CRISPY AMBULANCE - Compulsion LP

Highly recommended.

Formed 1977 in Manchester by Alan Hempsall and Robert Davenport. Started as a two-man outfit but adding Keith Darbyshire and Gary Madeley to the line-up in 1978.

During their first five years they recorded sessions for local and national radio and released several records on Factory, Factory Benelux and Aural Assault. They toured in the UK and Europe, both as headline act and as support to Joy Division, Killing Joke and Section 25.

Compulsion is the studio album Crispy Ambulance might have recorded after The Plateau Phase, with six of the eight tracks now included on FBN 54 written and performed back in 1982. To these are now added Rain Without Clouds, a previously unreleased outtake from The Plateau Phase newly restored from the original multitrack masters, and WMTP.2 with added synth lines by producer-cum fifth member Graham Massey (of 808 State and Biting Tongues). Check out the excellent Biting Tongues here.