The Pop up Ptich

Long out of print, this will be the first time the highly sought after album has been reissued, let alone made available digitally or on CD. Originally released in March 1980 on their own Y label through Rough Trade, For How Much Longer Do We Tolerate Mass Murder? spent 20 weeks in the Indie charts, peaking at #1. Produced and mixed by the band, For How Much Longer Do We Tolerate Mass Murder? represents the quintessential independent Pop Group album -untethered, entrenched and completely committed to challenging the political orthodoxy of the day and savagely denunciating its failings.

The Pop Group’s seminal 1979 album Y has been given a new dub mix by British reggae legend Dennis “Blackbeard” Bovell, who has produced for a wide variety of artists including Fela Kuti, Bananarama and Linton Kwesi Johnson. This new version of the album features reimagined arrangements of the original album’s tracks with mind-bending space echoes and a plethora of other studio effects. Y is ranked by The Wire as one of the 100 Most Important Records Ever Made and by Pitchfork as one of the Best Albums of the ‘70s.

This massive, ten-disc, 200-track box set covers a lot of ground. From post-punk and new wave to heavy metal and the paisley underground, the '80s were anything but dull, and Pop Years: The 80s does a nice job of conjuring up images of those old K-Tel record commercials that used to come on between Dance Fever and Solid Gold.

During the latter half of the '80s a new breed of guitar-orientated bands began to emerge in the UK - armed with an overt pop song craft sensibility, and enamoured with a conflicting post-punk spirit and adoration of the '60s, many of these unlikely acts - all anoraks, Dr Martens and charity shop chic - would go on to become Top 40 regulars and set the tone for music beyond these shores, culminating in 'The Stone Roses', an album that defined a generation. 'Cut Me Deep' - named for a Jasmine Minks track which captured that spirit - presents a snapshot of that time and place, via essential independent labels such as Creation, Sarah Records and 4AD, and their major backed counterparts in Blanco Y Negro et al, alongside distribution via Rough Trade and other like-minded outlets. With an electric guitar in hand (no Stratocasters here please), and resplendent in clothes as immaculately and cheaply curated as their record collections, a new generation of British musicians kickstarted what would become the only credible challenge to the increasingly dominant synthesiser pop scene of the late 1980's.