The KLF
Encyclopedia
The KLF were one of the seminal bands of the British
acid house
movement during the late 1980s and early 1990s.
Beginning in 1987, Bill Drummond
(alias King Boy D) and Jimmy Cauty
(alias Rockman Rock) released hip hop
-inspired and sample
-heavy records as The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu, and on one occasion (the British number one hit single
"Doctorin' the Tardis") as The Timelords. The abbreviation of the band has long been a mystery; however in a interview in Wired 2010 Bill revealed it to stand for "Kentucky Liberation Front", meant as a satire of the United States as the band saw it at the time. As The KLF, Drummond and Cauty pioneered the genres "stadium house" (rave music
with a pop-rock production and sampled crowd noise) and "ambient house
. The KLF released a series of international top-ten hits on their own KLF Communications record label, and became the biggest-selling singles act in the world for 1991 The duo also published a book, The Manual
, and worked on a road movie called The White Room.
From the outset, they adopted the philosophy espoused by esoteric novel series The Illuminatus! Trilogy
, gaining notoriety for various anarchic
situationist manifestations, including the defacement
of billboard adverts, the posting of prominent cryptic advertisements in NME
magazine and the mainstream press, and highly distinctive and unusual performances on Top of the Pops
. Their most notorious performance was a collaboration with Extreme Noise Terror
at the February 1992 BRIT Awards
, where they fired machine gun
blanks
into the audience and dumped a dead sheep at the aftershow party. This performance announced The KLF's departure from the music business, and in May 1992 the duo deleted
their entire back catalogue.
With The KLF's profits, Drummond and Cauty established the K Foundation
and sought to subvert the art world
, staging an alternative art award
for the worst artist of the year and burning one million pounds sterling. Although Drummond and Cauty remained true to their word of May 1992—the KLF Communications catalogue remains deleted in the UK, but The White Room
is still being pressed in the US by Arista
. They have released a small number of new tracks since then, as the K Foundation, The One World Orchestra and most recently, in 1997, as 2K
.
, played guitar in the Liverpool
band Big in Japan, and worked as manager of Echo & the Bunnymen
and The Teardrop Explodes
. On 21 July of that year, he resigned from his position as an A&R
man at record label WEA
, citing that he was nearly 33⅓ years old (33⅓ revolutions per minute
being significant to Drummond as the speed at which a vinyl LP
revolves), and that it was "time for a revolution in my life. There is a mountain to climb the hard way, and I want to see the world from the top". He released a well-received solo LP, The Man, judged by reviewers as "tastefully understated," a "touching if idiosyncratic biographical statement" encapsulating "his bizarrely sage ruminations", and "a work of humble genius: the best kind".
Artist and musician Jimmy Cauty was, in 1986, the guitarist in the commercially unsuccessful three-piece Brilliant
—an act that Drummond had signed to WEA Records and managed. Cauty and Drummond shared an interest in the esoteric conspiracy novels The Illuminatus! Trilogy
, and, in particular, their theme of Discordianism
, a form of post-modern anarchism. As an art student in Liverpool, Drummond had been involved with the set design for the first stage production of The Illuminatus! Trilogy, a 12-hour performance which opened in Liverpool on 23 November 1976.
Re-reading Illuminatus! in late 1986, and influenced by hip-hop, Drummond felt inspired to react against what he perceived to be the stagnant soundscape of popular music. Recalling that moment in a later radio interview, Drummond said that the plan came to him in an instant: he would form a hip-hop band with former colleague Jimmy Cauty, and they would be called The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu.
. In those novels, the JAMs are what the Illuminati
(a political organisation which seeks to impose order and control upon society) call a group of Discordians who have infiltrated the Illuminati in order to feed them false information. As The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu, Drummond and Cauty chose to interpret the principles of the fictional JAMs in the context of music production in the corporate music world. Shrouded in the mystique provided by their disguised identities and the cultish Illuminatus!, they mirrored the Discordians' gleeful political tactics of causing chaos and confusion by bringing a direct, humorous but nevertheless revolutionary approach to making records, often attracting attention in unconventional ways. The JAMs' primary instrument was the digital sampler
with which they would plagiarise
the history of popular music, cutting chunks from existing works and pasting them into new contexts, underpinned by rudimentary beatbox
rhythms and overlayed with Drummond's raps
, of social commentary, esoteric metaphors and mockery.
The JAMs' debut single "All You Need Is Love
" dealt with the media coverage given to AIDS
, sampling heavily from The Beatles
' "All You Need Is Love
" and Samantha Fox
's "Touch Me (I Want Your Body)
". Although it was declined by distributors fearful of prosecution, and threatened with lawsuits, copies of the one-sided white label
12" were sent to the music press
; it received positive reviews and was made "single of the week" in Sounds
. A later piece in the same magazine called The JAMs "the hottest, most exhilarating band this year.... It's hard to understand what it feels like to come across something you believe to be totally new; I have never been so wholeheartedly convinced that a band are so good and exciting."
The JAMs re-edited and re-released "All You Need Is Love" in May 1987, removing or doctoring the most antagonistic samples; lyrics from the song appeared as promotional graffiti
, defacing selected billboards. The re-release rewarded The JAMs not just with further praise (including NME´s "single of the week",) but also with the funds necessary to record their debut album. The album, 1987 (What the Fuck Is Going On?)
, was released in June 1987. Included was a song called "The Queen and I", which sampled large portions of the ABBA
single "Dancing Queen
". The recording came to the attention of ABBA's management and, after a legal showdown with ABBA and the Mechanical-Copyright Protection Society
, the 1987 album was forcibly withdrawn from sale. Drummond and Cauty travelled to Sweden in hope of meeting ABBA and coming to some agreement, taking an NME journalist and photographer with them, along with most of the remaining copies of the LP. They failed to meet ABBA, so disposed of the copies by burning most of them in a field and throwing the rest overboard on the North Sea
ferry trip home. In a December 1987 interview, Cauty maintained that they "felt that what [they]'d done was artistically justified."
Two new singles followed 1987, on The JAMs' "KLF Communications" independent record label. Both reflected a shift towards house
rhythms. According to NME, The JAMs' choice of samples for the first of these, "Whitney Joins The JAMs
" saw them leaving behind their strategy of "collision course" to "move straight onto the art of super selective theft". The song uses samples of the Mission: Impossible
and Shaft
themes alongside Whitney Houston
's "I Wanna Dance With Somebody
". Ironically, Drummond has claimed that The KLF were later offered the job of producing or remixing a new Whitney Houston album as an inducement from her record label boss (Clive Davis
of Arista Records
) to sign with them. Drummond turned the job down, but nonetheless The KLF signed with Arista as their American distributors. The second single in this sequence—Drummond and Cauty's third and final single of 1987—was "Down Town
", a dance record built around a gospel choir and "Downtown
" by 1960s star Petula Clark
. These early works were later collected on the compilation album Shag Times
.
A second album, Who Killed The JAMs?, was released in early 1988. Who Killed The JAMs? was a rather less haphazard affair than 1987, earning the duo at least one five-star review (from Sounds Magazine, who called it "a masterpiece of pathos".)
' pop single, "Doctorin' the Tardis" as The Timelords. The song is predominantly a mash-up
of the Doctor Who theme music
, "Block Buster!
" by The Sweet and Gary Glitter
's "Rock and Roll (Part Two)
", with sparse vocals inspired by The Daleks
and Harry Enfield
's "Loadsamoney" character. "Doctorin' the Tardis" reached number one in the UK Singles Chart
on 12 June, and charted highly in Australia
and New Zealand
.
Also credited on the record was "Ford Timelord", Cauty's 1968 Ford Galaxie
American police car (claimed to have been used in the film Superman IV
filmed in the UK). Drummond and Cauty declared that the car had spoken to them, giving its name as Ford Timelord, and advising the duo to become "The Timelords".
Drummond and Cauty would later portray the song as the result of a deliberate effort to write a number one hit single. However, in interviews with Snub TV
and BBC Radio 1
, Drummond said that the truth was that they had intended to make a house record using the Dr Who theme. After Cauty had laid down a basic track, Drummond observed that their house idea wasn't working and what they actually had was a Glitter beat
. Sensing the opportunity to make a commercial pop record they abandoned all notions of underground
credibility and went instead for the lowest common denominator. According to the British music press, the result was "rancid", "pure, unadulterated agony" and "excruciating" and—in something of a backhanded compliment from the normally supportive Sounds Magazine—"a record so noxious that a top ten place can be its only destiny". They were right: the record went on to sell over one million copies. A single of The Timelords' remix
es of the song was released: "Gary Joins The JAMs" featured original vocal contributions from Glitter himself, who also appeared on Top of the Pops
to promote the song with The Timelords.
The Timelords released one other product, a 1989 book called The Manual (How to Have a Number One the Easy Way)
, a tongue-in-cheek but nonetheless insightful step-by-step guide to achieving a number one hit single with little money or talent.
" (KLF 002). Although the Justified Ancients of Mu Mu name was not yet retired, most future Drummond and Cauty releases would go under the name "The KLF".
The name change accompanied a change in Drummond and Cauty's musical direction. Said Drummond (as 'King Boy D') in January 1988, "We might put out a couple of 12" records under the name The K.L.F., these will be rap free just pure dance music, so don't expect to see them reviewed in the music papers". King Boy D also claimed that he and Rockman Rock were "pissed off at [them]selves" for letting "people expect us to lead some sort of crusade for sampling". In 1990 he recalled that "We wanted to make [as The KLF] something that was ... pure dance music, without any reference points, without any nod to the history of rock and roll. It was the type of music that by early '87 was really exciting me ... [although] we weren't able to get our first KLF records out until late '88".
The 12" records subsequently released in 1988 and 1989 by The KLF were indeed rap free and house-oriented; remixes of some of The JAMs tracks, and new singles, the largely instrumental acid house
anthems "What Time Is Love?
" and "3 a.m. Eternal
", the first incarnations of later international chart successes. The KLF described these new tracks as "Pure Trance". In 1989, The KLF appeared at the Helter Skelter rave in Oxfordshire
. "They wooed the crowd", wrote Scotland on Sunday
some years later, "by pelting them with... £1,000 worth of Scottish pound notes which each bore the message 'Children we love you'".
