Scritti Politti: Worse than You'd Think. And You Already Knew it was Bad.

Scritti Politti: Worse than You'd Think. And You Already Knew it was Bad.

The awful thing about post-punk, well one of ‘em seeing as there’s a litany of troubles with the tag, including everything from bands pre-dating punk getting lumped in here, is that there’s so much eighties’ tripe lumped in her as to obfuscate the better efforts.

Beyond just that – as if it wasn’t enough – bands cropping up after the first wave of punk was receding were saddled with the label and subsequently moved on to work in overt pop tones (that was a good reference right there, I hope you caught it).

Scritti Politti presents one of the more confusing shifts and persistent labelings in the muddled genre’s history. The band began by releasing one of the earliest singles on the Rough Trade imprint, pretty much assuring its place in history. There were, of course, a few other well intentioned singles that encompassed anything from ska and reggae to a brand of funk almost tied to Gang of Four. No, Scritti Politti wasn’t as good, but the band was able to insert a wealth of rhythms into its music that a number of other ensembles, even the more enjoyable ones, just weren’t able to work out.

Collected as an album, Early, as is title states, does a decent job of portraying a band on the fringe of a new music, one with a huge amount of ska records sitting around at home. Each of the first three tracks – “Skank Bloc Bologna,” “Is and Ought the Western World” and “28/8/78”- toss of a reggae relations even as that last effort gets close to Gang of Four’s atonality. Unfortunately, as the compilation moves forward in time, Scritti Politi basically turns in any sort of aggression it once had for a sort of silly pop enthusiasm with Green Gartside’s proper singing becoming more and more bothersome – “Confidence” is a particularly nasty offender.

For the band’s first long playing album, 1982’s Songs to Remember, the punky flavor’s pretty much gone. It’s lead off track, though, really does count as an above boards UK ska effort, replete with accompanying female back-up singers. There is some overlap from the single’s compilation – “Lions After Slumber” is boring and ridiculous on either disc, though. From there on out, it’s all a tremendous bummer.

So, basically, Scritti Politti’s most interesting work was over by the end of the seventies. What’s even more bizarre is that the ensemble’s “Messthetics” serves as the name for a series of compilations documenting post punk stuffs. It’s not that great a track, but those compilations are more than worth shelling out a few bucks for.