featuring Operating Theatre — Miss Mauger (1983); reissued by Allchival, (2019), Milan W. — Slo Mo (2015), Marcelo Grassmann — Figuras (1959)

a Dublin theatre-and-synth duo, a first Fairlight, a voice from the stage: three songs were on repeat this week — “Rampwalk”, “Austrian”, “Gloss & Eggshell”.

Operating Theatre is a name that sounds like surgery and like a stage at once, and the band was both. it began in Dublin around 1981 as a collaboration between the composer Roger Doyle and the actor and singer Olwen Fouéré, to explore the role of music in performance: not a band that happened to be theatrical, but a theatre that happened to make records.

Miss Mauger, their debut LP, came out in 1983 and was largely overlooked. Allchival brought it back in 2019 with two bonus tracks and long liner notes. it is made of synthesisers, brass and vocoder, with Doyle’s electro-acoustic production under Fouéré’s voice, and it is said to be the first record in which a Fairlight sampler was used in an Irish studio. it sits somewhere between pop and electronica, in the DIY, post-punk Dublin of the early eighties.

“Rampwalk” first appeared on a 1982 CBS single, the B-side to “Blue Light and Alpha Waves”. “Rampwalk” is my favourite — walking down the street: no destination, only moving to the delicate beat, light as a feather. the pavement turns into an infinite path for four minutes.

(𓁹 𓁹) special mention:
Milan W. — Slo Mo and Marcelo Grassmann

Milan W. is Milan Warmoeskerken, from Flanders in Belgium, a cornerstone of the Flemish experimental scene; Slo Mo (2015) was his solo debut. an absolutely stunning album, very calm and eerie.

i have been listening to it beside the work of Marcelo Grassmann, the Brazilian engraver (1925–2013), whose knights, maidens, horses and fantastic creatures rise out of black line like figures in a dream.

.˳·˖✶𓁺✶˖·˳.

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