Also in 1989, The KLF embarked upon the creation of a road movie
and soundtrack album
, both titled The White Room
, funded by the profits of "Doctorin' The Tardis". Neither the film nor its soundtrack were formally released, although bootleg
copies of both exist. The soundtrack album contained pop-house versions of some of the "pure trance" singles, as well as new songs, most of which would appear (albeit in radically reworked form) on the version of the album which was eventually released to mainstream success. A single from the original album was released, however: "Kylie Said to Jason
", an electropop record featuring references to Todd Terry
, Rolf Harris
, Skippy the Bush Kangaroo
and BBC comedy programme The Good Life. In reference to that song, Drummond and Cauty noted that they had worn "Pet Shop Boys
infatuations brazenly on [their] sleeves".
The film project was fraught with difficulties and setbacks, including dwindling funds. "Kylie Said to Jason", which Drummond and Cauty were hoping could "rescue them from the jaws of bankruptcy", flopped commercially, failing even to make the UK top 100. In consequence, The White Room film project was put on hold, and The KLF abandoned the musical direction of the soundtrack and single.
Meanwhile, "What Time Is Love?" was generating acclaim within the underground clubs of continental Europe; according to KLF Communications, "The KLF were being feted by all the 'right' DJs". This prompted Drummond and Cauty to pursue the acid house tone of their Pure Trance series. A further Pure Trance release, "Last Train to Trancentral
", followed. At this time, Cauty had co-founded The Orb
as an ambient side-project with Alex Paterson
. Cauty and Paterson DJ-ed at the monthly "Land Of Oz" house night in London, and The KLF's seminal 1990 "ambient house" LP Chill Out
was born partly from these sessions. The ambient album Space and The KLF's ambient video Waiting were also released in 1990, as was a heavier, more industrial sounding dance track, "It's Grim Up North
", under The JAMs' moniker.
In 1990 The KLF launched a series of singles with an upbeat pop-house sound which they dubbed "Stadium House". Songs from The White Room soundtrack were re-recorded with rap and more vocals (by guests labelled "Additional Communicators"), a sample-heavy pop-rock production and crowd noise samples. The results brought The KLF international recognition and acclaim. The first "Stadium House" single, "What Time Is Love?", released in August 1990, reached number five in the UK Singles Chart and hit the top-ten internationally. The follow-up, "3 a.m. Eternal", was an international top-five hit in January 1991, reaching number one in the UK and number five in the US Billboard Hot 100
. The album The White Room
followed in March 1991, reaching number three in the UK. A substantial reworking of the aborted soundtrack, the album featured a segue
d series of "Stadium House" songs followed by downtempo
tracks.
The KLF's chart success continued with the single "Last Train to Trancentral" hitting number two in the UK, and number three in the Eurochart Hot 100
. In December 1991, a re-working of a song from 1987, "Justified & Ancient" was released, featuring the vocals of American country star Tammy Wynette
. It was another international hit—peaking at number two in the UK, and number 11 on the Billboard Hot 100—as was "America: What Time Is Love?", featuring the vocals of ex-Deep Purple
member Glenn Hughes (number four on the UK singles chart), a hard, guitar-laden reworking of "What Time Is Love?".
In 1990 and 1991, The KLF also remixed tracks by Depeche Mode
("Policy of Truth
"), The Moody Boys
("What Is Dub?"), and the Pet Shop Boys
("So Hard" from the Behaviour album, and "It Must Be Obvious"). Pet Shop Boy Neil Tennant
described the process: "When they did the remix of 'So Hard', they didn't do a remix at all, they re-wrote the record ... I had to go and sing the vocals again, they did it in a different way. I was impressed that Bill Drummond had written all the chords out and played it on an acoustic guitar, very thorough."
After successive name changes and a plethora of highly influential dance records, Drummond and Cauty ultimately became, as The KLF, the biggest-selling singles act in the world for 1991, still incorporating the work of other artists but in less gratuitous ways and predominantly without legal problems.
Vocalist Wanda Dee is featured on many of their hits and in addition to her own show, still performs as "Wanda Dee of the KLF"
group Extreme Noise Terror
performed a live version of "3 a.m. Eternal" at the BRIT Awards
, the British Phonographic Industry
's annual awards show; a "violently antagonistic performance" in front of "a stunned music-business audience". Drummond and Cauty had planned to throw buckets of sheep's blood over the audience, but were prevented from doing so due to opposition from BBC
lawyers and "hardcore vegans
" Extreme Noise Terror. The performance was instead garnished by a limping, kilt
ed, cigar-chomping Drummond firing blanks
from an automatic weapon over the heads of the crowd. As the band left the stage, The KLF's promoter and narrator Scott Piering
announced over the PA
system that "The KLF have now left the music business". Later in the evening the band dumped a dead sheep with the message "I died for you—bon appetit" tied around its waist at the entrance to one of the post-ceremony parties.
Reactions were mixed. Piers Morgan
, writing in The Sun
, under the headline "KLF's Sick Gun Stunt Fails To Hit The Target", called The KLF "pop's biggest wallies" and producer Trevor Horn
is reported to have called their antics "disgusting". NME, on the other hand, said that The KLF "stormed" the show and that after their performance the BRITs show went "downhill all the way".
Scott Piering
's PA announcement of The KLF's retirement was largely ignored at the time. NME, for example, assured their readers that the tensions and contradictions would continue to "push and spark" The KLF and that more "musical treasure" would be the result, but they noted: "[Drummond has] himself nicely skewered on the horns of an almighty dilemma. He has taken over pop music and it has been a piece of piss to do so. And he hates that. He wants to be separate from a music industry that clasps him ever closer to its bosom. He loves being in the very belly of the beast, yet he wishes he was something that'd cause it to throw up too. He wants not only to bite the hand that feeds but to shove it into an industrial mincer and stomp the resultant pulp into the dirt, yet pop, as long as you continue to make it money, would let you sexually abuse its grandmother. There is, Bill old boy, no sensible way out."
In the weeks following the BRITs performance, The KLF continued working with Extreme Noise Terror on the album The Black Room
, but it was never finished. On 14 May 1992, The KLF announced their immediate retirement from the music industry and the deletion
of their entire back catalogue:
In a comprehensive examination of The KLF's announcement and its context, Select called it "the last grand gesture, the most heroic act of public self destruction in the history of pop. And it's also Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty's final extravagant howl of self disgust, defiance and contempt for a music world gone foul and corrupt." Many of The KLF's friends and collaborators gave their reactions in the magazine. Movie director Bill Butt said that "Like everything, they're dealing with it in a very realistic way, a fresh, unbitter way, which is very often not the case. A lot of bands disappear with such a terrible loss of dignity". Scott Piering said that "They've got a huge buzz off this, that's for sure, because it's something that's finally thrilling. It's scary to have thrown away a fortune which I know they have. Just the idea of starting over is exciting. Starting over on what? Well, they have such great ideas, like buying submarines". Even Kenny Gates, who as a director of The KLF's distributors APT stood to lose financially from the move, called it "Conceptually and philosophically ... absolutely brilliant". Mark Stent
reported the doubts of many when he said that "I [have] had so many people who I know, heads of record companies, A&R men saying, 'Come on, It's a big scam.' But I firmly believe it's over". "For the very last spectacularly insane time", the magazine concluded, "The KLF have done what was least expected of them".
The final KLF Info sheet discussed the retirement in a typically offbeat fashion, and asked "What happens to 'Footnotes in rock legend'? Do they gather dust with Ashton Gardner and Dyke
, The Vapors
, and the Utah Saints
, or does their influence live on in unseen ways, permeating future cultures? A passing general of a private army has the answer. 'No', he whispers 'but the dust they gather is of the rarest quality. Each speck a universe awaiting creation, Big Bang
just a dawn away'."
There have been numerous suggestions that in 1992 Drummond was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Drummond himself said that he was on the edge of the "abyss". BRIT Awards organiser Jonathan King
had publicly endorsed The KLF's live performance, a response which Scott Piering cited as "the real low point". The KLF's BRITs statuette for "Best British Group" of 1992 was later "found" buried in a field near Stonehenge
.
was an arts foundation established by Drummond and Cauty in 1993 following their 'retirement' from the music industry. From 1993 to 1995 they engaged in a number of art projects and media campaigns, including the high-profile K Foundation art award
(for the "worst artist of the year"). Most notoriously, they burnt what was left of their KLF earnings—a million pounds in cash—and filmed the performance.
In 1995, Drummond and Cauty contributed a song to The Help Album
as The One World Orchestra ("featuring The Massed Pipes and Drums of the Children's Free Revolutionary Volunteer Guards"). "The Magnificent" is a drum'n'bass
version of the theme tune from The Magnificent Seven
, with vocal samples from DJ Fleka of Serbian radio station B92
: "Humans against killing... that sounds like a junkie against dope".
On 17 September 1997, ten years after their debut album 1987
, Drummond and Cauty re-emerged briefly as 2K. 2K made a one-off performance at London's Barbican Arts Centre with Mark Manning, Acid Brass
, the Liverpool Dockers and Gimpo
; a performance at which "Two elderly gentlemen, reeking of Dettol
, caused havoc in their motorised wheelchair
s. These old reprobates, bearing a grandfatherly resemblance to messrs Cauty and Drummond, claimed to have just been asked along." The song performed at the Barbican – "Fuck the Millennium
" (a remix of "What Time Is Love?" featuring Acid Brass and incorporating elements of the hymn "Eternal Father, Strong to Save
") – was also released as single. These activities were accompanied by the usual full page press adverts, this time asking readers "***k The Millennium: Yes/No?" with a telephone number provided for voting. At the same time, Drummond and Cauty were also K2 Plant Hire, with plans to build a "People's Pyramid" from used house bricks; this plan never reached fruition.
As of 2010,Bill Drummond continues to work as a writer and conceptual artist, with occasional appearances on radio and television. Jimmy Cauty has been involved in several post-KLF projects including the music and conceptual art collective Blacksmoke
and, more recently, numerous creative projects with the aquarium and the L-13 Light Industrial Workshop based in Clerkenwell, London.
in their home country (the UK). Their debut releases - the single "All You Need Is Love
" and the album 1987
- were released under the label name "The Sound Of Mu(sic)". However, by the end of 1987 Drummond and Cauty had renamed their label to "KLF Communications" and, in October 1987, the first of many "information sheets" (self written missives from The KLF to fans and the media) was sent out by the label.
KLF Communications releases were distributed by Rough Trade Distribution (a spinoff of Rough Trade Records
) in the South East of England, and across the wider UK by the Cartel
. As Drummond and Cauty explained, "The Cartel is, as the name implies, a group of independent distributors across the country who work in conjunction with each other providing a solid network of distribution without stepping on each other's toes. We are distributed by the Cartel." When Rough Trade Distribution collapsed in 1991 it was reported that they owed KLF Communications £500,000. (In the same feature it was reported that Drummond wished to sign Ian McCulloch
to the label, but this never happened.) Plugging (the promotion to TV and radio) was handled by long time associate Scott Piering
.
