The The - Heartland

This is the second of the four singles that were released from the Infected album, circa 1986.

The The are one of the few bands that I missed live - I remember going down to the ticket bit in Virgin and they only had one left for the Barras show (Mind Bomb tour) - there were two of us that used to always go to gig together so we just left it. Gutted. Never did see them in the end.

The A-side has the famous "this is the 51st state of the USA" chorus and isn't extended at all from the album version. 12" singles used to be a right con back in the 80s didn't they? Track B1 has a plinky plonk keyboard riff that is trying to sound like the hook from Lets Go To Bed by The Cure but doesn't quite manage it and then there's a spoken distorted vocal over noises kinda thing for the B2 track. Matt used to love doing those distorted spoken vocals.

*EDIT* It doesn't sound like Lets Go To Bed - I just said that to annoy my Cure-addict girlfriend, Wait till she sees Sunday's nonsense...

I loved all the imagery of the Soul Mining and Infected era stuff - it was a great logo and Matt's brother Andy did all the accompanying artwork. I remember once seeing a guy at a gig who had the whole of the Soul Mining cover on the back of his biker jacket. I was never talented enough to attempt any sort of band logo on mine...



The The - Heartland
A - Heartland
B1 - Flesh And Bones
B2 - Born In The New S.A.

Buy it here