Swim
2004
Headgit
About This Album
You'd expect a band whose name doubles as an insult (in Britain at least) to sound confrontational. Not so with Githead, a post-rock super-trio comprising Wire's Colin Newman, spouse Malka Spigel (ex-Minimal Compact) and Robin Rimbaud -- aka Scanner, telephone terrorist and Stockhausen's favorite flâneur électronique. Notwithstanding Githead's two-pronged guitar attack, in which the unlikely axeman Rimbaud plays Rick Parfitt to Newman's Francis Rossi, the band's maiden release eschews unbridled riffage in favor of well-wrought melodic textures and economical, hypnotic patterns, buoyed by programmed beats (courtesy of "the Beat Monster") and Spigel's bass throb. Encompassing minimalist funk, NEU!-like repetitive grooves and dub-flavored atmospherics, Headgit marks a departure from Newman's assaultive, amphetamine-paced forays with early-'00s Wire; if anything, it actually recalls that band's sound in the late '80s as it first embraced digital technology. Above all, though, Headgit shows continuity with Newman and Spigel's explorations of the interface between organic and electronic musics on their solo and collaborative projects. As a vocalist, Newman has always had three distinct modes: bolshy and shouty, snide and snarky, or simply affectless.
Track List (try tracks 1,2,3 and 4)

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.