Outside the UK, KLF releases were issued under licence by local labels. In the USA, the licensees were Wax Trax (the Chill Out
album), TVT
(early releases including The History of The JAMs a.k.a. The Timelords), and Arista Records
(The White Room
and singles).
The KLF Communications catalogue remains deleted in the United Kingdom.
for their antics, if not their music. Drummond and Cauty have also been compared to Stewart Home
and the Neoists
. Home himself said that the duo's work "has much more in common with the Neoist, Plagiarist and Art Strike
movements of the nineteen-eighties than with the Situationist avant-garde of the fifties and sixties." Drummond and Cauty "represent a vital and innovative strand within contemporary culture", he added.
, a modern chaos-based religion originally described by Malaclypse the Younger
in Principia Discordia
, but
popularised by Robert Shea
and Robert Anton Wilson
in the Illuminatus!
books, written between 1969 and 1971. The attitude and tactics of Drummond and Cauty's partnership matched that of the fictional cult whose name they had adopted. Throughout the partnership, these tactics were often interpreted by media commentators as "Situationist prank
s" or "publicity stunt
s". However, according to Drummond, "That's just the way it was interpreted. We've always loathed the word scam. I know no-one's ever going to believe us, but we never felt we went out and did things to get reactions. Everything we've done has just been on a gut level instinct." Cauty has expressed similar feelings, saying of The KLF, "I think it worked because we really meant it".
In addition to resembling the fictional JAMs attitudinally and tactically, references to themes of Discordianism and Illuminatus! also manifested Drummond and Cauty's musical, visual and written work, meticulously and often covertly.
The JAMs' debut single "All You Need Is Love" includes the words "Immanentize the Eschaton
!", in reference to the opening line of Illuminatus!, "They immanentized the Eschaton", interpreted as "they brought about the end of the world" or "they brought heaven to Earth". In The JAMs' "The Porpoise Song", from the album Who Killed The JAMs?, King Boy D and a talking porpoise
converse, referencing Howard, the talking porpoise in Illuminatus!. The KLF's single version of "Last Train to Trancentral" opens with the demand "Okay, everybody lie down on the floor and keep calm", which is also taken from Illuminatus!.
The refrain "All bound for Mu Mu land", from The KLF's "Justified & Ancient (Stand by The JAMs)" is a reference to the Lost Continent of Mu
, which Shea and Wilson identify with the fictional land Lemuria in Illuminatus!. Some research suggests that archeological remains located in waters off the coast of Japan may be Mu; at the end of the "Justified & Ancient" music video, The KLF exit in a submarine
.
Drummond and Cauty's output is also highly self-referential
, in common with Illuminatus!. In particular, original vocal samples are reused in a variety of musical contexts. For example, the ring modulated
"Mu Mu!" sample that first appeared on "Burn the Bastards" is also to be found on "What Time Is Love? (Live at Trancentral), "Last Train to Trancentral (Live from the Lost Continent)" and "Fuck the Millennium".
The number 23
, significant within numerology
, is a theme of Illuminatus!, where instances of the number are both overtly and surreptitiously placed. Similarly, an abundance of such occurrences were deposited throughout Drummond and Cauty's collective output, for example:
When questioned on the importance that he attaches to this number, Drummond has been evasive, responding enigmatically "I know. But I'm not going to tell, because then other people would have to stop having to wonder and the thing about beauty is for other people to wonder at it. It's not very beautiful once you know". Drummond's penchant for living by numbers has also been observed in his choosing to align the ages at which he undertook creative projects The Man and 45
with the standard revolution speeds of a turntable (33.3 and 45 rpm).
The "Pyramid Blaster" is a logo and icon
frequently and prominently depicted within the duo's collective work: a pyramid
, in front of which is suspended a ghetto blaster
displaying the word "Justified". This references the All-Seeing Eye
icon, often depicted as an eye within a triangle or pyramid, a significant symbol of Illuminatus!. The pyramid was also a theme of the duo's 1997 re-emergence, with the proposed building by K2 Plant Hire of "a massive pyramid containing one brick for every person born in the UK during the 20th century".
There is no definitive explanation of The KLF's name, nor of the origin of 'K' in the names of the K Foundation and 2K, although it is widely believed that the correct spelling was "Kopyrite" in order for the full title to comprise of 23 letters. KLF has been variously reported as being an acronym for "Kopyright Liberation Front" and "Kings of the Low Frequencies". This mirrors Illuminatus!, where the fictional JAMs are in alliance with The LDD—who regularly change the origins of their name—and The ELF ("Erisian
Liberation Front").
Although Drummond accounted for the adoption of The JAMs name in the first KLF Communications Info Sheet, the reasoning behind Drummond and Cauty's decision to reference the Illuminatus! mythology with such consistent intricacy is unknown. Indeed, it has been suggested by journalist Steven Poole
that the public's inability to fully understand The KLF results in all their subsequent activities (as a partnership or otherwise) being absorbed into The KLF's mystique. In a review of Drummond's 1999 book, 45, and an appraisal of The KLF's career, Poole stated that "[Bill Drummond] and collaborator Jimmy Cauty are the only true conceptual art
ists of the [1990s]. And for all the eldritch beauty of their art, their most successful creation is the myth they have built around themselves." He concluded,
", Trancentral was in fact Cauty's residence in Stockwell
, South London
, "a large and rather grotty squat
" according to Melody Maker
s David Stubbs: "Jimmy has lived [there] for 12 years. ('I hate the place. I've no alternative but to live here.') There's little evidence of fame or fortune. The kitchen is heated by means of leaving the three functioning gas rings on at full blast until the fumes make us all feel stoned.... And, pinned just above a working top cluttered with chipped mugs is a letter from a five-year-old fan, featuring a crayon drawing of the band."
Eternity
is a recurring theme in song titles ("3 a.m. Eternal", "Madrugada Eterna") and lyrics. Drummond and Cauty also asserted that 'Eternity' was the author of an ambiguous, far-reaching contract offered to The JAMs. (See The KLF films: The White Room
.)
Following the February 1990 release of Chill Out, sheep had recurring roles in the duo's output until their 1992 retirement. Drummond has claimed that the use of sheep on the Chill Out cover was intended to evoke contemporary rural rave
s and the cover of the Pink Floyd
album Atom Heart Mother
, insisting that the dead sheep gesture at the BRIT Awards was a compromise, replacing his earlier intention to literally cut off his hand at the ceremony. Sheep feature in The KLF ambient video Waiting, and some sheep were guests of honour at the first screening of The KLF's ultimately unreleased film The White Room. It is unclear whether the theme of sheep had any particular artistic meaning. Indeed, the inner sleeve of The White Room CD pictured Drummond and Cauty each holding a sheep, with the caption "Why sheep?".
, who incorporates physical journeys into his art.
Fire and sacrifice
were recurring ceremonial themes: Drummond and Cauty made fires to dispose of their illegal debut album and to sacrifice The KLF's profits; their dead sheep gesture of 1992 carried a sacrificial message. The KLF's short film The Rites of Mu
depicts their celebration of the 1991 summer solstice
on the Hebridean
island of Jura
: a 60 feet (18.3 m) tall wicker man
was burnt at a ceremony in which journalists were asked to wear yellow and grey robes and join a chant
. Chanting also featured in "3 a.m. Eternal", Chill Out and—aggressively—"Fuck the Millennium".
Drummond and Cauty's promotional tactics were unconventional. The duo were renowned for their distinctive and humorous public appearances (including several on Top of the Pops
), at which they were often costumed. They granted few interviews, communicating instead via semi-regular newsletters, or cryptically phrased full-page adverts in UK national newspapers and the music press. Such adverts were typically stark, comprising large white lettering on black. A single typeface
became characteristic of all KLF Communications' and K Foundation output, being used almost exclusively on sleevenotes and record labels, merchandise and adverts.
From the outset of their collaborations, Drummond and Cauty practised the guerrilla communication
tactic that they described as "illegal but effective use of graffiti
on billboards
and public buildings" in which "the original meaning of the advert would be totally subverted". Much as The JAMs' early recordings carried messages on the back of existing musical works, their promotional graffiti often derived its potency from the context in which it was placed. For instance, The JAMs' "SHAG SHAG SHAG" graffiti, coinciding with their release of "All You Need Is Love
", was drawn over the "HALO HALO HALO" slogan of a Today
billboard that depicted Greater Manchester
Police Chief Constable James Anderton
, who had decried homosexuals
amidst the UK media's AIDS furore.
Music press journalists were occasionally invited to witness the defacements. In December 1987, a Melody Maker reporter was in attendance to see Cauty reverse his car Ford Timelord alongside a billboard and stand on its roof to graffiti a Christmas
message from The JAMs. In February 1991, another Melody Maker journalist watched The KLF deface a billboard advertising The Sunday Times
, doctoring the slogan "THE GULF
: the coverage, the analysis, the facts" by painting a 'K' over the 'GU'. Drummond and Cauty were, on this occasion, caught at the scene by police and arrested, later to be released without charge.
In November 1991, the slogan "It's Grim Up North" appeared as graffiti on the junction of London's M25
orbital motorway with the M1
, which runs to Northern England. The graffiti, for which The JAMs denied responsibility, led to a House of Commons
motion being timetabled by Member of Parliament
Joe Ashton
regarding regional imbalance. In September 1997, on the day after Drummond and Cauty's brief remergence as 2K, the graffiti "1997: What The Fuck's Going On?" appeared on the outside wall of London's National Theatre
, ten years after the slogan "1987: What The Fuck's Going On?" had been similarly placed to mark the release of The JAMs' debut album.
, The JAMs continue to be associated with the cultural movement which retrospectively bundles together those literary and artistic works that make use of 'creative plagiarism
'. 1987: What the Fuck Is Going On? is considered a landmark work in the early history of sampling music in the United Kingdom. (See mashup.)
Similarly, Chill Out is cited as "one of the essential ambient albums". In 1996, Mixmag
named Chill Out the fifth best "dance" album of all time, describing Cauty's DJ sets with The Orb's Alex Paterson as "seminal". The Guardian has credited The KLF with inventing "stadium house" and NME named The KLF's stadium house album The White Room the 81st best album of all time. Elements of The KLF's stadium house concept (sampled crowd noise, and signatory vocal samples reused on different songs) were adopted by several less successful rave acts of the early 1990s, including Utah Saints
, N-Joi
and Messiah.
