Britpop Mix

It's Your Move

When Fifth Colvmn started out the strategy was to not just sign all kinds of unsigned bands that we liked but to build the label with licensing deals - distributing European or foreign labels here in the States. This strategy started to bear fruit early on in the label's life with a relationship that had begun with Paul Green of Cyber-tec Records. Cyber-tec Records was based in the UK and had a lot of traditional 80's-style EBM. Their stuff was a lot more dancey than Chemlab, haloblack and Acumen and would complement the synth-heavy 'dust rock that we already had on the label. Cyber-tec's bands/projects included an album from the Electro Assassins, Crisis (later renamed Crisis-N.T.I. so as not to annoy Metal Blade who had a band named Crisis), New Mind and the crown jewel of their catalog Cyber-tec Project. Cyber-tec Project was a very Front 242-sounding project that featured Jean-Luc DeMeyer the vocalist of Front 242 in addition to members of New Mind and Cubanate. The demo tapes we heard were fantastic. But Paul Green was not having it. He initially held the Cyber-tec Project out of any licensing negotiations in the hopes of finding a better deal for them with another label. We pressed on with Jared and Brian McNelis ("God's gift to the independent labels") fronting on the negotiations with Green. I guess Green just needed to have his ass kissed and fawned over because some time later Cyber-tec Project was part of the deal and we were "ready to rock"!

A full album's worth of material had been completed by Cyber-tec Project including numerous remixes each of which stood up on its own as independent compositions. This was one of our best records and the fact that it sounded nearly exactly like Front 242 didn't hurt either. It sold reasonably well (for FCR) and was a mainstay on the college dance charts.

But would they tour? That was the question. Since Jean-Luc was in Front 242 full-time (at the time) we actually didn't expect them to tour at all. But I think we all knew that if given the opportunity we'd find a way to make it work. Just such an opportunity came up a few months after the their self-titled record was released. A small tour in select U.S. markets was being arranged; Boston, NYC, Washington, DC, Chicago and perhaps Philly or Cleveland. Not much of a tour but we jumped at the chance. It ended up being only NYC, DC, Philly and Chicago and we set our promotional machine in motion. Ads were booked, a publicist was hired - we were psyched. With the DC show set for our sister entity the Fifth Colvmn Nightclub ArtGallery, our local efforts were in rare form.

The NYC date was at a Sat. Industrial/Goth night called "The Bat Cave" produced by a British fellow named Neville. A first rate prick so I heard. But the date came and went - no problems. Usually we would have made the drive up to NYC to see the show but with a DC gig in place it made more sense to stay put.

The next day - the day before the DC show - Jared called. He broke the news. The band was going back to the UK, they didn't have the money to make this thing work. The rest of the dates were already cancelled and with this call the DC gig was now among the cancelled as well. The owner of the label and the club was the same person - and he was crestfallen. One of the few bands other than Chemlab that he was passionate about and they were going to come up short. He didn't take disapointment very well and was ready to get the band down to DC at any cost - but it was too late. Arrangements had already been made to return to the UK despite the promo and arrangements that were made for these gigs. But still, our boss would not be undone:

"That's fine" he stated curtly. "You know what we're going to do?" he asked me.
"What's that Z?" I was playing along now having no idea where this was going.
"I have a close friend from High School who is a great musician. I mean, he was trained at Julliard and everything. You, me and Todd can go up on stage with him and just be this band. We can be the Cyber-tec Project and no one will know the difference. We'll keep the lights low on the stage, he'll re-create all the music and we'll just jump around and pretend to sing - we can do this!"
I looked for a glimmer of a joke, a hint of sarcasm but there was only a little. Not enough to convince me that he wasn't completely serious.
"Yeah", I said with a smile but it was only partially returned and Z left the office.
Todd (FCR employee #3) and I looked at each other.
"Do you think he's serious?" Todd asked me.
"I have no idea" I said. But I hoped he wasn't. I was kind of imagining the three of us jumping around on stage in large velvety-hood type robes like some faux-benedictine monks/Industrial kids and it wasn't a pretty sight. Z wasn't used to not getting his way. This could get kind of scary.
I looked over at Todd and we both kind of shrugged our shoulders and then went back to work.

Later that afternoon/evening after Todd had gone home and the next night's plans for the gig were yet to be worked out, Z made a return appearance to the office.
"Well, it doesn't look like we are going to be able to get on stage and be the Cyber-tec Project" he said dejectedly. In fact, he wouldn't even make eye contact with me when he said it. It occurred to me that maybe he felt like he had let us down somehow.
"That's Ok", I tried to reassure him, "it would've been tough to pull off anyway."
"Yeah" and he walked away.