BRITISH ELECTRIC FOUNDATION - Music For Stowaways

Cassette Virgin Records 1981
Limited edition of 10.000 copies



"In search of more meaningful dance music, Martyn Ware and Ian Craig Marsh abandoned the about-to-be-enormous Human League in 1980 to form the more experimental (musically and structurally) British Electric Foundation. The core members - Marsh, Ware and singer Glenn Gregory - also work as Heaven 17, a 'division' of B.E.F. Confused? While Heaven 17 is geared for dance funk'n'soul, the short-lived B.E.F. pursued conceptual one-offs with a variety of people, like the TV dance troupe Hot Gossip. Music for Stowaways - released only on cassette - consists of moody instrumentals, ranging from funk-rock to icy Germanic synth-garde to electro-bop and sound experiments. Much of it was reissued on the seven-track Music for Listening To".
(Steven Grant, Trouser Press)

"The production arm of early synth-popsters Heaven 17 and occasionally a recording entity in its own right, B.E.F. (or British Electric Foundation) was formed by Martyn Ware and Ian Craig Marsh just after their exit from the original lineup of the Human League. Ware and Marsh had formed the Human League in 1977 as a completely electronic synthesizer band. (...) Late in 1980 however, both Ware and Marsh left the band over disagreements about its musical direction. Eager to avoid repeating the mistakes they felt the Human League were making (and would continue to make), the pair incorporated British Electric Foundation as a production team instead of a band. (...) One of the few synth-pop records of the era - instrumental or otherwise - that attempted to develop the universe of possibilities inherent in the form, [Music for Stowaways] spans percussion-heavy sequencer trance, free-floating ambience and minimalist proto-techno as well as more recognizable synth-funk (notably, the original version of Heaven 17's Groove Thang). It's not even a matter of sounding dated; [Music for Stowaways] sounds decades ahead of its time and could easily be taken for music produced 20 years later".
(John Bush, All-Music Guide)

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