Sound on Sound
magazine credited The KLF with "set[ting] the trend for a new approach to mixing". Engineer Mark Stent
is quoted as saying:
of the Pet Shop Boys said that he considered the only other worthwhile group in the UK to be The KLF. Neil Tennant
added that "They have an incredibly recognisable sound. I liked it when they said EMF
nicked the F from KLF. They're from a different tradition to us in that they're pranksters and we've never been pranksters."
At the time of The KLF's retirement announcement, Drummond's old friend and colleague David Balfe
said of Drummond's KLF career that "the path he's trod[den] is a more artistic one than mine. I know that deep down I like the idea of building up a very successful career, where Bill is more interested in weird stuff.... I think the very avoidance of cliche has become their particular cliche".
In March 1994, members of the anarchist band Chumbawamba
expressed their respect for The KLF. Vocalist and percussionist Alice Nutter referred to The KLF as "real situationists" categorising them as political musicians alongside the Sex Pistols
and Public Enemy. Dunst Bruce lauded the K Foundation, concluding "I think the things The KLF do are fantastic. I'm a vegetarian but I wish they'd sawn an elephant's legs off at the BRIT Awards."
, being sampled on virtually every album Scooter have released. KLF were themselves apparently the victims of a "hoax" when an outfit called "1300 Drums featuring the Unjustified Ancients of M.U." released a novelty single to cash-in on the popularity of Manchester United
footballer Eric Cantona
. 1300 Drums even made a KLF-style Top of the Pops appearance, with the "band" wearing Cantona masks. The authorship of "Ooh Aah" remains unresolved: at least one source maintains that Drummond and Cauty themselves were 1300 Drums.
The Timelords' book, The Manual
, was reportedly used by the one-hit-wonders Edelweiss
to secure their hit "Bring Me Edelweiss".
"Last Train to Trancentral" is used in the finale of Blue Man Group
's theatrical shows and was covered by them on an EP
. The group's Rock Concert Instruction Manual is a tribute to The Manual.
Ninthwave Records
recording artists POP INC name check The KLF in their 2010 micro-hit "Looking 4 The KLF", which starred a voice over by BBC actor Simon Jones
.
s and music papers since The KLF's retirement, most often in connection with the K Foundation and their burning of one million pounds. It is worth noting that The KLF in their various incarnations have been to an extent "media darlings" who have received largely unqualified praise from the printed media. This may or may not be due to what NME called their "Master[y] of manipulating media and perceptions of themselves".
In 1992, NME referred to The KLF as "Britain's greatest pop group" and "the two most brilliant minds in pop today", and in 2002 listed the duo in their "Top 50 Icons" at number 48. The British music paper also listed The KLF's 1992 BRIT Awards appearance at number 4 in their "top 100 rock moments". "What's unique about Drummond and Cauty", the paper said in 1993, "is the way that, under all the slogans and the sampling and the smart hits and the dead sheep and the costumes, they appear not only to care, but to have some idea of how to achieve what they want."
"[Of their many aliases,] it is as the KLF that they will go down in pop history," wrote Alix Sharkey in 1994, "for a variety of reasons, the most important being the resolute purity of their self-abnegation, and their visionary understanding of pop." He added: "By early 1992 the KLF was easily the best-selling, probably the most innovative, and undoubtedly the most exhilarating pop phenomenon in Britain. In five years it had gone from pressing up 500 copies of its debut recording to being one of the world's top singles acts." The same piece also quoted Sheryl Garratt, editor of The Face
: ""the music hasn't dated. I still get an adrenaline rush listening to it." Garratt believes their influence on the British house and rap scene cannot be overestimated. "Their attitude was shaped by the rave scene, but they also love pop music. So many people who make pop actually despise it, and it shows.""
In a largely cynical piece, Trouser Press
reviewer Ira Robbins referred to The KLF's body of work as "a series of colorful sonic marketing experiments". The Face called them "the kings of cultural anarchy".
In 2003, The Observer
named The KLF's departure from the music business (and the BRITs performance in which the newspaper says "their legend was sealed") the fifth greatest "publicity stunt" in the history of popular music (Elvis
joining the army being hailed as the greatest). A 2004 listener poll by BBC 6 Music
saw The KLF/K Foundation placed second in a list of "rock excesses" (after The Who
).
computer with a Greengate DS3 sampler peripheral card
, and a Roland TR-808
drum machine. On later releases, the Greengate DS3 and Apple II were replaced with an Akai S900
sampler and an Atari
computer respectively. The house music of Space and The KLF involved much original instrumentation, for which the Oberheim OB-8
analogue synthesiser was prominently used. Of the two Oberheims The KLF used, only one remains. It is now owned by James Fogarty
(with whom Cauty founded Blacksmoke
).
The KLF's 1990–1992 singles were mixed
by Mark Stent
, using a Solid State Logic
(S.S.L.) automated mixing desk, and The White Room LP mixed by J. Gordon-Hastings using an analogue desk. The SSL is referenced in the subtitle of The KLF single "3 a.m. Eternal (Live at the S.S.L.)". The Roland TB-303
bassline and Roland TR-909
drum machine feature on "What Time Is Love (Live at Trancentral)".
Several of Drummond and Cauty's compositions feature distinctive original instrumentation using non-synthesised instruments. Drummond played a Gibson ES-330
semi-acoustic guitar on "America: What Time Is Love?", and Cauty played electric guitar
on "Justified & Ancient (Stand by The JAMs)" and "America: What Time Is Love?". Graham Lee
provided prominent pedal steel
contributions to The KLF's Chill Out
and "Build a Fire". Duy Khiem played clarinet
on "3 a.m. Eternal" and "Make It Rain". The KLF track "America No More" features a pipe band
, and 2K's "Fuck The Millennium" incorporates a full brass band
.
www.theflk.com/ Website for Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cautys new project
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
acid house
Acid house
Acid house is a sub-genre of house music that emphasizes a repetitive, hypnotic and trance-like style, often with samples or spoken lines rather than sung lyrics. Acid house's core electronic squelch sounds were developed around the mid-1980s, particularly by DJs from Chicago who experimented with...
movement during the late 1980s and early 1990s.
Beginning in 1987, Bill Drummond
Bill Drummond
William Ernest Drummond is a Scottish artist, musician, writer and record producer. He was the co-founder of late 1980s avant-garde pop group The KLF and its 1990s media-manipulating successor, the K Foundation, with which he burned a million pounds in 1994...
(alias King Boy D) and Jimmy Cauty
Jimmy Cauty
James Francis Cauty is a British artist and musician born in Liverpool, England, in 1956...
(alias Rockman Rock) released hip hop
Hip hop music
Hip hop music, also called hip-hop, rap music or hip-hop music, is a musical genre consisting of a stylized rhythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping, a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted...
-inspired and sample
Sampling (music)
In music, sampling is the act of taking a portion, or sample, of one sound recording and reusing it as an instrument or a different sound recording of a song or piece. Sampling was originally developed by experimental musicians working with musique concrète and electroacoustic music, who physically...
-heavy records as The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu, and on one occasion (the British number one hit single
Single (music)
In music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...
"Doctorin' the Tardis") as The Timelords. The abbreviation of the band has long been a mystery; however in a interview in Wired 2010 Bill revealed it to stand for "Kentucky Liberation Front", meant as a satire of the United States as the band saw it at the time. As The KLF, Drummond and Cauty pioneered the genres "stadium house" (rave music
Rave music
Rave music may either refer the late 1980s genre or any genre of electronic dance music that may be played at an electronic dance party such as a rave. Very rarely, the term is used to refer to less electronic related genres glam, powerpop, psychedelic rock and dub music parties...
with a pop-rock production and sampled crowd noise) and "ambient house
Ambient house
Ambient house, a music genre that first emerged in the late 1980s, is a sub-genre of house music, combining elements of acid house and ambient music...
. The KLF released a series of international top-ten hits on their own KLF Communications record label, and became the biggest-selling singles act in the world for 1991 The duo also published a book, The Manual
The Manual
The Manual is a 1988 book by The Timelords , better known as The KLF. It is a tongue-in-cheek step by step guide to achieving a No.1 single with no money or musical skills, and a case study of the duo's UK novelty pop No...
, and worked on a road movie called The White Room.
From the outset, they adopted the philosophy espoused by esoteric novel series The Illuminatus! Trilogy
The Illuminatus! Trilogy
The Illuminatus! Trilogy is a series of three novels written by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson first published in 1975. The trilogy is a satirical, postmodern, science fiction-influenced adventure story; a drug-, sex-, and magick-laden trek through a number of conspiracy theories, both...
, gaining notoriety for various anarchic
Anarchism
Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations...
situationist manifestations, including the defacement
Vandalism
Vandalism is the behaviour attributed originally to the Vandals, by the Romans, in respect of culture: ruthless destruction or spoiling of anything beautiful or venerable...
of billboard adverts, the posting of prominent cryptic advertisements in NME
NME
The New Musical Express is a popular music publication in the United Kingdom, published weekly since March 1952. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s, changing from newsprint in 1998. It was the first British paper to include a singles...
magazine and the mainstream press, and highly distinctive and unusual performances on Top of the Pops
Top of the Pops
Top of the Pops, also known as TOTP, is a British music chart television programme, made by the BBC and originally broadcast weekly from 1 January 1964 to 30 July 2006. After 25 December 2006 it became a radio program, now hosted by Tony Blackburn...
. Their most notorious performance was a collaboration with Extreme Noise Terror
Extreme Noise Terror
Extreme Noise Terror are a British crust punk / grindcore band originally formed in Ipswich, England in 1985. The band are widely considered one of the earliest and most influential European grindcore bands, and particularly the forefathers of the crustgrind subgenre.Notable for one of the...
at the February 1992 BRIT Awards
Brit Awards
The Brit Awards are the British Phonographic Industry's annual pop music awards. The name was originally a shortened form of "British", "Britain" or "Britannia", but subsequently became a backronym for British Record Industry Trust...
, where they fired machine gun
Machine gun
A machine gun is a fully automatic mounted or portable firearm, usually designed to fire rounds in quick succession from an ammunition belt or large-capacity magazine, typically at a rate of several hundred rounds per minute....
blanks
Blank (cartridge)
A blank is a type of cartridge for a firearm that contains gunpowder but no bullet or shot. When fired, the blank makes a flash and an explosive sound . Blanks are often used for simulation , training, and for signaling...
into the audience and dumped a dead sheep at the aftershow party. This performance announced The KLF's departure from the music business, and in May 1992 the duo deleted
Deletion (music industry)
Deletion is a music industry term referring to the removal of a record or records from a label's official catalog, so that it is out of print, but usually at a record artist's request....
their entire back catalogue.
