23 Leftovers: The Final Serving - - - 23 Skidoo part 3

Shortly after Urban Gamelan was released, Fritz Catlin took a sabbatical from the group while the Turnbulls devoted their energies to their chosen martial arts. For much of the next decade, 23 Skidoo activity was displaced by remix & production work under various guises, including Assassins with Soul & 23 Skidoo. 

In 1990 The Turnbulls also founded their own label, Ronin, releasing a raft of British hip-hop & breakbeat sides by Paradox, F.O.R.C.E., Skitz, & Deckwrecka. 

 

In 1996, 23 Skidoo signed to record a new album for Virgin, although it would be four years before the tapes were delivered, this delay due to the illness & death of the Turnbull brothers' mother Kim. The album, simply titled 23 Skidoo, was released in August 2000, the first new Skidoo album in sixteen years. 

 

23 Skidoo - 23 Skidoo, Virgin CDV 2912, 2000.
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Freeze Frame
Dirty Lo
Interzonal
Kendang
Catch 23
Crossfire
Where You At
Atmosfear
Dawning
Meltdown
Dusk to Dawn
Ayu

 

 

 

 

A selection of 23 Skidoo & Ronin recordings from the 90s was later released as Just Like Everybody (Pts One / Two), which features Catlin, Sketch, & the Turnbulls. Here's my personal favorite, Part Two... 

23 Skidoo - Just Like Everybody Part Two, Ronin Records RDCD 08, 2002.

Roninstep
Meltdown
What Y'All Gon' Do
Eye Spy
23 Break
100 Dark
Lightening Beats
Cushite
The Best
Suspense
Mr. Lee, Are You Ready?
Clan Break
Elephants
Reachin' Break
Liquid Noise
Return of the Dragon
Recoup

Enjoy,
NØ

Back to 23 Skidoo

When last we left the band, Sam Mills & Tom Heslop had been dismissed & 23 Skidoo was now the trio of Fritz Catlin, Johnny & Alex Turnbull. 

 

The departure of Sam & Tom was not reported in the press. Shortly afterwards the band was added to the line-up for the WOMAD festival, held at Shepton Mallet in July. There the new Skidoo performed a ritual to 'banish' their previous incarnation. They decided not to use traditional instruments, but instead to improvise a performance with instruments made of scrap metal using multiple tape loops (at this time, 1982, literally looped sections of tape). The ritual of banishing, invocation, & healing mirrored the changes that had occurred within the group. At 11am on a sunny July 17th morning 23 Skidoo, with heads shaven & faces camouflaged, took to the stage. They were joined by David Tibet of Psychic TV on thigh bone trumpet. The bleary-eyed festival crowd, expecting a trendy funk band, were greeted by a wall of noise. Some fled, but those that remained witnessed Skidoo at their most confrontational. While expectations were shattered, Skidoo's radical mid-morning gesture was missed by the music weeklies & passed unreported at the time.

Late September/early October 23 Skidoo took part in a short package tour of Belgium, arranged by Les Disques du Crépuscule billed as Move Back-Bite Harder. Here's the 27 minute loop-based recording from Tielt on October 8th. 

 

23 Skidoo - Move Back - Bite Harder live, 1982.
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Using new material combined with recordings from the WOMAD festival & an October 22/23 recording session from Dartington College, the new Skidoo released The Culling is Coming on February 4, 1983. Carrying on the William S. Burroughs connection, each side is 23 minute long.

 

23 Skidoo - The Culling is Coming, Operation Twilight OPT23, 1983.

Side 1: A Summer Rite-11Am 17.7.82 -
Banishing
Invocation
Flashing
Stifling
Healing (for the Strong)

Side 2: Dartington Gamelan -
G-2 Contemplation
S-Matrix
G-3 Insemination
Shrine
Mahakala

 

 

The Culling met with some hard resistance from critics & fans alike & 23 Skidoo started having a bit of a hard time getting live gigs. No record labels were knocking at their door. Midway through 1983, the band had a chance meeting with Peter ‘Sketch’ Martin of the Britfunk duo Linx. Sketch was trying to move away from commercial music at the same time 23 Skidoo were trying to cozy up to a more commercial sound. The result was the single Language.

 

 

 

 

23 Skidoo/Sketch - Language, Illuminated Records ILL 3812, 1984.

Side A -
Language
Side B -
Language

 

 

 

 

The move towards more commercial music since their meeting with Sketch also resulted in the release of Coup, a tight dance version of a track the band had been playing for some time known as "Coup in the Palace". This outstanding funk single featured a classic bassline from Sketch & horns courtesy of Aswad. Coup had definite commercial potential, but the absence of a 7" version meant no radio airplay, hence, no chart hit.

 

 

 

 

23 Skidoo/Sketch - Coup, Illuminated Records ILL 2812, 1984.

Side A -
Coup
Side B -
Version (in the Palace)

 

 

 

 

However, once more the brush with commercial success & the Britfunk paranoia halted this arc of 23 Skidoo's trajectory. In August 1984 the band released Urban Gamelan. This album essentially erased any lines of acceptance from fans & critics again. For the album tracks, both singles were omitted, to be replaced with alternate takes. "Coup" resurfaced in radically different form as "Fuck You GI" & "Language" in sparse percussive form now entitled "Language Dub".

 

 

23 Skidoo - Urban Gamelan, Illuminated Records JAM 40, 1984.

Face One -
Fuck You GI (23 F.P.M.)
Fire
Misr Wakening
Jalan Jalan

Face Two -
Urban Gamelan, Part One
Sirens
Helicopters
Kongo-Do
Language Dub
Drunken Reprisal
Coup de Grace

 

 

 

 

It will be another sixteen years before the next phase of 23 Skidoo kicks in. As I sez last month: "From this point onward, 23 Skidoo morphed into another enity. That, however, is a story for another day (next month...hint...hint)".

