UK-based label LTM were recently responsible for reissuing Severed Heads’ 1989 commercial sales high-watermark album ‘Rotund For Success’, and this Roxy Music-punningly monikered collection ‘Viva! Heads!’ acts as a live retrospective of various festivals, shows and radio sessions recorded from 1998-2005. Except it’s not exactly a ‘live’ album per se; in this case the 13 tracks here are in fact the rehearsal recordings for events such as What Is Music?, Electrofringe and Antwerp’s 2005 Bimfest, meaning that you’re not exactly going to get the sounds of baying crowds and thrown beer leaking through here. While crowd-pleasing favourites ‘Dead Eyes Opened’ and ‘Greater Reward’ certainly make appearances, the tracklisting takes in a diverse cross-section of Ellard’s post-major label output, meaning that ‘Viva! Heads!’ represents the perfect primer compilation for anyone unaware that Sevs continued to release albums post-‘Gigapus.’
As well as featuring tracks from ‘Haul Ass’ and ‘Op 1.2’ (both released independently through Ellard’s www.sevcom.com website in 1998 and 2001 respectively), the tracklisting also manages to pack in a suitably twisted remix of ‘Your Kidneys’ from last year’s ‘Illustrated Family Doctor’ soundtrack and even a handful of tracks previously released under Ellard’s Cok*La*Coma alias. You’ll also get to hear a prominent retailer of electrical appliances get digitally mashed up over buzzing electro-house rhythms thanks to ‘Go’, recorded at last year’s Electrofringe, a moment sure to prick up the ears of Australian viewers of commercial television. In many ways Ellard’s openly-expressed ambivalence towards his commercially successful early nineties electro-pop period comes across as curious in the light of the fact that it’s clearly left an indelible imprint upon his later work – as this retrospective collection neatly illustrates.
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