Music Monday - Pop Will Eat Itself

Pop Will Eat Itself aka PWEI aka the Poppies were a late 80s/early 90s band, mostly known in the UK. The majority of their music is electronic dance with samples all over the place, with geek references all over the place. If you remember Information Society, they're kinda like that. Oooh, Information Society, gotta remember to write about them too.

So, beats for geeks. Well, not only geeks, but the geek references add a layer.





Sampling Rod Serling is not enough. Let's list all the things we like. Oooh, and center the song around a chant from one of the most comic book movies to not actually be based on a comic book, The Warriors. Great fun movie about a gang getting accused of killing the wanna-be kingpin of town at a meeting and then having to fight their way to their home turf, through gangs like the Baseball Furies (wearing pinstrip uniforms and Kiss style makeup), and that lesbian gang and...oh yeah, the Riffs! The video is FULL of panels from 'Watchmen' because, as everyone knows, Alan Moore knows the score.





This may be the geekiest video apart from one of those Matthew Sweet video with the anime clips in it. Oooh, Matthew Sweet, another good call there. She loves me, she loves me not...

Anyway, I found out about all this after the fact. I came into the band with the first single off of 1994's 'Dos Dedos Mis Amigos'. With this album, the band became less dance and more industrial. Very heavy. This song just blew me away. I was instantly hooked. That it had a message didn't hurt any.






I love this entire album as, while it's heavy and more 'serious', there are certainly light moments to be had. It's not all the doom and gloom of 'Everything's Cool'. I'm not much for fan made videos, but at least they chose reasonably logical subject matter for this one.





Unfortunately for me, this new direction didn't go very far. Apart from an album that was solely made up of remixes of 'Amigos', there would be nothing. The band broke up, forming other groups (like Bentley Rhythm Ace) and lead singer Clint Mansell is known more now as maker of soundtracks. With the 25th anniversary of the Poppies approaching there's suddenly talk of a reunion. A new single came out earlier this year which I must now find.

It's also an awesome band name. So terribly true...

Dos Dedos Mis Amigos     This Is The Day...This Is The Hour... This Is This     Cure for Sanity