General Strike

General Strike released only one album -'Danger In Paradise'- in 1984, originally on cassette by Touch in 1984, and the single 'My Body', released on single by Canal Records in 1979. Performers were Steve Beresford (bass, piano, Farfisa organ, Prophet 5, trumpet, flugelhorn, euphonium, percussion, glockenspiel, voice, toy piano, melodica, noises, rhythm tracks, drumkit), David Toop (guitar, prepared guitar, bass, percussion, flute, alto flute, glockenspiel, voice, tapes, noises, rhythm tracks), David Cunningham (tape treatments) with guests Lol Coxhill, Dawn Roberts and Maartje Ten Hoorn. 

 

The atmosphere which General Strike conjures together suits an old-fashioned, Cold War-ish scenario of technology. Their "Interplanetary Music" is the space-pop of George Pal and "The Day The Earth Stood Still", of computers built like Blackpool Tower in order to struggle through simple trigonometry, of "The Jetsons" and I.G.Y. They go no further than Expo '67, the world's last gasp of optimism. And although there are dark and disquieting moods set in this mosaic which their listeners have pieced together, it is made with a humor which is true to the spirit of adventure which those references apply. The sanitation merchants who make up most of the world's record-makers today would forbid our ears from hearing these strangely electric keyboards, earthworked textures, bizarre chatterings of percussion, and voices that seem like puzzled robots. Cataloguing the sound in that way makes it all seem a bit of a joke, but it isn't: laughter is encouraged, but it's serious music, made with a great deal more serious spirit than the great and disheartening mountain of music which today implores you to hear and not listen. [SOURCE: SOUNDOHM]