Monday, October 18, 2010

Perfect Kiss by T-4-2

By the late 1980s, not only were bands popping up that had a darker Depeche Mode like sound, a wave of similar sounding songs from other new bands that had a lighter tone, and high tenor vocals, hit the airwaves. The debut of Anything Box with "Living in Oblivion" and "Jubilation" are part of this wave, as were The Hunger with their song "Never Again" and the output of rather unluckly synthpoppers T-4-2. I picked up a vinyl EP from T-4-2, which includes among others, the song below, and thought it was extraordinarily good.

Sadly, when they finally scored a full length CD release, it had been reproduced and remixed, by Paul Robb of Information Society fame, and much of what made the initial release so charming was exorcised. The CD is disappointingly mediocre, while the vinyl self-produced EP remains difficult to find in digital format. After releasing this sad CD, T-4-2 seem to have disappeared from the music scene altogether. Frontman Will Loconto went on to compose music for video games, mostly, and so has remained active and apparently fairly successful. But their contribution to synthpop in the 80s was under-rated and unappreciated.

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