With The KLF's profits, Drummond and Cauty established the K Foundation
K Foundation
The K Foundation was an art foundation set up by Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty in 1993, following their 'retirement' from the music industry. The Foundation served as an artistic outlet for the duo's post-retirement KLF income...
and sought to subvert the art world
Art world
The art world is composed of all the people involved in the production, commission, preservation, promotion, criticism, and sale of art. Howard S. Becker describes it as "the network of people whose cooperative activity, organized via their joint knowledge of conventional means of doing things,...
, staging an alternative art award
K Foundation art award
The 1994 K Foundation award was an award given by the K Foundation to the "worst artist of the year". The shortlist for the £40,000 K Foundation award was identical to the shortlist for the well-established but controversial £20,000 Turner Prize for the best British Contemporary artist...
for the worst artist of the year and burning one million pounds sterling. Although Drummond and Cauty remained true to their word of May 1992—the KLF Communications catalogue remains deleted in the UK, but The White Room
The White Room
Allmusic said that The White Room "represents the commercial and artistic peak of late-'80s acid-house" and Q magazine called it "strikingly imaginative" and "a more subtle form of subterfuge" than previous works...
is still being pressed in the US by Arista
Arista Records
Arista was an American record label. It was a wholly owned subsidiary of Sony Music Entertainment and operated under the RCA Music Group. The label was founded in 1974 by Clive Davis, who formerly worked for CBS Records...
. They have released a small number of new tracks since then, as the K Foundation, The One World Orchestra and most recently, in 1997, as 2K
Fuck the Millennium
"Fuck the Millennium" or "***K the Millennium" is an electronic protest song that was released as a single in 1997 by 2K...
.
History
In 1986, Bill Drummond was an established figure within the British music industry, having co-founded Zoo RecordsZoo Records
Zoo Records was a British independent record label formed by Bill Drummond and David Balfe in 1978. Zoo was launched in order to release the work of the perennially struggling Liverpool band, Big in Japan...
, played guitar in the Liverpool
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
band Big in Japan, and worked as manager of Echo & the Bunnymen
Echo & the Bunnymen
Echo & the Bunnymen are an English post-punk band, formed in Liverpool in 1978. The original line-up consisted of vocalist Ian McCulloch, guitarist Will Sergeant and bass player Les Pattinson, supplemented by a drum machine. By 1980, Pete de Freitas had joined as the band's drummer, and their debut...
and The Teardrop Explodes
The Teardrop Explodes
The Teardrop Explodes were an English post-punk/neo-psychedelic band formed in Liverpool in 1978. Best known for their Top Ten UK single "Reward" the group originated as a key band in the emerging Liverpool post-punk scene of the late 1970s, the group also launched the career of group frontman...
. On 21 July of that year, he resigned from his position as an A&R
A&R
Artists and repertoire is the division of a record label that is responsible for talent scouting and overseeing the artistic development of recording artists. It also acts as a liaison between artists and the record label.- Finding talent :...
man at record label WEA
Warner Music Group
Warner Music Group is the third largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry, making it one of the big four record companies...
, citing that he was nearly 33⅓ years old (33⅓ revolutions per minute
Revolutions per minute
Revolutions per minute is a measure of the frequency of a rotation. It annotates the number of full rotations completed in one minute around a fixed axis...
being significant to Drummond as the speed at which a vinyl LP
Gramophone record
A gramophone record, commonly known as a phonograph record , vinyl record , or colloquially, a record, is an analog sound storage medium consisting of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove...
revolves), and that it was "time for a revolution in my life. There is a mountain to climb the hard way, and I want to see the world from the top". He released a well-received solo LP, The Man, judged by reviewers as "tastefully understated," a "touching if idiosyncratic biographical statement" encapsulating "his bizarrely sage ruminations", and "a work of humble genius: the best kind".
Artist and musician Jimmy Cauty was, in 1986, the guitarist in the commercially unsuccessful three-piece Brilliant
Brilliant (band)
Brilliant were a British pop/rock group active in the 1980s. Although not commercially successful and mauled by the critics, they remain notable because of the personnel involved - Martin Glover aka Youth, formerly of Killing Joke and subsequently a top producer/remixer; Jimmy Cauty, later to find...
—an act that Drummond had signed to WEA Records and managed. Cauty and Drummond shared an interest in the esoteric conspiracy novels The Illuminatus! Trilogy
The Illuminatus! Trilogy
The Illuminatus! Trilogy is a series of three novels written by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson first published in 1975. The trilogy is a satirical, postmodern, science fiction-influenced adventure story; a drug-, sex-, and magick-laden trek through a number of conspiracy theories, both...
, and, in particular, their theme of Discordianism
Discordianism
Discordianism is a religion based on the worship of Eris , the Greco-Roman goddess of strife. It was founded circa 1958–1959 after the publication of its holy book the Principia Discordia, written by Malaclypse the Younger and Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst after a series of shared hallucinations at a...
, a form of post-modern anarchism. As an art student in Liverpool, Drummond had been involved with the set design for the first stage production of The Illuminatus! Trilogy, a 12-hour performance which opened in Liverpool on 23 November 1976.
Re-reading Illuminatus! in late 1986, and influenced by hip-hop, Drummond felt inspired to react against what he perceived to be the stagnant soundscape of popular music. Recalling that moment in a later radio interview, Drummond said that the plan came to him in an instant: he would form a hip-hop band with former colleague Jimmy Cauty, and they would be called The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu.
The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu
Early in 1987, Drummond and Cauty's collaborations began. They assumed alter egos—King Boy D and Rockman Rock respectively—and they adopted the name The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu (The JAMs), after the fictional conspiratorial group "The Justified Ancients of Mummu" from The Illuminatus! TrilogyThe Illuminatus! Trilogy
The Illuminatus! Trilogy is a series of three novels written by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson first published in 1975. The trilogy is a satirical, postmodern, science fiction-influenced adventure story; a drug-, sex-, and magick-laden trek through a number of conspiracy theories, both...
. In those novels, the JAMs are what the Illuminati
Illuminati
The Illuminati is a name given to several groups, both real and fictitious. Historically the name refers to the Bavarian Illuminati, an Enlightenment-era secret society founded on May 1, 1776...
(a political organisation which seeks to impose order and control upon society) call a group of Discordians who have infiltrated the Illuminati in order to feed them false information. As The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu, Drummond and Cauty chose to interpret the principles of the fictional JAMs in the context of music production in the corporate music world. Shrouded in the mystique provided by their disguised identities and the cultish Illuminatus!, they mirrored the Discordians' gleeful political tactics of causing chaos and confusion by bringing a direct, humorous but nevertheless revolutionary approach to making records, often attracting attention in unconventional ways. The JAMs' primary instrument was the digital sampler
Sampler (musical instrument)
A sampler is an electronic musical instrument similar in some respects to a synthesizer but, instead of generating sounds, it uses recordings of sounds that are loaded or recorded into it by the user and then played back by means of a keyboard, sequencer or other triggering device to perform or...
with which they would plagiarise
Plagiarism
Plagiarism is defined in dictionaries as the "wrongful appropriation," "close imitation," or "purloining and publication" of another author's "language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions," and the representation of them as one's own original work, but the notion remains problematic with nebulous...
the history of popular music, cutting chunks from existing works and pasting them into new contexts, underpinned by rudimentary beatbox
Beatboxing
Beatboxing is a form of vocal percussion primarily involving the art of producing drum beats, rhythm, and musical sounds using one's mouth, lips, tongue, and voice. It may also involve singing, vocal imitation of turntablism, and the simulation of horns, strings, and other musical instruments...
rhythms and overlayed with Drummond's raps
Rapping
Rapping refers to "spoken or chanted rhyming lyrics". The art form can be broken down into different components, as in the book How to Rap where it is separated into “content”, “flow” , and “delivery”...
, of social commentary, esoteric metaphors and mockery.
The JAMs' debut single "All You Need Is Love
All You Need Is Love (The JAMs song)
"All You Need Is Love" is a song by The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu, independently released as their debut single on 9 March 1987. A politically topical song concerning the UK media's AIDS furore, the track was initially given a 12" white label release because of its sampling of other records.The...
" dealt with the media coverage given to AIDS
AIDS
Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome is a disease of the human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus...
, sampling heavily from The Beatles
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...
' "All You Need Is Love
All You Need Is Love
"All You Need Is Love" is a song written by John Lennon and credited to Lennon–McCartney. It was first performed by The Beatles on Our World, the first live global television link. Watched by 400 million in 26 countries, the programme was broadcast via satellite on 25 June 1967...
" and Samantha Fox
Samantha Fox
Samantha Karen "Sam" Fox is an English dance-pop singer, actress, and former glamour model. In 1983, at the age of 16, she began her topless modeling career on Page Three of The Sun, and went on to become a popular pin-up girl...
's "Touch Me (I Want Your Body)
Touch Me (I Want Your Body)
"Touch Me " was the first hit for British singer Samantha Fox. It was released in 1986 from her first album Touch Me. The single was a worldwide hit, peaking at number four in the United States , number three in her native UK, and topping the Australian and Canadian charts...
". Although it was declined by distributors fearful of prosecution, and threatened with lawsuits, copies of the one-sided white label
White label
White label records are vinyl records with adhesive plain white labels affixed. Test pressings, usually with Test Pressing written on the label, with catalogue number, artist and recording time or date, are produced in small quantities to evaluate the quality of the disc production...
12" were sent to the music press
Music journalism
Music journalism is criticism and reportage about music. It began in the eighteenth century as comment on what is now thought of as 'classical music'. This aspect of music journalism, today often referred to as music criticism , comprises the study, discussion, evaluation, and interpretation of...
; it received positive reviews and was made "single of the week" in Sounds
Sounds (magazine)
Sounds was a long-term British music paper, published weekly from 10 October 1970 – 6 April 1991. It was produced by Spotlight Publications , which was set up by Jack Hutton and Peter Wilkinson, who left "Melody Maker" to start their own company...
. A later piece in the same magazine called The JAMs "the hottest, most exhilarating band this year.... It's hard to understand what it feels like to come across something you believe to be totally new; I have never been so wholeheartedly convinced that a band are so good and exciting."
The JAMs re-edited and re-released "All You Need Is Love" in May 1987, removing or doctoring the most antagonistic samples; lyrics from the song appeared as promotional graffiti
Graffiti
Graffiti is the name for images or lettering scratched, scrawled, painted or marked in any manner on property....
