Friday, March 5, 2021

The Sky Is Empty

"I think our overriding message is one of hope even in the darkest of times, which we all suffer from at times. An amazing amount of people have told me over the years how our music has helped them through really difficult times." -Mark Wilson, The Mob

During the pandemic I discovered a handful of blogs that were compiling and posting their own albums for download, with music culled from across the spectrum of genres and ranging from singles collections to rumored "lost albums." Thus inspired I decided to create a few collections myself (under the Create To Exist moniker*), starting with a band that surely wouldn't mind their old sounds being shared**, The Mob (UK). To my ears, their music is the perfect soundtrack for a global pandemic and shutdown.

The Mob formed in 1977 and within a few years were part of England's anarcho-punk/peace-punk movement of the early '80s, but their sound was slower and drew from darker post-punk sources. Despite not sounding like the bands they often shared stages with (Crass, Conflict, Rudimentary Peni, Dirt), they still embraced radical politics, played loads of benefits, and in a proper D.I.Y. vein released all but two of their own records via their All The Madman label.

This collection, which I dubbed No Doves Fly Here (named for most famous song), includes all of their singles in chronological order, including their remarkable comeback from 2013. The singles are followed by two alternate versions, most notably the original stunning take of the aforementioned "No Doves Fly Here," an apocalyptic classic in the vein of Bonnie Dobson's "Morning Dew." The collection is completed with their primal Ching cassette from 1981, which features a clutch of songs not heard elsewhere.

If you dig these sounds, be sure to track down their sole proper long-player May The The Tribe Increase, a timeless classic which has been reissued a few times over the years.



* Dig the first proto-Create To Exist "release" here.
** If the band does in fact mind, the link will of course be promptly deleted.

No comments: