I must come to terms with the fact that a blog entry is not a book, so instead of a definitive history of skronk in the UK, here is a brief survey of it. "Skronk" is a term attributed to Robert Christgau (by Lester Bangs) to refer to a certain kind of music being made in New York in the late 70s: bands bringing punk's do-it-yourself attitude (which does not necessarily mean "sloppy" but that was often the result) to new interpretations of jazz and funk, and of course rock. The quintessential skronk album is the 1978 No New York collection compiled by Brian Eno for Antilles Records, featuring James Chance and the Contortions, Teenage Jesus and the Jerks (with Lydia Lunch), Mars, and D.N.A. (with Arto Lindsay). "No Wave" is another term applied to roughly the same music (nice photo archive here).
In England, Bristol band The Pop Group was an early proponent of the no wave melting pot, previously seen here. Another early UK skronk band was Sheffield's Clock DVA, formed by Adi Newton after he quit The Human League (in their first incarnation as The Future) because of their emphasis on electronics. (Ironic, then, that Newton would later transform Clock DVA into one of the purest electronic bands of the 80s and 90s.) Clock DVA's first great album, 1981's Thirst, contains lots of saxophone wailing by Charlie Collins and scratchy guitar playing by Paul Widger, plus energetic if not quite nimble bass playing from the late, much-maligned Stephen "Judd" Turner. It's more conventional than most US skronk, but there is a greater dynamic range (especially on the stately, measured "Impressions of an African Winter"). On occasion, though, they do work up quite a racket, as on "Piano Pain"--
(Great early album cover by design superstar Neville Brody.) Newton decided to pursue a more accessible sound and fired the Thirst band, an unpopular move which nevertheless paid off, as the next Clock DVA album, Advantage, is one of the best of the decade. Collins, Widger, and drummer Roger Quail stayed together as The Box (previously seen here) with new vocalist Peter Hope and bassist Terry Todd, producing an unsurpassed catalog of British skronk.
Meanwhile in Manchester, Biting Tongues were dishing out the skronk. The band's origin is described on the Biting Tongues website:
Then came Tony Wilson's Factory
Club (at the Russell Club in Hulme) offering an open invitation
to experiment that was taken up when Ken Hollings, Howard Walmsley,
Eddie Sherwood and a few others decided to make some noise to accompany
their 16mm silent epic Biting Tongues. A further performance followed
a few weeks later, when Colin Seddon and Graham Massey disbanded
their Post Natals project and joined up. The film itself, a flashing
series of negative images, became a memory; the name remained.
(Massey would later be a founding member of 808 State.) Biting Tongues' first album, Don't Heal (also 1981), was the first record on the Beggars Banquet offshoot label Situation Two. The vocals are mostly spoken recitations of found texts, often cut up in the grandest surrealist tradition. Here is "You Can Choke Like That"--
More UK skronk on the way!
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