, defacing selected billboards. The re-release rewarded The JAMs not just with further praise (including NME´s "single of the week",) but also with the funds necessary to record their debut album. The album, 1987 (What the Fuck Is Going On?)
1987 (What the Fuck Is Going On?)
1987 is the debut album of The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu . 1987 was produced using extensive unauthorised samples which plagiarised a wide range of musical works, continuing a theme begun in The JAMs' debut single "All You Need Is Love"...
, was released in June 1987. Included was a song called "The Queen and I", which sampled large portions of the ABBA
ABBA
ABBA was a Swedish pop group formed in Stockholm in 1970 which consisted of Anni-Frid Lyngstad, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson and Agnetha Fältskog...
single "Dancing Queen
Dancing Queen
"Dancing Queen" is a pop song recorded by Swedish pop group ABBA. It was released in August 1976, but was first performed two months earlier, on 18 June 1976, during a Royal Variety Show in Stockholm the evening before the Swedish royal wedding. It was the follow-up single to the hit "Fernando"...
". The recording came to the attention of ABBA's management and, after a legal showdown with ABBA and the Mechanical-Copyright Protection Society
Mechanical-Copyright Protection Society
The Mechanical-Copyright Protection Society is an organisation that pay royalties to composers, songwriters and music publishers when a composition is manufactured into any format. This includes copies of the music alone such as CDs and downloads, and also products that use the music as a part of...
, the 1987 album was forcibly withdrawn from sale. Drummond and Cauty travelled to Sweden in hope of meeting ABBA and coming to some agreement, taking an NME journalist and photographer with them, along with most of the remaining copies of the LP. They failed to meet ABBA, so disposed of the copies by burning most of them in a field and throwing the rest overboard on the North Sea
North Sea
In the southwest, beyond the Straits of Dover, the North Sea becomes the English Channel connecting to the Atlantic Ocean. In the east, it connects to the Baltic Sea via the Skagerrak and Kattegat, narrow straits that separate Denmark from Norway and Sweden respectively...
ferry trip home. In a December 1987 interview, Cauty maintained that they "felt that what [they]'d done was artistically justified."
Two new singles followed 1987, on The JAMs' "KLF Communications" independent record label. Both reflected a shift towards house
House music
House music is a genre of electronic dance music that originated in Chicago, Illinois, United States in the early 1980s. It was initially popularized in mid-1980s discothèques catering to the African-American, Latino American, and gay communities; first in Chicago circa 1984, then in other...
rhythms. According to NME, The JAMs' choice of samples for the first of these, "Whitney Joins The JAMs
Whitney Joins The JAMs
-Release:"Whitney Joins The JAMs" was given a low-key release in the UK, initially as a run of 500 one-sided 12-inch singles in generic monochrome KLF Communications sleeves. The vinyl labels contained only the title and "120 bpm"...
" saw them leaving behind their strategy of "collision course" to "move straight onto the art of super selective theft". The song uses samples of the Mission: Impossible
Mission: Impossible
Mission: Impossible is an American television series which was created and initially produced by Bruce Geller. It chronicled the missions of a team of secret American government agents known as the Impossible Missions Force . The leader of the team was Jim Phelps, played by Peter Graves, except in...
and Shaft
Shaft (1971 film)
Shaft is a 1971 American blaxploitation film directed by Gordon Parks, released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. An action film with elements of film noir, Shaft tells the story of a black private detective, John Shaft, who travels through Harlem and to the Italian mob neighborhoods in order to find the...
themes alongside Whitney Houston
Whitney Houston
Whitney Elizabeth Houston is an American singer, actress, producer and a former model. Houston is the most awarded female act of all time, according to Guinness World Records, and her list of awards include 1 Emmy Award, 6 Grammy Awards, 30 Billboard Music Awards, 22 American Music Awards, among...
's "I Wanna Dance With Somebody
I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)
"I Wanna Dance with Somebody " is the first single from Whitney Houston's second studio album Whitney. It was produced by Narada Michael Walden, and written by George Merrill and Shannon Rubicam of the band Boy Meets Girl, who had previously written the number-one Whitney Houston hit "How Will I...
". Ironically, Drummond has claimed that The KLF were later offered the job of producing or remixing a new Whitney Houston album as an inducement from her record label boss (Clive Davis
Clive Davis
Clive Davis is an American record producer and music industry executive. He has won five Grammy Awards and is a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a non-performer. From 1967 to 1973 he was the President of Columbia Records. He was the founder and president of Arista Records from 1975...
of Arista Records
Arista Records
Arista was an American record label. It was a wholly owned subsidiary of Sony Music Entertainment and operated under the RCA Music Group. The label was founded in 1974 by Clive Davis, who formerly worked for CBS Records...
) to sign with them. Drummond turned the job down, but nonetheless The KLF signed with Arista as their American distributors. The second single in this sequence—Drummond and Cauty's third and final single of 1987—was "Down Town
Down Town
"Down Town" was the a 1987 release by The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu . The song is gospel music driven by house music rhythms, incorporating a sample of Petula Clark's 1964 single "Downtown".-Origins:...
", a dance record built around a gospel choir and "Downtown
Downtown (Petula Clark song)
"Downtown" is a pop song composed by Tony Hatch which, as recorded by Petula Clark, became an international hit – No. 1 in the US and No. 2 in the UK – at the end of 1964.-Original recording:...
" by 1960s star Petula Clark
Petula Clark
Petula Clark, CBE is an English singer, actress, and composer whose career has spanned seven decades.Clark's professional career began as an entertainer on BBC Radio during World War II...
. These early works were later collected on the compilation album Shag Times
Shag Times
Shag Times, sometimes called Shag Times , is a UK compilation and remix double album released in 1989 by The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu...
.
A second album, Who Killed The JAMs?, was released in early 1988. Who Killed The JAMs? was a rather less haphazard affair than 1987, earning the duo at least one five-star review (from Sounds Magazine, who called it "a masterpiece of pathos".)
The Timelords
In 1988, Drummond and Cauty became "Time Boy" and "Lord Rock", and released a 'noveltyNovelty song
A novelty song is a comical or nonsensical song, performed principally for its comical effect. Humorous songs, or those containing humorous elements, are not necessarily novelty songs. The term arose in Tin Pan Alley to describe one of the major divisions of popular music. The other two divisions...
' pop single, "Doctorin' the Tardis" as The Timelords. The song is predominantly a mash-up
Mashup (music)
A mashup or bootleg is a song or composition created by blending two or more pre-recorded songs, usually by overlaying the vocal track of one song seamlessly over the instrumental track of another...
of the Doctor Who theme music
Doctor Who theme music
The Doctor Who theme is a piece of music composed by Ron Grainer and realised by Delia Derbyshire at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. Created in 1963, it was one of the first electronic music signature tunes for television and after nearly five decades remains one of the most easily...
, "Block Buster!
Block Buster!
"Block Buster!" is a popular song by The Sweet. Written by Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman, and produced by Phil Wainman, "Block Buster!" was the band's sole UK #1 hit...
" by The Sweet and Gary Glitter
Gary Glitter
Gary Glitter is an English former glam rock singer-songwriter and musician.Glitter first came to prominence in the glam rock era of the early 1970s...
's "Rock and Roll (Part Two)
Rock and Roll (Gary Glitter song)
"Rock and Roll", also known as "The Hey Song", is a song performed by British glam rocker Gary Glitter that was released in 1972 as a single and on the album Glitter. Co-written by Glitter and Mike Leander, the song is in two parts: Part 1 is a vocal track reflecting on the history of the genre,...
", with sparse vocals inspired by The Daleks
Dalek
The Daleks are a fictional extraterrestrial race of mutants from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Within the series, Daleks are cyborgs from the planet Skaro, created by the scientist Davros during the final years of a thousand-year war against the Thals...
and Harry Enfield
Harry Enfield
Henry Richard "Harry" Enfield is a BAFTA-winning English comedian, actor, writer and director.-Early life:...
's "Loadsamoney" character. "Doctorin' the Tardis" reached number one in the UK Singles Chart
UK Singles Chart
The UK Singles Chart is compiled by The Official Charts Company on behalf of the British record-industry. The full chart contains the top selling 200 singles in the United Kingdom based upon combined record sales and download numbers, though some media outlets only list the Top 40 or the Top 75 ...
on 12 June, and charted highly in Australia
ARIA Charts
The ARIA charts are the main Australian music sales charts, issued weekly by the Australian Recording Industry Association. The charts are a record of the highest selling singles and albums in various genres in Australia. ARIA commenced compiling its own charts in-house from the week ending 26 June...
and New Zealand
Recording Industry Association of New Zealand
The Recording Industry Association of New Zealand is a non-profit trade association of record producers, distributors and recording artists who sell music in New Zealand...
.
Also credited on the record was "Ford Timelord", Cauty's 1968 Ford Galaxie
Ford Galaxie
The Ford Galaxie was a full-size car built in the United States by the Ford Motor Company for model years 1959 through 1974. The name was used for the top models in Ford’s full-size range from 1959 until 1961, in a marketing attempt to appeal to the excitement surrounding the Space Race...
American police car (claimed to have been used in the film Superman IV
Superman IV: The Quest for Peace
Superman IV: The Quest for Peace is a 1987 superhero film directed by Sidney J. Furie. It is the fourth film in the Superman film series and the last installment to star Christopher Reeve as the Man of Steel. It is the first film in the series not to be produced by Alexander and Ilya Salkind, but...
filmed in the UK). Drummond and Cauty declared that the car had spoken to them, giving its name as Ford Timelord, and advising the duo to become "The Timelords".
Drummond and Cauty would later portray the song as the result of a deliberate effort to write a number one hit single. However, in interviews with Snub TV
Snub TV
Snub TV or simply Snub was a alternative culture television programme that ran from 1987 to 1989. Originally produced as a part of the Nightflight in the USA, it went on to success in the UK and other countries...
and BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation which also broadcasts internationally, specialising in current popular music and chart hits throughout the day. Radio 1 provides alternative genres after 7:00pm including electronic dance, hip hop, rock...
, Drummond said that the truth was that they had intended to make a house record using the Dr Who theme. After Cauty had laid down a basic track, Drummond observed that their house idea wasn't working and what they actually had was a Glitter beat
Gary Glitter
Gary Glitter is an English former glam rock singer-songwriter and musician.Glitter first came to prominence in the glam rock era of the early 1970s...
