Marc And The Mambas - Torment and Toreros - 1983 - Ep. 29

During the height of his fame with Soft Cell, Marc Almond had a side project. An outlet for the less polished pop side of his persona. Dark, passionate, intense, diverse, and riveting. And that was just the musicians that were part of the collective known as Marc and the Mambas. As we publish this podcast episode in mid-August 2023, it's precisely 40 years since Marc and the Mambas released their 2nd LP 'Torment and Toreros'. We celebrate by looking at the key personnel involved, the recording process they went through, and the songs that were released on this 90 minute long double album. You'll hear about the real life torment that emerged after the release of the record and Marc's extreme reaction to less than favourable reviews. For balance, there's comments from the fans that adore the album and what it still means to them 40 years on, Kate included.

From the same week of release, we enjoy a bumper hit of nostalgia. It was a great top 10 UK singles chart to wax lyrical about, featuring 80's gold from Depeche Mode, Wham, Spandau Ballet, Elton John, Paul Young, and The Style Council. The movies on at the box office were equally impressive, including some huge blockbusters and critically acclaimed films starring the likes of Michael Caine, Jennifer Beals, Harrison Ford, Roger Moore, Christopher Reeve, Julie Walters, and Matthew Broderick. The heat makes the headlines during the summer of 1983 in the UK, along with a new registration plate format for vehicles, and Kate gets rather excited about a couple of shows that aired for the first time in the UK on ITV.

Our Top 3 picks this week, are our favourite double albums of all time. Spoiler alert, all Kate's are from the same artist. I wonder who that could be!?

Singles of the week:

Kate goes for the modern classic from Sheffield's Reverend & The Makers - 'A letter To My 21 Year old self': https://youtu.be/8IQJTCrDI5Q

Rick sticks with 1983 and the pop gem from Aztec Camera that is 'Oblivious': https://youtu.be/2B2Sc2G_5ZA

For those on Facebook, here's a link to a post we published in the private 'Marc Almond' group with some great comments about the record: https://www.facebook.com/groups/4258153798?multi_permalinks=10161469921478799

Two recent podcasts featuring Anni Hogan:

https://open.spotify.com/episode/5RJuwSD4NZjuxb7TOZ05fz?si=rBhS5rPxRgu11khgisWd1Q

https://open.spotify.com/episode/4kh3V42TjQBp3XlyaWAeVq?si=QWb-fyltSLaAR5aZ4EVKdA

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Thank you for listening and for your interest,

Rick & Kate x

p.s. the claim made at the start of the episode about us keeping the running time to 60 minutes moving forward, was clearly a blatant lie!