Andy Copper & Craig High joined forces with Dave the Rave in 1997 as
soon as Whip The Minister split. This trio of Acid Punk Techno Break
Beat Drum & Base Jazz Hounds fused the Beat poetry of the 1950's with
the digital sounds of the ever expanding Dance scene of the late '90's.
Videos shot at The Goldsmiths Tavern in Deptford:
Hows Your Brain
Red Black Mood
They wrote & rehearsed at Sanford Co-op in South East London (noted for
its mural of world leaders flying around the planet on nuclear missiles
& sharing the experience with the Reaper). Meanwhile a dove is carrying
a C.N.D. sigil in the opposite direction & is spreading a rainbow as
it flies.
Many bands have come out of the Sanford co-op over the years. The most
notable has probably been Transglobal Underground. Revoltage had the
dubious honour of writing in the same flat that Transglobal had written
in a few years before (ley lines?).
Andy & Craig provided the lyrics for Revoltage & Dave played the guitar
& did the beats & samples. Andy sung & played base live & Craig sung &
played clarinet, recorder, tin whistle, harmonica & percussion.
They rehearsed at Music City & played venues like Goldsmith's Tavern in
Deptford & Sanford co-op itself. They also got two slots at The Severn
Revels Festival in The Forest of Dean in 1997 sharing the line-up with
a whole host of bands. Some of these included Tarantism, Doctor Brown
& Astralasia.
Tapes & film footage survive including quite a few remixes since much of
the material was triggered digitally by Dave's keyboard equipment. Andy &
Craig would sing complimentary lyrics in & amongst samples of fifties
poets, traditional Indian singing & Sitar playing. Dave would make
break-beat patterns out of tabla breaks & Andy would add bass lines while
Craig screamed clarinet solos over the top. This was the first line-up
Craig had been in where the samples stood up as arrangements strong enough
to play without the live musical input. This meant that two versions of
every song existed. One with the band members playing & one (albeit more
stripped back) without. This dichotomy would be explored in even more
depth further along Craig's musical path with the emergence of Sunsnake.
Revoltage spent more time in the recording environment than on the stage
(another first for Craig) & thus quite a substantial amount of recorded
material survives.
By the start of 1998 Dave moved to Scotland to become a microbiologist &
Andy started mending computers for primary & secondary schools.
Craig (already gigging extensively with Lord Snooty at this time) went
on to form Sunsnake.
The photos are from The Severn Revels Festival & taken by Pam & Norman
High.
[Email] Craig
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