. Sensing the opportunity to make a commercial pop record they abandoned all notions of underground
Underground music
Underground music comprises a range of different musical genres that operate outside of mainstream culture. Such music can typically share common values, such as the valuing of sincerity and intimacy; an emphasis on freedom of creative expression; an appreciation of artistic creativity...
credibility and went instead for the lowest common denominator. According to the British music press, the result was "rancid", "pure, unadulterated agony" and "excruciating" and—in something of a backhanded compliment from the normally supportive Sounds Magazine—"a record so noxious that a top ten place can be its only destiny". They were right: the record went on to sell over one million copies. A single of The Timelords' remix
Remix
A remix is an alternative version of a recorded song, made from an original version. This term is also used for any alterations of media other than song ....
es of the song was released: "Gary Joins The JAMs" featured original vocal contributions from Glitter himself, who also appeared on Top of the Pops
Top of the Pops
Top of the Pops, also known as TOTP, is a British music chart television programme, made by the BBC and originally broadcast weekly from 1 January 1964 to 30 July 2006. After 25 December 2006 it became a radio program, now hosted by Tony Blackburn...
to promote the song with The Timelords.
The Timelords released one other product, a 1989 book called The Manual (How to Have a Number One the Easy Way)
The Manual
The Manual is a 1988 book by The Timelords , better known as The KLF. It is a tongue-in-cheek step by step guide to achieving a No.1 single with no money or musical skills, and a case study of the duo's UK novelty pop No...
, a tongue-in-cheek but nonetheless insightful step-by-step guide to achieving a number one hit single with little money or talent.
The KLF
By the time the JAMs' single "Whitney Joins The JAMs" was released in September 1987, their record label had been renamed "KLF Communications" (from the earlier "The Sound of Mu(sic)"). However, the duo's first release as The KLF was not until March 1988, with the single "Burn the Bastards"/"Burn the BeatBurn the Bastards
"Burn the Bastards" is a 1988 song by Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty as The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu , from their second and final album Who Killed The JAMs?...
" (KLF 002). Although the Justified Ancients of Mu Mu name was not yet retired, most future Drummond and Cauty releases would go under the name "The KLF".
The name change accompanied a change in Drummond and Cauty's musical direction. Said Drummond (as 'King Boy D') in January 1988, "We might put out a couple of 12" records under the name The K.L.F., these will be rap free just pure dance music, so don't expect to see them reviewed in the music papers". King Boy D also claimed that he and Rockman Rock were "pissed off at [them]selves" for letting "people expect us to lead some sort of crusade for sampling". In 1990 he recalled that "We wanted to make [as The KLF] something that was ... pure dance music, without any reference points, without any nod to the history of rock and roll. It was the type of music that by early '87 was really exciting me ... [although] we weren't able to get our first KLF records out until late '88".
The 12" records subsequently released in 1988 and 1989 by The KLF were indeed rap free and house-oriented; remixes of some of The JAMs tracks, and new singles, the largely instrumental acid house
Acid house
Acid house is a sub-genre of house music that emphasizes a repetitive, hypnotic and trance-like style, often with samples or spoken lines rather than sung lyrics. Acid house's core electronic squelch sounds were developed around the mid-1980s, particularly by DJs from Chicago who experimented with...
anthems "What Time Is Love?
What Time Is Love?
"What Time Is Love?" is a song released, in different mixes, as a series of singles by the band The KLF. It featured prominently and repeatedly in their output from 1988 to 1992 and, under the moniker of 2K, in 1997...
" and "3 a.m. Eternal
3 a.m. Eternal
"3 a.m. Eternal" is a song by The KLF, numerous versions of which were released as singles between 1989 and 1992. In January 1991, an acid house pop version of the song became an international top ten hit single, hitting #1 in the UK Singles Chart and #5 on the US Billboard Hot 100, and leading to...
", the first incarnations of later international chart successes. The KLF described these new tracks as "Pure Trance". In 1989, The KLF appeared at the Helter Skelter rave in Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire is a county in the South East region of England, bordering on Warwickshire and Northamptonshire , Buckinghamshire , Berkshire , Wiltshire and Gloucestershire ....
. "They wooed the crowd", wrote Scotland on Sunday
Scotland on Sunday
Scotland on Sunday is a Scottish Sunday newspaper, published in Edinburgh by The Scotsman Publications Ltd and consequently assuming the role of Sunday sister to its daily stablemate The Scotsman...
some years later, "by pelting them with... £1,000 worth of Scottish pound notes which each bore the message 'Children we love you'".
Also in 1989, The KLF embarked upon the creation of a road movie
Road movie
A road movie is a film genre in which the main character or characters leave home to travel from place to place. They usually leave home to escape their current lives.-History:...
and soundtrack album
Soundtrack album
A soundtrack album is any album that incorporates music directly recorded from the soundtrack of a particular feature film or television program. In some cases, not all the tracks from the movie are included in the album; however there are rare cases of songs in the trailers that do not appear in...
, both titled The White Room
The KLF films
The KLF released three long form videos during their career - Waiting, The Rites of Mu, and The Stadium House Trilogy. They also worked on an ambitious road movie - The White Room - which was never released...
, funded by the profits of "Doctorin' The Tardis". Neither the film nor its soundtrack were formally released, although bootleg
Bootleg recording
A bootleg recording is an audio or video recording of a performance that was not officially released by the artist or under other legal authority. The process of making and distributing such recordings is known as bootlegging...
copies of both exist. The soundtrack album contained pop-house versions of some of the "pure trance" singles, as well as new songs, most of which would appear (albeit in radically reworked form) on the version of the album which was eventually released to mainstream success. A single from the original album was released, however: "Kylie Said to Jason
Kylie Said to Jason
"Kylie Said to Jason" was a 1989 single by The KLF, "Kylie" and "Jason" being Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan, then stars in the popular Australian TV soap opera Neighbours. Designed for chart success, the single nonetheless failed to enter the UK top 100...
", an electropop record featuring references to Todd Terry
Todd Terry
Todd N. Terry is an American DJ, producer, and remixer.-Career:Terry's productions extensively used samples blending the sounds of classic disco, the Chicago sound, and elements of hip-hop....
, Rolf Harris
Rolf Harris
Rolf Harris, CBE, AM is an Australian musician, singer-songwriter, composer, painter and television personality.Born in Perth, Western Australia, Harris was a champion swimmer before studying art. He moved to England in 1952, where he started to appear on television programmes on which he drew the...
, Skippy the Bush Kangaroo
Skippy the Bush Kangaroo
Skippy the Bush Kangaroo is an Australian television series for children created by John McCallum, produced from 1966–1968, telling the adventures of a young boy and his intelligent pet kangaroo, in the Waratah National Park in Duffys Forest, near Sydney, New South Wales.Ninety-one 30-minute...
and BBC comedy programme The Good Life. In reference to that song, Drummond and Cauty noted that they had worn "Pet Shop Boys
Pet Shop Boys
Pet Shop Boys are an English electronic dance music duo, consisting of Neil Tennant, who provides main vocals, keyboards and occasional guitar, and Chris Lowe on keyboards....
infatuations brazenly on [their] sleeves".
The film project was fraught with difficulties and setbacks, including dwindling funds. "Kylie Said to Jason", which Drummond and Cauty were hoping could "rescue them from the jaws of bankruptcy", flopped commercially, failing even to make the UK top 100. In consequence, The White Room film project was put on hold, and The KLF abandoned the musical direction of the soundtrack and single.
Meanwhile, "What Time Is Love?" was generating acclaim within the underground clubs of continental Europe; according to KLF Communications, "The KLF were being feted by all the 'right' DJs". This prompted Drummond and Cauty to pursue the acid house tone of their Pure Trance series. A further Pure Trance release, "Last Train to Trancentral
Last Train to Trancentral
"Last Train to Trancentral" is a song released, in different mixes, as a series of singles by The KLF, including "Last Train to Trancentral ", a commercially successful single of April 1991 that reached # 2 in the UK Singles Chart and achieved international top ten placings...
", followed. At this time, Cauty had co-founded The Orb
The Orb
Throughout 1989, the Orb, along with Martin Glover, developed the musical genre of ambient house through the use of a diverse array of samples and recordings. The culmination of its musical work came toward the end of the year when the group recorded a session for John Peel on BBC Radio 1...
as an ambient side-project with Alex Paterson
Alex Paterson
Alex Paterson is an English musician and co-founder of the ambient group The Orb, in which he has worked since its inception....
. Cauty and Paterson DJ-ed at the monthly "Land Of Oz" house night in London, and The KLF's seminal 1990 "ambient house" LP Chill Out
Chill out
Chill out may mean:*Chill out music, a laid-back style of music*Chill Out, an album by KLF*Chill Out *Chill Out, an album by John Lee Hooker...
was born partly from these sessions. The ambient album Space and The KLF's ambient video Waiting were also released in 1990, as was a heavier, more industrial sounding dance track, "It's Grim Up North
It's Grim Up North
"It's Grim Up North" was a 1991 single by The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu , the main lyrics of which consist of a list of towns and cities in the North of England, set to a pounding industrial techno accompaniment reminiscent of steam whistles, all of which segues into an orchestral instrumental of...
", under The JAMs' moniker.
In 1990 The KLF launched a series of singles with an upbeat pop-house sound which they dubbed "Stadium House". Songs from The White Room soundtrack were re-recorded with rap and more vocals (by guests labelled "Additional Communicators"), a sample-heavy pop-rock production and crowd noise samples. The results brought The KLF international recognition and acclaim. The first "Stadium House" single, "What Time Is Love?", released in August 1990, reached number five in the UK Singles Chart and hit the top-ten internationally. The follow-up, "3 a.m. Eternal", was an international top-five hit in January 1991, reaching number one in the UK and number five in the US Billboard Hot 100
Billboard Hot 100
The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...
. The album The White Room
The White Room
Allmusic said that The White Room "represents the commercial and artistic peak of late-'80s acid-house" and Q magazine called it "strikingly imaginative" and "a more subtle form of subterfuge" than previous works...
followed in March 1991, reaching number three in the UK. A substantial reworking of the aborted soundtrack, the album featured a segue
Segue
A segue is a smooth transition from one topic or section to the next.-In music:In music, segue is a direction to the performer. It means continue without a pause. It comes from the Italian "it follows". The term attacca is also used in classical music.For written music it implies a transition...
d series of "Stadium House" songs followed by downtempo
Downtempo
Downtempo is a laid-back electronic music style similar to ambient music, but usually with a beat or groove unlike the beatless forms of Ambient music. The beat is sometimes made from loops that have a hypnotic feeling...
tracks.
