Formed in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1979, the Associates comprised vocalist Billy Mackenzie and multi-instrumentalist Alan Rankine. Built on an eclectic mix of influences and interests ranging from art-rock to glam and disco, the group debuted with a manic cover of David Bowie's "Boys Keep Swinging," which earned them a contract with Fiction... [+] Read More

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Bill Nelson is both an enigma and a highly public person whose motivations sometimes seem shrouded in complex mysteries, yet whose sometimes prodigious output amounts to public development of song ideas and musical experiments. He has been both a guitar hero and the background figure in any number of art installations, exhibitions and theatrical... [+] Read More

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We don't need no freaking meds! The canteloupe man donates salvation to the fishworthy. Huzzah, sisters of the workable curve! Crying roses, I bleed the sweet plasma of divine invention. Rainbows in cages, you ask? Of course, but the truly expansive will share their gifts with the falsely inhibited. Angels fear to tread where devils loll in bed.... [+] Read More

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Duran Duran personified new wave for much of the mainstream audience. And for good reason, too. Duran Duran's reputation was built through music videos, which accentuated their fashion-model looks and glamorous sense of style. Without music videos, it's likely that the band's pop-funk -- described by the group as the Sex Pistols meets Chic --... [+] Read More

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Gavin Friday was the lead singer and principal visionary of one of Ireland's most ambitious, challenging, and (often) difficult post-punk groups, the Virgin Prunes. After leaving the Prunes in 1986, he abandoned the music business to paint for a year and a half, returning to the fray after teaming up with pianist Maurice Roycroft (whom Friday... [+] Read More

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A founding member of the enormously influential Krautrock group Can, Holger Czukay was one of the pivotal underground figures of his era; over the course of his long, expansive career, Czukay successfully bridged the gap between pop and the avant-garde, pioneering the use of samples and exploring the significance of world music on Western... [+] Read More

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With the exception of a handful of common threads -- chief among them the plaintive vocals and haunting lyrics of frontman Mark Hollis -- there is little to suggest that the five studio LPs which make up the Talk Talk oeuvre are indeed the work of the same band throughout. After beginning their career with records which virtually epitomize the... [+] Read More

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The Scottish folk-ambient band the Blue Nile has enjoyed a mystique contrived by its inaccessibility and the infrequency of its recordings, but it has also made a series of critically acclaimed discs. The group was formed by three Glasgow natives who had graduated from university there: singer/songwriter/guitarist Paul Buchanan, bassist Robert... [+] Read More

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Synth pop's first international superstars, the Human League were among the earliest and most innovative bands to break into the pop mainstream on a wave of synthesizers and electronic rhythms, their marriage of infectious melodies and state-of-the-art technology proving enormously influential on countless acts following in their wake. The group... [+] Read More

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Rejecting the abrasive guitars of their punk-era contemporaries in favor of lushly romantic synthesizers, Ultravox emerged as one of the primary influences on the British electro-pop movement of the early '80s. Formed in London in 1974, the group -- originally dubbed Ultravox! -- was led by vocalist and keyboardist John Foxx (born Dennis Leigh),... [+] Read More

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The trailblazing force behind the emergence of the Japanese techno-pop sound of the late '70s, Yellow Magic Orchestra remains a seminal influence on contemporary electronic music -- hugely popular both at home and abroad, their pioneering use of synthesizers, sequencers and drum machines places them second only to Kraftwerk as innovators of... [+] Read More

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