Early career :...
& the Rumour and later of the Mekons) - drums (1982–1983)
- Howard Hughes
Stephen Betts, also known as L. Howard Hughes, was the keyboardist for the band the Associates. He also co wrote and co produced Peter Murphy's first solo album 'Should The World fail To Fall Apart'Betts is currently a member of Vachement Bath....
was a friend of Mackenzie and played keyboards live and on his later albums Perhaps, The Glamour Chase and Wild and Lonely. (1984–1990)
- Steve Reid was a friend of Mackenzie and played guitar on Perhaps. (1982–1984)
- Roberto Soave - bass (1983–1985)
- Moritz Von Oswald
Moritz von Oswald , half of both Basic Channel and Maurizio, went on to become one of the most influential producers of techno music in the 1990s. In the 1980s he was percussionist for Palais Schaumburg and The Associates, but would segue into electronic music by the late 80s and early 90s...
- drums (1985 onwards), percussion on "Wild and Lonely": also composed some songs on Outernational and did various remixes of Associates songs with Ralf Hertwig.
- Anne Dudley
Anne Dudley is an English composer and pop musician, and was the first BBC Concert Orchestra's Composer in Association in 2001. She has worked in both the classical and pop genres. She is perhaps best known, however, as one of the core members of the synthpop band Art of Noise and also as a film...
of Art of Noise - strings on Wild and Lonely. (1990)
- Martha Ladly
Martha Ladly, AOCA RGD MCSD is a Canadian academic, designer and musician. She is currently Associate Professor of interaction design, at OCAD University. Ladly has also had a long career as a musician and achieved international fame as part of Canadian New Wave band Martha & the Muffins...
(previously of Martha and the MuffinsMartha and the Muffins are a Canadian new wave band, active from 1977 to the present. Although they only had one major international hit single under their original band name, they had a number of hits in their native Canada, and the core members of the band also charted in Canada and...
) - keyboards and vocals on Sulk. (1982)
- Robert Smith
Robert James Smith is an English musician. He is the lead singer, guitar player and principal songwriter of the rock band The Cure, and its only constant member since its founding in 1976...
(lead singer of The Cure) - backing vocals on "The Affectionate Punch".
- Jim Russell - drums (1984)
- Ian McIntosh - guitars, live and radio sessions after Rankine left, (1982–1985)
- Martin Lowe - live guitars, (1982)
Albums and compilations
- The Affectionate Punch
The Affectionate Punch is the first album by Scottish Post-Punk group, Associates. It was released in August 1980.- Style :The album is markedly different from both the Associates darker, more experimental recordings and their later watery dense production style as made famous on Sulk and Fourth...
(FictionFiction Records is a UK label founded by Chris Parry in 1978 that is best known for being the home of The Cure for over 20 years. Formerly independent, the label is now owned by Polydor, a subsidiary of Universal Music Group.-History:...
, 1980)
- Fourth Drawer Down
Fourth Drawer Down is the second album by Scottish Post-Punk/New Wave group Associates released in 1981. It is a singles and b-sides compilation from all 6 singles they released that year on Situation Two records...
(Situation TwoSituation Two, aka Situation 2, was a record label created in 1981 by Peter Kent as an offshoot of the larger Beggars Banquet label. At the time, Beggars Banquet records were distributed by WEA Records; so, to appeal to the indie audience and to get releases into the indie charts, the Situation Two...
, 1981)
- Sulk
Sulk is the third album by Scottish New Wave band Associates. It was released in May 1982, and reissued as a CD in 2000 with extra tracks...
(WEA, 1982) ]UKThe UK Albums Chart is a list of albums ranked by physical and digital sales in the United Kingdom. It is compiled every week by The Official Charts Company and broadcast on a Sunday on BBC Radio 1 , and published in Music Week magazine and on the OCC website .To qualify for the UK albums chart...
#10
- The Affectionate Punch (Remixed) (Fiction, 1982)
- Perhaps
Perhaps is the fourth album released by the Scottish New Wave band, Associates. It is the first album without founding multi-instrumentalist Alan Rankine.- Development :...
(WEA, 1985) UK #23, NL #29
- The Glamour Chase (WEA, 1988) - but unreleased until 2003
- Wild and Lonely (Circa, 1990) UK #71
- Popera (WEA East West, 1990)
- The Radio 1 Sessions (Nighttracks, 1994)
- Double Hipness (V2
V2 Records is a record label that is owned by Universal Music Group as of October 2007. The label was founded in 1996 by Richard Branson, five years after he sold Virgin Records to EMI....
, 2000)
- Radio 1 Sessions Volume 1;1981-83 (Strange Fruit
Strange Fruit Records was an independent record label in the United Kingdom.The label, established by Clive Selwood and John Peel in 1986, was the primary distributor of BBC recordings, including Peel Sessions....
, 2003)
- Radio 1 Sessions Volume 2;1984-85 (Strange Fruit, 2003)
- Singles (Warners
Warner Music Group is the third largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry, making it one of the big four record companies...
, 2004)
Singles
- "Boys Keep Swinging" (Double Hip, 1979)
- "The Affectionate Punch" (Fiction, 1980)
- "Tell Me Easter's on Friday" (Situation Two, 1981)
- "Kites" [as 39 Lyon Street] (1981)
- "Q Quarters" (Situation Two, 1981)
- "Kitchen Person" (Situation Two, 1981)
- "A" (Fiction, 1981)
- "Message Oblique Speech" (Situation Two, 1981)
- "White Car in Germany" (Situation Two, 1981)
- "Party Fears Two" (WEA, 1982) UK
The UK Singles Chart is compiled by The Official Charts Company on behalf of the British record-industry. The full chart contains the top selling 200 singles in the United Kingdom based upon combined record sales and download numbers, though some media outlets only list the Top 40 or the Top 75 ...
#9
- "Club Country" (WEA, 1982) UK #13
- "18 Carat Love Affair" / "Love Hangover
"Love Hangover" was the fourth number one single for Motown singer Diana Ross. It was released in March 1976, and rose to number one on the Billboard Hot 100, Hot Soul Singles and Hot Dance Club Play charts simultaneously....
" (WEA, 1982) UK #21
- "Even Dogs In the Wild" (1982)
- "Matter of Gender" (1982)
- "Ice Cream Factory" (1983)
- "Those First Impressions" (1984) UK #43
- "Waiting for the Love Boat" (1984) UK #53
- "Breakfast" (1984) UK #49, NL #36
- "Take Me to the Girl" (1985)
- "Heart of Glass" (1988) UK #56
- "Country Boy" (WEA, 1989 - withdrawn)
- "Fever" (1990)
- "Fire to Ice" (1990)
- "Just Can't Say Goodbye" (1990)
External links