Stay tuned dear listener,
NØ

A Propitious Opportunity to Leave

May is upon us, always a favorite of mine as it is the month of my birth, as is today the anniversary of said natality.

Also the 5th month of the year. I am a firm believer in the Law of Five & the power of Virus 23. This also ties in with William S. Burroughs, who I touched on in the last post. That's where this post comes in to play. 

 

23 Skidoo took their name from an American slang phrase translating loosely as 'move it', or 'get out while the going is good'. This same philosophy - cut, run, & confound - would become a guiding principle for this unique, unorthodox group. They lifted the name from the famous Illuminati trilogy by Robert Anton Wilson & Robert Shea but 23 Skidoo has also had a place of prominence in the works of Aleister Crowley & William S. Burroughs (a favorite of the band).

The origins of 23 Skidoo lie in a punk-inspired schoolboy trio formed in North London in 1979.
By 1980, the 23 Skidoo collective had become a quartet, comprising Fritz Catlin on drums, Sam Mills on guitar, Johnny Turnbull on guitar & Patrick Griffiths on bass. They were soon joined by Alex Turnbull on percussion, drums, bass & Tom Heslop on vocals, electronics, saxophone.

23 Skidoo released a series of highly influential records fusing post-punk, dub, industrial, world, & hip-hop styles. Their influences ranged from The Pop Group to Parliament to Fela Kuti to Can to Eno to This Heat.

Their first single, Last Words reference Burroughs. Tom Heslop commented: ''Certainly I read a lot of William Burroughs, and we've played with the cut-up thing. Oh yeah, it works. It always comes out with some meaning, even if it's a bit strange.'' 

 

23 Skidoo - Last Words, Fetish Records FE 10, 1981.
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Last Words b/w Last Words (version) 

 

 

September 16, 1981 Skidoo also recorded an impressive 4-song session for John Peel, with only "Four Note Bass" subsequently appearing on record as "Porno Base".

 

 

23 Skidoo - Peel Session, 1981..

Macaw Gunger
View from Here
Four Note Bass
Retain Control

 

 

 

 

At the end of November Skidoo entered Jacob's Studio in Farnham to record the seminal Seven Songs. The eight tracks were recorded over three days & like Skidoo live shows were part funk & part experimental featuring: thumb piano & pygmy pipe on Martin Denny pastiche "Quiet Pillage"; a lock groove; & within "Porno Base" the refined voice of Diana Mitford, decrying the pernicious influence of pop music.

 

23 Skidoo - Seven Songs, Fetish Records FM 2008, 1982.

Side A -
Kundalini
Vegas el Bandito
Mary's Operation (then lock groove)

Side B -
New Testament
IY
Porno Base
Quiet Pillage (then lock groove)

 

 

 

Immediately after the recording Seven Songs, Alex & Johnny left to travel in the Far East for three months.  A 'reduced personnel' trio of Fritz, Sam, & Tom  recorded Tearing Up the Plans.

 

 

23 Skidoo - Tearing up the Plans 12" 45, Fetish Records FP 20, 1982.

Side P -
Tearing up the Plans (pt. 1)
Tearing up the Plans (pt. 2)

Side F -
Just Like Everybody (featuring Tim Soar)
Gregouka

 

 

 

 

With the massive success of Seven Songs, the Turnbull brothers were hurriedly recalled from Singapore. Dates by the full band were hastily arranged. On June 16th, Skidoo headlined a prestigious London show at The Venue. Shortly before going onstage, Sam Mills & Tom Heslop were dismissed from the band, though to their great credit both still performed that night. For Fritz & the Turnbull brothers, it really was a case of Tearing up the Plans - ironically enough, the title of the newest EP featuring the 'reduced personnel' of Fritz, Sam and Tom. Ah, well, 23 Skidoo!

From this point onward, 23 Skidoo morphed into another enity. That, however, is a story for another day (next month...hint...hint).

Enjoy,
NØ

Remember, It is the Law...the Law of Fives

Been reReading the Illuminatus Trilogy

RAWilson states:
     "I first heard of the 23 enigma from William S Burroughs, author of Naked Lunch, Nova Express, etc. According to Burroughs, he had known a certain Captain Clark, around 1960 in Tangier, who once bragged that he had been sailing 23 years without an accident. That very day, Clark’s ship had an accident that killed him and everybody else aboard. Furthermore, while Burroughs was thinking about this crude example of the irony of the gods that evening, a bulletin on the radio announced the crash of an airliner in Florida, USA. The pilot was another Captain Clark and the flight was Flight 23."

#23

SKIDOO

What man is at ease in his Inn?

Get out.

Wide is the world and cold.

Get out.

Thou hast become an in-itiate.

Get out.

But thou canst not get out by the way thou camest in. The Way out is THE WAY.

Get out.

For OUT is Love and Wisdom and Power.

Get OUT.

If thou hast T already, first get UT.

Then get O.

And so at last get OUT.

                                                                         from The Book of Lies - Aleister Crowley (1912/13)

23 Skidoo - The Gospel Comes to New Guinea 12“ 45 single, Fetish Records FE11, 1981.

The Gospel Comes to New Guinea
Last Words

Alex & Johnny Turnbull, Sam Mills, Fritz Catlin, & Tom Heslop

Now it’s coming to your house,
NØ