I never did understand the OMD appeal though. I think maybe it was because every song was in the shiniest, happiest unrelentingly major key - it all sounded like a vapid commercial for girls' toys or something...
No flame suit necessary but I bet hearing their really early stuff like Architecture & Morality and Dazzle Ships LPs would change your mind quick. 80-83 era OMD, not vapid at all, but still pop inflections, er... kind of. Cool moody conceptual electronic experimentation (shortwave radio samples of GMT timezone announcers with all the lovable blips and bleeps that go with them, cracking voice samples in other languages) and some of it quite film soundtracky. To me that era of OMD has more in common with early Kraftwerk more than the more overt teen-pop that they finely honed into the later 80s. (which I also like, but in a much different way... in that John Hughes film way I suppose, ha ha). Remember 'If You Leave' appeared on the Pretty In Pink soundtrack alongside New Order, etc.. much more 80s sugary alterna-pop.
Check out the track "Apollo" on the Junk Culture LP... pure tr-808 workout and crazy crashing/explosion sounds at the end... but really it's essentially still an uptempo love song... brilliant IMHO.
Didn't OMD have an early 12" release on Factory records? "electricity" worth checking, not sure how hard that one is to find, anyone?
peace, Matt MacQueen
