Friday, October 21, 2011

Human Switchboard

Another forgotten post-punk band getting the reissue treatment, this time from Bar/None...It's well worth checking out if you like this sort of thing.

Human Switchboard
Who's Landing in My Hangar: Anthology 1977-1984
Bar/None

“In this town, a third can’t find work. Another third drink to go to sleep, but everything, everything still seems possible.” Bob Pfeifer murmured into the mic in a tremulous baritone remarkably like Lou Reed’s, his guitar alternating between jangle and brutal stabs, his partner Myrna Macarian throwing up a keening, reeling swell of organ behind him. It was 1981, perhaps the bleakest year of the Rust Belt recession. Cleveland’s Human Switchboard was recording what would be its one and only studio album, a nervy, sexually fixated jitter along the peripheries of post-punk, girl-group and new wave. Who’s Landing in My Hangar?, released on IRS’s Faulty Products imprint, turned out to be Human Switchboard’s commercial and artistic highpoint, and by 1985, after a deal with Polydor fell through, the band broke up.

More

(Say No To) Saturday's Girl by Human Switchboard by BarNoneRecords

2 comments:

Jean-Luc Garbo said...

Thanks for writing such a thorough review. The song posted at Dusted also hit the right buttons so I'll check out the band.

jenniferpkelly said...

Oh, good hope you like it.