4 MINUTE WARNING
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4 MINUTE WARNING were a woefully underrated band from Edinburgh's early 1980s music scene. They were formed when Mark Fleming, guitarist with punk also-rans THE SEDUCED was approached by Ross Galloway and Shuggy McKay - the former bassist and drummer with one of the capital's foremost punk outfits THE AXIDENTS - who invited him aboard their new venture.
They were joined by Scott 'Toby' Fraser on vocals, a rare example of a punk vocalist who chose to sing rather than shout. (His Hogmanay 'spin the bottle' repertoire included Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin).
4 MINUTE WARNING's remit was to be more overtly political than THE AXIDENTS. Their first action as a band, before they had even picked up an instrument, was to join C.N.D.
They were joined by Scott 'Toby' Fraser on vocals, a rare example of a punk vocalist who chose to sing rather than shout. (His Hogmanay 'spin the bottle' repertoire included Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin).
4 MINUTE WARNING's remit was to be more overtly political than THE AXIDENTS. Their first action as a band, before they had even picked up an instrument, was to join C.N.D.
protest and surviveThis was 1980. There was a widespread fear of nuclear Armageddon. The Thatcher Government's response was to stoke that uncertainty, issuing an information leaflet entitled 'Protect and Survive.' This offered sage guidance about combating radiation contamination by painting windows white, or hiding underneath tables.
I'm sure the numbers of Hiroshima and Nagasaki citizens vaporised in 1945 would've been drastically reduced had they rearranged the furniture. postpunk v. punk |
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KILLING JOKE were a major influence - '4 Minute Warning' is a line from their debut EP 'Turn to Red.' Their meld of mesmerising guitar lines and foreboding rhythms was a platform for apocalyptic lyrics and imagery that encapsulated the paranoia of the times. If punk had been an impudent spraypainting of Jubilee bunting to rile Daily Mail readers, postpunk was a far more cerebral confrontation of the establishment mentality that would produce a booklet encouraging the populace to die in their homes while constructing underground fallout shelters for its own kind.
KILLING JOKE were determinedly postpunk not punk. Together with WIRE, PiL, THE POP GROUP, MAGAZINE, THE STRANGLERS and others too numerous to mention, they took the basic tenets of punk that had inspired them to start bands in the first place - self-expression, the DIY ethos, the anarchic blend of the poptastic with the chaotic - using these as a springboard into a whole new sonic universe as opposed to simply rehashing ideas that had quickly become stale. Punk, now exemplified by youths in identikit uniforms of biker jackets and mail-order bondage gear, posing for tourist photos of their mohicans while listening to ever-snarlier, ever-thrashier parodies of the 1976 Ramones debut, was the past. The freedom and experimentation of postpunk was the future.
4 MINUTE WARNING embraced the postpunk experiment, absorbing many other influences, BASEMENT 5, PUNISHMENT OF LUXURY, CRISIS (and others, again too numerous to mention). They played everything from thrash to more doom-laden rock, prototype funk to reggae, synthy prog to pop. They only played a handful of gigs, including the dining hall of their former school, Tynecastle High. The singer left to start a family. The others evolved into DESPERATION A.M., leaving the speed-rush of punk even further behind ...
KILLING JOKE were determinedly postpunk not punk. Together with WIRE, PiL, THE POP GROUP, MAGAZINE, THE STRANGLERS and others too numerous to mention, they took the basic tenets of punk that had inspired them to start bands in the first place - self-expression, the DIY ethos, the anarchic blend of the poptastic with the chaotic - using these as a springboard into a whole new sonic universe as opposed to simply rehashing ideas that had quickly become stale. Punk, now exemplified by youths in identikit uniforms of biker jackets and mail-order bondage gear, posing for tourist photos of their mohicans while listening to ever-snarlier, ever-thrashier parodies of the 1976 Ramones debut, was the past. The freedom and experimentation of postpunk was the future.
4 MINUTE WARNING embraced the postpunk experiment, absorbing many other influences, BASEMENT 5, PUNISHMENT OF LUXURY, CRISIS (and others, again too numerous to mention). They played everything from thrash to more doom-laden rock, prototype funk to reggae, synthy prog to pop. They only played a handful of gigs, including the dining hall of their former school, Tynecastle High. The singer left to start a family. The others evolved into DESPERATION A.M., leaving the speed-rush of punk even further behind ...
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