185

In the book called "The Russians" there is a procedure in the story where certain classified material in libraries in the Soviet Union was stamped "<185>". This is where they came up with the title for this album.

Many people descibe the music on here as a cross between SOFT MACHINE and HENRY COW and I can't disagree. Fred Frith produced and played on this record, and it took only two days to record this album, and two days for mixing. The band heard over the years from fans and friends alike that this record did not sound like them. Which is why on this cd we have two versions of "<185>", with the second version being a re-mix from the original master tapes. They didn't re-mix the three improvs from the original album though, just skipping them completely. Apparently the re-mixed version is about as close to what this band sounds live as you'll here. I personally much prefer this version mainly because it sounds much cleaner and clearer to me. As usual with this band we get a lot of sax, clarinet and flute, along with piano, organ, violin, guitar, drums, bass and fuzz bass.

This band should be held in high esteem in my opinion, they're absolutely brilliant with the challenging and innovative music they present. I consider "<185>" to be an important part of my collection.