San Francisco will forever be associated with the summer of love but it’s trail-blazing musical foraging didn’t just stop when the Fillmore closed down. The city was early embracing punk, then riding that thirst for change to eschew guitars for the emerging new synthesisers which were also revolutionising the city’s parallel disco movement. While New York had post-punk, SF’s disaffected youth flaunted synth-punk, more accessible than Suicide but still too far ahead of its time for the world as outfits like the Screamers, Tuxedomoon and Units combined defiant attitude and energy with synthesisers, performance art and visual collages. Now the Units return on Portland’s Community Library label with this collection of their early highly-sought singles, tracks from 1980’s Digital Stimulation album plus previously-unreleased demos and movie music. Tracks like [The Mission Is Bitchin” and ‘Warm Moving Bodies’ recalls anything from Devo quirkiness to Numan synth-pop while ‘Zombo”s panoramic mood music predates further electronic revolutions to come: all shot with Units’ inimitably hot-wired brand of San Francisco-style anarchy which, in a few years time, would throw up further spaced evangelists like the amazing Hardkiss family.
4 Out Of 5
Reviewed By: Kris Needs
