On any post, if the link is no longer good, leave a comment if you want the music re-uploaded. As long as I still have the file, or the record, cd, or cassette to re-rip, I will gladly accommodate in a timely manner all such requests.

Slinging tuneage like some fried or otherwise soused short-order cook

02 May 2025

May: I Come Again - It’s a Crime

I shared Crime & the City Solution December 30, 2009 here.

On the selections I'm sharing today are two distinct C&tCS bands, the Rowland S. Howard Crime & the post-Howard Crime.
 
 


Crime & the City Solution had first existed in Sydney, then Melbourne, before the band fragmented. Simon Bonney, the band's founder, decamped to London, forming a new version of the band with Mick Harvey (Birthday Party / Bad Seed multi-instrumentalist), the late Birthday Party guitarist Rowland S. Howard, Rowland's brother Harry on bass, & Swell Maps drummer Epic Soundtracks. This line-up released four Mute offerings: the two EPs - The Dangling Man & The Kentucky Click as well as two full-lengths - Just South of Heaven (see link above) & Room of Lights.
 
 
Crime & the City Solution - Room of Lights, Mute CDSTUMM36, 1986.
decryption codes in comments

Right Man, Wrong Man
No Money, No Honey
Hey Sinkiller
Six Bells Chime
Adventure
Untouchable
The Brother Song
Her Room of Lights (for Lisa)

extra tracks -    
Rose Blue
The Coal Train
Five Stone Walls
The Wailing Wall
Trouble Come This Morning
The Dangling Man
 
 
 

Simon Bonney decided to take shelter from the intense lens of the London music media by moving to Berlin. Berlin in the Eighties was a thrilling artistic community, filled with interesting collaborations between musicians & artists. Simon Bonney fostered these collaborations & built a new band  from fellow ex-pats & the best local talent. Bonney's new Crime featured Mick Harvey, Einstürzende Neubauten's Alexander Hacke, Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft's Chrislo Haas  & Gerausch's Thomas Stern, who was brought along by Alex a bit later on when they discovered that Haas, who passed away in 2004, was "a bit erratic, unpredictable and unreliable." Completing the new line-up was Bronwyn Adams, Bonney's wife, who contributed violin & lyrics to the new Crime.

Here's the new Berlin line-up's first release on Mute... 
Crime + the City Solution - Shine, Mute CDSTUMM59, 1988.

All Must Be Love    
Fray so Slow    
Angel    
On Every Train (Grain Will Bear Grain)    
Hunter    
Steal to the Sea    
Home is Far from Here    
On Every Train (Grain Will Bear Grain) 12" version
All Must Be Love (early version)
 
 
 

Revisiting

8 comments:

  1. Room of Lights
    g8iXDq-urzrfVPCmLclAtVLmsfBJMLc6EGb4r3ipooA
    Shine
    k5ZL2V8yG6z99ly2eRiqAuMGauYXW887j3qCqxVALlY

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  2. Happy birthday - and endless thanks for all the excellent posts! Keep up the good work! It really helps in these dark times.
    By the way, I just read that today is also the International Day of the Sun and the National Astronomy Day and the National Paranormal Day in the US. I find that quite fitting.

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    1. National Paranormal Day does it for me. Thanks, brother.

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  3. Richie Muster5/3/25, 5:13 AM

    This is another (one amongst too many!) of those bands that slipped below my radar way back when. It embarrasses me now to think of how narrowly defined my tastes in music were in the 80s, though i think i redeem myself a little in bucking the trend that most people follow as they get older, in that my tastes seem to become more radical, less conservative as the years pass. I just thank all the gods that i discovered blogs like yours, Nate, amongst so may others, which are helping to dispel any lasting signs of ossification. Thank you!

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  4. Most people I know get narrower musickal tastes as they get older. The idea is just what you're doing...expand the breadth of our listening to discover all the things we missed because of limiting listening habits at a particular period & see what new musick are out there to wow us like musick of the past wow'd us. As I sez in my blogger profile: "I was born before now. I lived since then but refuse to grow up." Keeping musickal interest is one of the best ways to not grow up. Once we're grown, we're done. Thanks, brother for helping to dispel my signs of decaying.

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    Replies
    1. Richie Muster5/4/25, 4:46 AM

      I like it, and concur. When i officially became a pensioner last year, i had my 1st tattoos done (though i'd been thinking about it for decades): on my arm i had "growing old is compulsory; growing up is optional", and on my back, a Walt Whitman quote: "I contain multitudes." More power to you.

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    2. Both of your tattoos are exactly what I believe. Kindred spirits, through & through.

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  5. I've heard of them but not 'heard' them, so I'm changing that. Many thanks!

    Brian

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