Side One
Bright waves
Reprint 1
Side Two
Reprint 2
Under Press of Sail
Nein Nein Nein
All tracks by Philip Sanderson, except 'Nein NeinNein' by Philip Sanderson & Steven Ball, 'Bright Waves' by Philip Sanderson & Nancy Slessinger.
Credits:
Format: Cassette 100 copies
Release Date: 1980
Label: Snatch Tapes
Catalogue Number: Fuse TCH 220
Sleeve Design: Steven Ball. Photocopy onto blue card,
Notes:
Claire Thomas & Susan Vezey fist appeared on Snatch 1 in 1979, and were a pseudonym for Philip Sanderson. Quite where the idea came from for a female alter ego I can't recall - possibly a nod to Ducahmp's Rrose SÈlavy? To accompany Reprint a press release was issued which cast the pair as a Pre-Raethelite synthesizer duo with robes flowing as they strode across Blackheath. It was intended that the whole thing be a fairly transparent spoof. A small display board with a number of Snatch Tapes cases on it was put up in Rough Trade shop in 1980 and was seen by an A & R man from Cherry Red who believing in the existence of the pair included the Claire Thomas & Susan Vezey track 'Bright Waves' on the compilation LP Perspectives & Distortion. Cherry Red were even intending to put out an LP by the duo untik their cover was blown.
The sleeve notes on the tape sleeve are somewhat inaccurate,There are in fact four tracks on Reprint. The first track 'Bright Waves' features some tape delayed ethereal vocals (supplied by Nancy Slessinger) whilst the two longer tracks employ a VCS3 and tape delay process to produce an evolving percussive landscape. The fourth track is the old favourite 'Under Press of Sail' from Snatch 1. A few copies of the tape included a fifth track; a ring modulator cassette tape loop piece by Philip Sanderson & Steven Ball entitled 'Nein Nein Nein'. For info on the CD re-issue go to Reprint CD
Review:
From: the Wire Magazine by Jim Haynes:
Part shrewd marketing manoeuvre, part homage to Marcel Duchamp's alter ego Rose Selavy, DIY electronic pioneer Philip Sanderson donned the personna of Claire Thomas & Susan Vezey as two female electronic minimalists in the late 70's and early 80's. He kept up the charade long enough to land a Thomas & Vezey track on the 1980 Cherry Red compilation Perspectives and Distortion but was thwarted in his attempts to when the label discovered that Claire & Susan were not who they claimed to be. Sanderson subsequently released those recordings as the Reprint Cassette through his Snatch Tapes [actually the cassette release came first and was what lead Cherry Red to discover Thomas and Vezey], which published his other project Storm Bugs and a couple of recordings from the then unknown composer David Jackman. 23 years later the electronic din of Claire & Susan resurfaces, although the author is no longer hiding behind the pseudonym. Fortunately the music of Reprint (Anomalous NOM23) is much more than a giddy prank. Aptly described by Sanderson as 'an inverted Pop Art aesthetic', Reprint graft a grimy brutism culled from home made ring modulators and dismembered answering machines onto the sterile arepeggiations and polyrhythmic interplay of Cluster or Chris Carter's early productions. what may have been consigned to the dustbin of 1980's cassette culture turns out to be a marvellous find, as good as any of the recently recovered cassettes of recordings of Cabaret Voltaire or Throbbing Gristle."