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My first Fad Gadget compilation since a C90 cassette in 1990, which I posted on this blog in October 2021.
The trigger for this wasn't the usual random airing of a song or coming across a video or live performance online. No, it was far more innocuous than that. Surfing the crap TV the other day, I spotted an advert for a Channel 5 show called Your Kitchen: 60 Years Of Fads & Gadgets. I mean, what more sign does one need?
As the original selection was a 20-track 'best of', this is arguably the 'best of the rest', but there's absolutely no barrel scrapng here. There are three singles - For Whom The Bells Toll, Fireside Favourite and I Discover Love - alongside the debut B-side from 1979, The Box.
Wheels Of Fortune has featured on another various artists cassette that I've compiled and posted here previously. Taken from 1982 Falklands War commentary Under The Flag, it's one of several tracks to feature label mate Alison Moyet on the saxophone.
Sleep appeared on the 1984 album Gag, an earlier version circa 1982 appearing as the B-side to One Man's Meat, the final single by Fad Gadget. Frank Tovey went on to record several albums under his own name and with The Pyros.
In 2001, Mute Records released The Best Of Fad Gadget, which compiled 30 A-sides, B-sides and 12" versions. Amongst them were a couple of new remixes. I Monster tackled Fireside Favourite whilst Frank himself 'regurgitated' Swallow It from 1981 album Incontinent.
On the back of the compilation, Frank revived Fad Gadget for a support slot on Depeche Mode's Exciter tour in late 2001 and then headed out on a headline tour of Europe in January 2002, culminating in the SAMA festival in Gothenburg, Sweden on 30th March 2002. At home in London, on 3rd April 2002, Frank died of a heart attack at age 45. A tragic, shocking loss.
To these ears, Frank Tovey's music as Fad Gadget sounds just as fresh, incisive and relevant as it did when I first heard it in the 1980s.
1) Incontinent (1981)
2) Swallow It (Regurgitated) (2001)
3) Stand Up (1984)
4) For Whom The Bells Toll II (Single Version) (1982)
5) Salt Lake City Sunday (1980)
6) Wheels Of Fortune (1982)
7) Speak To Me (1984)
8) Sleep (Electro-Induced Original) (1982)
9) The Box (Single Version) (1979)
10) Blind Eyes (1981)
11) Fireside Favourite (Album Version) (1980)
12) I Discover Love (Single Version) (1983)
1979: Back To Nature 7": 9
1980: Fireside Favourites: 5, 11
1981: Incontinent: 1, 10
1982: For Whom The Bells Toll 7": 4
1982: Under The Flag: 6
1983: I Discover Love 7": 12
1984: Gag: 3, 7
1984: One Man's Meat 7": 8
2001: The Best Of Fad Gadget: 2
You can find my C90 Fad Gadget compilation, The Damage Done, here
Fad Gadget!!!
ReplyDeleteI know!!!
DeleteThanks, middle aged man, Frank's come up with the goods again.
ReplyDeleteBack in the day, I was more an admirer of than a fan of Fad Gadget. But in recent years, thanks to the prompting of one particular friend and blog postings such as yours, I have really begun to appreciate just how significant and influential he was.
ReplyDeleteOh, and I can say that I did see him play live! I travelled down a long way back in the early 80s to see perennial jingle-jangle Glasgow popsters Friends Again play at the London School of Economics where they shared top-billing with Fad Gadget. Fair play to the Ents Officer who dreamt up that particular night's entertainment.