Mind Bomb

Product Information

HarperCollins imprint The Friday Project announced in the spring of 2014 that they would be publishing the first official biography of the The. Authored by Neil Fraser, it will apparently [ according to whom?] have the full cooperation of Matt Johnson. Bassist James Eller and drummer David Palmer weren't famous, particularly (the former had played for Clive Langer and Julian Cope, the latter was a member of ABC's classic line-up), but they were just the men for job, as Marr would have been regardless of his fame. If there's anything in Marr's post-Smiths career as good as this, and if his own work on anything since has been as good as it is on this, I've missed it. It's not simply a matter of how different Mind Bomb would be if you took his - by turns - stretched, coiled, wailing, glowing guitar off it; it's that you can't imagine anything akin to the same album might have come about without it in the first place. austriancharts.at > The The in der Österreichischen Hitparade" (in German). Hung Medien . Retrieved 19 November 2011.

The The released their official studio album debut, the synth-noir classic Soul Mining, in 1983. It featured the minor UK No.71 hit " This Is the Day", as well as a new recording of the The performing "Uncertain Smile". Produced by Johnson and Paul Hardiman, it featured guest appearances from Orange Juice's drummer Zeke Manyika, Jools Holland, Thomas Leer and JG Thirlwell (a.k.a. Foetus). If Infected seethed and rattled with claustrophobic urgency and loathing, and it did, then Mind Bomb was slow, expansive, looming into inexorable life with a rage that smouldered rather than flamed. It creeps up on you, on 'Good Morning Beautiful', with what sounds like a muezzin's call, which for one reason and another it's likely no major label act would dare to use today (although it might be a Qawwal; it isn't credited and I haven't the ear to tell.) Next, a blast of sluggish brass over ominous piano chords, and pattering, insinuating percussion. Then Johnson's voice, a tense, febrile tenor, a voice living on its nerves, near breaking point, teetering here and there into an aspirated growl, sizzling when pressed against the side of the pan. Uniquely optimistic yet tortured and anguished, Mind Bomb is THE THE’s most impressive work to date. A meld of bitter images and desperate hopes focusing on the individual conflicts and politics of a troubled world.”But that was the album before. He'd done his own country and his own era. What to do next without repeating himself? He fixed upon the world, its geopolitical future, and the fate of humanity as a whole. Whatever criticisms might be levelled at Matt Johnson over the years, thinking small would not be one of them

The Beat(en) Generation": "The The – The Beat(en) Generation (single)" (in German). GfK Entertainment . Retrieved 9 June 2017.

Credits (21)

Mark Feltham– harmonica on Mind Bomb (1989): "Kingdom of Rain" / "Good Morning Beautiful" / "The Beat(en) Generation" / "The Violence of Truth" Original release and 1983 reissue credited to Matt Johnson. The 1993 re-release of Burning Blue Soul credits this album to the The. During the The's more prolific period of releases, from Soul Mining (1983) to Dusk (1992), most artwork used on the albums and single releases was produced by Johnson's brother Andrew Johnson, using the pseudonym Andy Dog. The artwork has a distinctive style, and sometimes courted controversy, most notably the initial release of the 1986 single "Infected", which featured a masturbating devil and was withdrawn from sale and re-issued with an edited version of the same drawing.