13 years before the planet succumbed to Prodigy's techno-punk, Sigue Sigue Sputnik had an intergalactic hit with a Missile F1-11 foreseeing the electronica of the 90's.
Flaunt It, the band's first album (now out of print but available as an import) features a succession of electronic bombs from "Rocket Miss USA" to "21st Century Boy", mixing synthetic bass, a drum machine, electric guitar and schizophrenic voices. The album was also supposed to revolutionize the music industry by inserting commercials between the tracks, what fortunately never generated a following.
Of course, some made fun of their marketing hype (what also happened to the Sex Pistols!!) and of their success in Japan, the only country where John Tesh and David Hasselhof can have a carreer, but 13 years later, one can only deduce that they were ahead of their time. The techno explosion re-introduces Sigue as players in the game, unlike the first New Order which already sounds dated.
It's time to listen to Flaunt It again, and give credit where credit is due. No one deserves it more than Tony James, the band leader, who after playing with the Sisters of Mercy and X-CNN is currently preparing a new album of the cyber-punks Sigue Sigue Sputnik.
