Friday, July 27, 2007

B-SHOPS FOR THE POOR-THE ICEBERG PRINCIPLE, CD, 1989, USA




Very much a product of it's time, the arch, angular horn-charty Downtown NY-meets R.I.O. sonics of this peculiarly moniked unit have a definite whiff of perky yet hectic Curlew style bippity boop about them, but they've been buffed to an oddly antiseptic shine by punchy 80's production values. In theory, this should come off as a chalk and cheese combo but in practice, it lands B-Shops in a fruitful and under-charted territory thats not far from the giddy sax-centric universe of Hajime Tachibana. These offbeat constructs are frequently offset by Sarra Tyrer's too-cool-for-you chanteuse stylizations, whose supple approach is like an unexpected silk caress in a pachinko parlor.

Get it Here

3 comments:

Spring Day said...

Wow, great to find this. I can't say that this one has been on my search list, but at least my subconsciousness immediately responded when it saw this great post. Now I'll have to search my stack of fanzines from the early 90s, because somewhere there was an interview with them...

Anonymous said...

They did an album and a tour with Brotzmann and I think the horn section became The Remote Viewers (CD's on Leo Records) Wasn't bassist John Edwards involved in B Shops For The Poor??

Anonymous said...

They're from the UK, BTW