Amnesty Report
By request, here are two very different versions of Amnesty Report. Both were featured on the We Are All Prostitutes CD released in 1998. What was called Amnesty Report II on the CD was actually recorded first, at Foel Studios, 1979, and is featured on the We Are Time LP. The lyrics are very hard to decipher. Or, at least, they were for me. It wasn't until I'd been running this site for awhile that I tracked down the single, We Are All Prostitutes (flipside pictured above), which featured this oddball free-jazz version of Amnesty Report with avant jazz cellist Tristan Honsinger. The lyrics now quite easy to understand. Disturbing stuff. Reportedly a reading of an Amnesty International report of torture of Irish prisoners by the British army. (Which quite upset one visitor to this site.)
And now for something completely different. Head, Gareth Sager's band after Rip Rig and Panic. In a documentary on the Bristol scene, Gareth says, (something to the effect of) "To his credit, Mark's music has stayed consistent, whereas I've lost fans all along the way. After Rip Rig and Panic, I formed a kinky rock band." UPDATE: The actual quote: "I reacted completely against the whole cooler-than-thou situation, and went completely the opposite way, and said, right - coz I'd been in that scenario for a hell of a long time, with everyone watching what you do, and I'd had enough of it, so I did the uncoolest thing I could do and made a kinky rock band. I've gone such crazy paths. I've lost people with every change I've made in my direction. I've lost the people that... I mean really extreme changes, music-wise, whereas someone like Mark, to his credit, some would say, virtually, y'know, you've heard the record he's making, they're of very similar ilk all the way down, so he never loses his audience." stream the quote
As he says "kinky rock band", the documentary cuts to a Head video featuring the band, covered in axle grease, performing in a mechanic's garage. Head was my intro to Rich Beale as a singer - I knew his name as the artist responsible for much of The Pop Group's art - and he quickly became one of my all-time favorite singers (though his alias in Head was Clevedon Pier - the name of an actual pier in Somerset). Along with Gareth and Rich, Head featured Nick Sheppard, former Cortinas and future Clash guitarist. Head was kinda sleazy, and could almost pass for hair metal, with its big, 80s sounding gated drums and rock-out guitars. But listen for the most subtle of over-the-top guitar solos in
