Gang of Four
Karl Marx believed that history, in its gradual unscrolling, would reveal man’s social and political destiny: as feudalism was overrun by capitalism, so capitalism would be overrun by communism. True to that notion Gang of Four, the brilliant neo-Marxist rockers who put Leeds, England, on the postpunk map, have always been preoccupied with gauging the wisdom of history. “History’s bunk!” they declared on an early single. “History is the reason I’m washed-up,” vocalist-guitarist Andy Gill concluded on the workingman’s lament “Paralysed.” And on “The History of the World,” from their 1982 U.S. commercial breakthrough, Songs of the Free, Gill and songwriting partner Jon King suggest that the whole grand story of civilization is nothing but a sop for the children of corporate capitalism. So it’s only appropriate that the new two-CD Gang of Four retrospective, 100 Flowers Bloom, abandons chronology for a mix-and-match track list that spreads the band’s earliest and best-loved work over both discs, peppered with songs from its much-ignored reunion efforts in the 90s.
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Personally, I’ve always hated compilations like this. A career-spanning box set should do more than collect the favorites, round up the B sides, and toss in a few live tracks. It should be, above all, a story, tracing the act’s creative arc, mapping the musical ideas that made it great, illuminating where it originated, how it took shape, how it found its perfect expression, and why it couldn’t last. But sets like 100 Flowers Bloom are more like an evening of channel surfing than a story: entertaining perhaps, amusing in their strange juxtapositions, but nothing much to think about later.
By 1981 the fissures that characterized the band had already grown into fault lines. Bassist Dave Allen quit, exhausted by relentless touring, and drummer Hugo Burnham, whose supremely inventive rhythms had spurred the band to great heights on Solid Gold, began deferring to Gill and King, who wanted in on the new-romantic scene then sweeping England. Their writing for Songs of the Free locked him into more predictable beats, especially on disco showcases like “Call Me Up” and “I Love a Man in Uniform.” Both songs got some airplay in America, especially the latter, which became a dance club favorite with campy double entendres like “The girls they love to see him shoot.” Gill and King replaced Burnham with a drum machine in 1983; he entered the workforce as an A and R man. The band’s fourth album, Hard, groped for the sound of mid-70s Philly soul, its female backup singers and icy string arrangements clashing horribly with Gill’s jagged guitar. By then I was old enough to get into their shows, and watching Gill stride around in a puffy space-age tunic, I knew I’d missed the boat. Within a year Gang of Four was…history.
