HEAVEN 17

BORN IN AN ATMOSPHERE OF INTENSE RIVALRY, THE CAUSTICALLY POLITICAL YET DEEPLY BEGUILING DEBUT ALBUM FROM HEAVEN 17 CLOTHED ITS RADICAL IDEOLOGY WITH ADDICTIVE ELECTRO HOOKS, FUNKY BASSLINES AND A DEEPLY SATIRICAL CORPORATE POLISH…

MARK LINDORES

Although The Human League’s Reproduction and Travelogue had proved to be two landmark albums of the burgeoning synth-pop movement of the late-70s, the records’ failure to live up to their promise commercially proved to be hugely problematic for the band as the 80s dawned. Though The League had been proclaimed as “the future of pop music” by no less an icon than David Bowie, the Sheffi eld collective were frustrated that their titles languished unsold in record shops while those of their peers – bands such as OMD, Gary Numan and Visage – had taken the sound to the top of the charts.

Soon, tensions within the band came to a head. Fearing that the pressure to have a hit would cause the whole group to implode, manager Bob Last engineered a split, unceremoniously ousting founding member Martyn Ware from the line-up.

“I turned up at the studio one day and they said they were throwing me out of the group,” Martyn told the BBC in 2015. “I was extremely hurt because not only were we very close as a band, but Phil [Oakey] had been my best friend for years prior to that. There was an increasing amount of niggling arguments within the band… between myself and Phil in particular. But at that age we were just locking horns trying to determine who was the alpha male of the group – the founder or the lead singer. What I didn’t know was that Bob Last and the record company had already come to the conclusion that the band wasn’t going to work and had engineered a plan to destabilise the group by dropping words in Phil’s ear, telling him he should be the star and that it should be a vehicle for straightforward pop.”

While Martyn felt betrayed and let down by his former friend and colleague, he was comforted by the loyalty of bandmate Ian Craig Marsh, who also left The Human League to embark with him upon the British Electric Foundation (BEF), an experimental production company on which they could collaborate with established artists and launch new projects.

The pair soon recruited Glenn Gregory to complete their new group. Glenn had been one of Martyn’s best friends ever since they met at school, and had at one point been in the picture to front The Human League. His decision to move to London to pursue a career in photography had prevented him joining The League, but his regular retreats back home ensured he was kept abreast of what was happening on the social scene. Indeed, he had managed to sustain a position as a key fi gure on the Sheffi eld live music scene, frequenting the Meat Whistle arts project, the launchpad for countless groups including Cabaret Voltaire and Clock DVA. He was back in Sheffi eld on a photography assignment to shoot Joe Jackson for the Sounds music weekly when Martyn asked him to join the band – an offer he accepted on the spot.