New Age Steppers - New Age Steppers

On-u Sound

£20.16

Format: LP
Catalogue No.: ONULP1
Barcode: 5060263722731
Release Date: 19th March 2021
Genre: Dub, Reggae, Post-punk

Tracklist:
Fade Away
Radial Drill
State Assembly
Crazy Dreams and High Ideals
Abderhamane’s Demise
Animal Space
Love Forever
Private Armies

 ‘New Age Steppers’: The landmark first album on the On-U Sound label, this self-titled debut announced a gathering of the tribes: producer Adrian Sherwood bringing together members of the Slits, the Pop Group, the Flying Lizards and the Raincoats and getting them to collaborate with the likes of the Roots Radics’ Style Scott, Creation Rebel’s Crucial Tony, and Aswad’s George Oban to form a potent post-punk/dub fusion.
 The album’s two highest peaks are brilliantly realised interpretations of Jamaican classics - Junior Byles’ ‘Fade Away’ and Bim Sherman’s ‘Love Forever’, Ari Up’s vocal transporting the dread warning and lovers rock vibes to the icy hallways of early-80s London squatland. Elsewhere Mark Stewart marshalls an early version of his ‘Crazy Dreams and High Ideals’ (later re-versioned with the Maffia), music journalist Vivien Goldman voices caustic album closer ‘Private Armies’ (originally a B-side to her ‘Launderette’ single), and all sorts of strange noises and rhythmic murk bridge the gaps, the instrumentals falling somewhere
between a late night studio session at Channel One and the kinds of experimental soundscapes being explored at the time by Industrial Records.
 A certified classic of the era back on wax for the first time in 40 years and an essential addition to any post-punk record collection. Includes download card and printed inner with new sleevenotes and interviews by Oli Warwick.
 ‘New Age Steppers’, ‘Action Battlefield’, ‘Foundation Steppers’, ‘Love Forever’ and ‘Avant Gardening’ are also being made available as part of a 5CD box set titled ‘Stepping Into A New Age 1980 - 2012’.