Cleaners from Venus

I mentioned this a couple weeks ago, but now there's a review of the Cleaners from Venus reissues up at Dusted.

The Cleaners from Venus
The Cleaners from Venus, Vol. 1
Captured Tracks


This initial trio of reissues documents the first three DIY cassette-only releases made by Cleaners from Venus, a British duo whose lo-fi pop experiments filtered British eccentric pop, a la The Kinks, Syd Barrett and XTC through the most minimal of recording technology and a scrim of politically engaged madness. The two Cleaners – Martin Newell and Lawrence “Lol” Elliott – met in Wivenhoe, a small-ish coastal town in southeast England at the beginning of 1980. They convened every day from November 1980 to April 1981, working from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. to write, perform and record songs. Two a day was the goal.

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Cleaners from Venus' "Time in Vain"

Wow, falling in love with this soundcloud track from the lost 1980s lo-fi cassette only Cleaners from Venus.



Captured Tracks, which reissued three Cleaners from Venus full-lengths last March -- Blow Away Your Troubles (1981), On Any Normal Monday (1982), and Midnight Cleaners (1982) -- says this:

Lol Elliott and Martin Newell, who together formed the legendary lo-fi band Cleaners from Venus met in the small town of Wivenhoe, southeast England at the turn of 1980s. Newell, a rock singer and part-time kitchen porter who’d left his band the previous summer, and Elliott, a drummer and former hippy traveller, had much in common. They shared a love of sunny 1960s pop music, punk rock and musical comedy. Neither Elliott nor Newell cared much for any kind of musical rule book, both were dismayed by the new right -wing politics which had now taken over their country. Both , were in their twenties, had time on their hands and were keen to create something new.