Marc And The Mambas
My Former Self
(Cold Spring)
Although most will be familiar with Marc Almond from Soft Cell, especially given the recent endless waves of wallet emptying deluxe box set re-issues, re-mixes and alternative versions of Non Stop Erotic Cabaret, his reach extended far beyond the pop world and into the experimental avant-garde scene centred around Foetus, Psychic TV/Coil and Einstürzende Neubauten. Despite the subversive undertones of his commercially successful act, I always felt that Marc Almond was more at home rubbing shoulders with Genesis P Orridge and Peter ‘Sleazy’ Christopherson where he could be freer to express himself. Marc And The Mambas were an offshoot project from Soft Cell, existing in parallel and formed of a rotating cast of collaborators including Matt Johnson from The The, Steve James Sherlock and Annie Hogan (with whom Almond worked later in his solo career) as well as Almond’s Soft Cell partner David Ball on the Mambas' first single, ‘Sleaze'. The Mambas produced two albums, featuring Almond’s distinctive ‘Torch Singer’ style of vocals. On the second Mambas album, 'Torment And Toreros’ that was accompanied by guitar noise, piano and string sections.
Commercially, the Mambas came nowhere close to Soft Cell’s success, but have gained more of a reputation retrospectively, as is the way of these things. Despite having performed live in various incarnations, there only seems to have been one set of recordings made of those, a set of VHS tape recordings from The Duke Of York's Theatre in London's West End in 1983, originally released as a fan club only album ‘Bite Black + Blues’ in 1984 and 2000, then on CD in 2012 as ‘Three Black Nights Of Little Black Bites’, and now re-mastered and re-issued as a double album on Cold Spring Records with all the usual extras (bonus tracks, red vinyl edition and so on). Judging by the taster track ‘My Former Self’, the recordings are of ropey quality (though the YouTube link below is from the previous release on Cherry Red as no video currently exists for the Cold Spring reissue) and possibly of interest mainly to Soft Cell/Almond completists, but the idea behind The Mambas remains strong and the interest is still there.
The re-issue of ‘Three Black Nights Of Little Black Bites’ comes as a vinyl double album on Cold Spring on 8th August and includes a reproduction of the 16-page programme printed in 1983 for the three concerts and a new and impressive looking cover painting. Almond is an unusual character, not your usual sort of pop star, and was far from squeaky clean – I recall a possibly exaggerated tabloid story about him having his stomach pumped for reasons we won’t go into here – and for that quality alone, this release deserves both your respect and interest.
Essential Information:
Pre-order ‘Three Black Nights Of Little Black Bites’ from Cold Spring here
