Polyrock
Polyrock

We forty-somethings are a bit of jokers, it's true; we don't admit the supremacy of the new wave records produced in the '80s to be questioned. However, keep in mind that:

1) Back then, it was quite a challenge to get a record: I personally had to take a train to Gallarate (guess where) to painstakingly get, after arduous savings (I worked in a bar), the first of the Dead Kennedys rather than the 12" of Circus Mort.

2) Then it was a bit of luck: you had to trust the review or article by Red Ronnie (great back then on Popster, no matter what anyone says, the review of "London Calling" is legendary) or Claudio on Rockerilla: you’d come home and religiously listen to the fruit of your labor. Good times indeed.

From those times is Polyrock, a band considered alternative back then, but also marginal, unlikely that anyone would go crazy for them, just like for the Monochrome Set, for example, the similarity is there. I don't know how to put it, a band doomed from the start.

Yet, the two LPs they produced (recently reissued on CD) are among the few precious things I own: intriguing pop that owes much to Talking Heads, enhanced by solutions that were ahead of their time (produced by Philip Glass, who must be someone who knows his stuff), minimalists one could say, creators of beautiful, even danceable songs that deserve a rediscovery.

"Go West", "Your Dragging Feet" on the record in question, the MAGNIFICENT "Love Song" (echoes of the best Wire in the background) "Like Papers On A Rock" on the second, are indelible marks that, when listened to today, first of all, "hold up" masterfully and, above all, flood me with so many good memories.

Music? Of Heaven 17 (those of Let Me Go) or ABC, but lyophilized: when I think of minimal, I think of Polyrock.

Highly recommended.