group: xex

(Not to be confused with a contemporary metal band also called xex....)

recently got given a reissue of this 1980 LP: 'an electronic pop collective from New Jersey, xex combines avant-garde sounds with witty, cogent lyrics about contemporary life and politics' (from the sleeve). Trying to find out a bit more about them - like, whether they really did exist! Or are they too good to be true...?

The CD was re-relased by Tom Smith of To Live & Shave in LA...

The lyrics are incredible:

Soviet nerve gas is subtle/once it hits there's no time for rebuttal/there's no colour there's no smell/but it works very well/soviet nerve gas is subtle

There's something on them here: http://www.appelstein.com/xex/ but generally very little online.

anyone any the wiser?
 

martin

----
There's a track by them called 'Holland Tunnel' on that electro comp I was banging on about in the Psychic Youth thread, but afraid I don't have a clue about them
 

lil flip

Member
yes yes yes!

I first came across Xex last year from listening to WFMU, where I believe they were rediscovered.

You'll be very hard pressed to find anything more than is on that reissue CD though.
It's pretty much impossible to find any original vinyl.

They are unerringly fantastic. Fashion Hurts and Rome on $5 A Day are personal favourites. My idea of perfect warped pop music.

I'm yet to come across an Xex fan that I didn't like. :D
 

owen

Well-known member
heh this record is so ridiculously up my strasse that i was convinced it was a hoax at first, somehing knocked up by the boys from dopplereffekt or summat...supported by their total absence from the exhaustive discogs for Rip it up and Start Again...

anyway its amazing- fizzy synths, droll vocals, 'be a good bolshevik' as a chorus

(which reminds me, what exactly was all that 'rave for communism' stuff about a few days ago...?)
 

john eden

male pale and stale
owen said:
(which reminds me, what exactly was all that 'rave for communism' stuff about a few days ago...?)

Rave For Communism was the first record by German breakcore arist LFO Demon. Bits of it are on the mix me and Paul Meme did for On The Wire on BBC Radio Lancashire.

http://www.lfodemon.com/

I am also loving xex. Mmmmmmmmm.
 
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