The KLF's chart success continued with the single "Last Train to Trancentral" hitting number two in the UK, and number three in the Eurochart Hot 100
Eurochart Hot 100 Singles
The European Hot 100 Singles has been compiled by Billboard and Music & Media magazine since March, 1984. The chart is based on national singles sales charts in 15 European countries: Austria, Belgium , Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden,...
. In December 1991, a re-working of a song from 1987, "Justified & Ancient" was released, featuring the vocals of American country star Tammy Wynette
Tammy Wynette
Virginia Wynette Pugh, known professionally as Tammy Wynette , was an American country music singer-songwriter and one of the genre's best-known artists and biggest-selling female vocalists....
. It was another international hit—peaking at number two in the UK, and number 11 on the Billboard Hot 100—as was "America: What Time Is Love?", featuring the vocals of ex-Deep Purple
Deep Purple
Deep Purple are an English rock band formed in Hertford in 1968. Along with Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, they are considered to be among the pioneers of heavy metal and modern hard rock, although some band members believe that their music cannot be categorised as belonging to any one genre...
member Glenn Hughes (number four on the UK singles chart), a hard, guitar-laden reworking of "What Time Is Love?".
In 1990 and 1991, The KLF also remixed tracks by Depeche Mode
Depeche Mode
Depeche Mode are an English electronic music band formed in 1980 in Basildon, Essex. The group's original line-up consisted of Dave Gahan , Martin Gore , Andy Fletcher and Vince Clarke...
("Policy of Truth
Policy of Truth
"Policy of Truth" is Depeche Mode's twenty-fifth UK single, released on May 7, 1990, and the third single for the album Violator.The cover art for "Policy of Truth" has the blurred image of a nude woman. The camera angles and poses differ on the 7" Vinyl, the 12" Vinyl, the CD and Cassette. Usually...
"), The Moody Boys
The Moody Boys
The Moody Boys was a UK house music production and remix outfit active since 1988 , consisting of Tony Thorpe and, until 1992, Jimmy Cauty.-History:...
("What Is Dub?"), and the Pet Shop Boys
Pet Shop Boys
Pet Shop Boys are an English electronic dance music duo, consisting of Neil Tennant, who provides main vocals, keyboards and occasional guitar, and Chris Lowe on keyboards....
("So Hard" from the Behaviour album, and "It Must Be Obvious"). Pet Shop Boy Neil Tennant
Neil Tennant
Neil Francis Tennant is an English musician, singer and songwriter, who, with bandmate Chris Lowe, makes up the successful electronic dance music duo Pet Shop Boys.-Childhood:...
described the process: "When they did the remix of 'So Hard', they didn't do a remix at all, they re-wrote the record ... I had to go and sing the vocals again, they did it in a different way. I was impressed that Bill Drummond had written all the chords out and played it on an acoustic guitar, very thorough."
After successive name changes and a plethora of highly influential dance records, Drummond and Cauty ultimately became, as The KLF, the biggest-selling singles act in the world for 1991, still incorporating the work of other artists but in less gratuitous ways and predominantly without legal problems.
Vocalist Wanda Dee is featured on many of their hits and in addition to her own show, still performs as "Wanda Dee of the KLF"
Retirement
On 12 February 1992, The KLF and crust punkCrust punk
Crust punk is a form of music influenced by anarcho-punk, hardcore punk and extreme metal. The style, which evolved in the mid-1980s in England, often has songs with dark and pessimistic lyrics that linger on political and social ills...
group Extreme Noise Terror
Extreme Noise Terror
Extreme Noise Terror are a British crust punk / grindcore band originally formed in Ipswich, England in 1985. The band are widely considered one of the earliest and most influential European grindcore bands, and particularly the forefathers of the crustgrind subgenre.Notable for one of the...
performed a live version of "3 a.m. Eternal" at the BRIT Awards
Brit Awards
The Brit Awards are the British Phonographic Industry's annual pop music awards. The name was originally a shortened form of "British", "Britain" or "Britannia", but subsequently became a backronym for British Record Industry Trust...
, the British Phonographic Industry
British Phonographic Industry
The British Phonographic Industry is the British record industry's trade association.-Structure:Its membership comprises hundreds of music companies including all four "major" record companies , associate members such as manufacturers and distributors, and hundreds of independent music companies...
's annual awards show; a "violently antagonistic performance" in front of "a stunned music-business audience". Drummond and Cauty had planned to throw buckets of sheep's blood over the audience, but were prevented from doing so due to opposition from BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
lawyers and "hardcore vegans
Veganism
Veganism is the practice of eliminating the use of animal products. Ethical vegans reject the commodity status of animals and the use of animal products for any purpose, while dietary vegans or strict vegetarians eliminate them from their diet only...
" Extreme Noise Terror. The performance was instead garnished by a limping, kilt
Kilt
The kilt is a knee-length garment with pleats at the rear, originating in the traditional dress of men and boys in the Scottish Highlands of the 16th century. Since the 19th century it has become associated with the wider culture of Scotland in general, or with Celtic heritage even more broadly...
ed, cigar-chomping Drummond firing blanks
Blank (cartridge)
A blank is a type of cartridge for a firearm that contains gunpowder but no bullet or shot. When fired, the blank makes a flash and an explosive sound . Blanks are often used for simulation , training, and for signaling...
from an automatic weapon over the heads of the crowd. As the band left the stage, The KLF's promoter and narrator Scott Piering
Scott Piering
Scott Piering was a successful and influential American-born music publicist for many British music acts, including Pulp, The KLF, The Smiths, Stereophonics, The Orb, Placebo, Underworld and The Prodigy...
announced over the PA
Public address
A public address system is an electronic amplification system with a mixer, amplifier and loudspeakers, used to reinforce a sound source, e.g., a person giving a speech, a DJ playing prerecorded music, and distributing the sound throughout a venue or building.Simple PA systems are often used in...
system that "The KLF have now left the music business". Later in the evening the band dumped a dead sheep with the message "I died for you—bon appetit" tied around its waist at the entrance to one of the post-ceremony parties.
Reactions were mixed. Piers Morgan
Piers Morgan
Piers Stefan Pughe-Morgan , known professionally as Piers Morgan, is a British journalist and television presenter. He is editorial director of First News, a national newspaper for children....
, writing in The Sun
The Sun (newspaper)
The Sun is a daily national tabloid newspaper published in the United Kingdom and owned by News Corporation. Sister editions are published in Glasgow and Dublin...
, under the headline "KLF's Sick Gun Stunt Fails To Hit The Target", called The KLF "pop's biggest wallies" and producer Trevor Horn
Trevor Horn
Trevor Charles Horn CBE is an English pop music record producer, songwriter, musician and singer. He was born in Houghton-le-Spring in north-east England....
is reported to have called their antics "disgusting". NME, on the other hand, said that The KLF "stormed" the show and that after their performance the BRITs show went "downhill all the way".
Scott Piering
Scott Piering
Scott Piering was a successful and influential American-born music publicist for many British music acts, including Pulp, The KLF, The Smiths, Stereophonics, The Orb, Placebo, Underworld and The Prodigy...
's PA announcement of The KLF's retirement was largely ignored at the time. NME, for example, assured their readers that the tensions and contradictions would continue to "push and spark" The KLF and that more "musical treasure" would be the result, but they noted: "[Drummond has] himself nicely skewered on the horns of an almighty dilemma. He has taken over pop music and it has been a piece of piss to do so. And he hates that. He wants to be separate from a music industry that clasps him ever closer to its bosom. He loves being in the very belly of the beast, yet he wishes he was something that'd cause it to throw up too. He wants not only to bite the hand that feeds but to shove it into an industrial mincer and stomp the resultant pulp into the dirt, yet pop, as long as you continue to make it money, would let you sexually abuse its grandmother. There is, Bill old boy, no sensible way out."
In the weeks following the BRITs performance, The KLF continued working with Extreme Noise Terror on the album The Black Room
The Black Room
The Black Room is a never-released LP by The KLF/The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu, originally intended to be a complement to their earlier LP The White Room.-History:...
, but it was never finished. On 14 May 1992, The KLF announced their immediate retirement from the music industry and the deletion
Deletion (music industry)
Deletion is a music industry term referring to the removal of a record or records from a label's official catalog, so that it is out of print, but usually at a record artist's request....
of their entire back catalogue:
In a comprehensive examination of The KLF's announcement and its context, Select called it "the last grand gesture, the most heroic act of public self destruction in the history of pop. And it's also Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty's final extravagant howl of self disgust, defiance and contempt for a music world gone foul and corrupt." Many of The KLF's friends and collaborators gave their reactions in the magazine. Movie director Bill Butt said that "Like everything, they're dealing with it in a very realistic way, a fresh, unbitter way, which is very often not the case. A lot of bands disappear with such a terrible loss of dignity". Scott Piering said that "They've got a huge buzz off this, that's for sure, because it's something that's finally thrilling. It's scary to have thrown away a fortune which I know they have. Just the idea of starting over is exciting. Starting over on what? Well, they have such great ideas, like buying submarines". Even Kenny Gates, who as a director of The KLF's distributors APT stood to lose financially from the move, called it "Conceptually and philosophically ... absolutely brilliant". Mark Stent
Mark Stent
Mark 'Spike' Stent is a British record producer, and audio engineer who has worked with The KLF, Björk, Keane, Depeche Mode, Muse, Erasure, Hard-Fi, Massive Attack, Janet Jackson, Madonna, Christina Aguilera, Marilyn Manson, Pet Shop Boys, Dave Matthews, No Doubt/Gwen Stefani, CSS, Beth Orton,...
reported the doubts of many when he said that "I [have] had so many people who I know, heads of record companies, A&R men saying, 'Come on, It's a big scam.' But I firmly believe it's over". "For the very last spectacularly insane time", the magazine concluded, "The KLF have done what was least expected of them".
The final KLF Info sheet discussed the retirement in a typically offbeat fashion, and asked "What happens to 'Footnotes in rock legend'? Do they gather dust with Ashton Gardner and Dyke
Ashton, Gardner and Dyke
Ashton, Gardner and Dyke were a power rock trio, most popular in the early 1970s. They are best remembered for their song, "Resurrection Shuffle", a transatlantic Top 40 success in 1971...
, The Vapors
The Vapors
The Vapors were a New Wave and power pop band from England, that existed between 1979 and 1981. They had a hit with the song "Turning Japanese" in 1980, which reached #3 in the UK Singles Chart, and #36 in the U.S...
, and the Utah Saints
Utah Saints
Utah Saints is a dance band based in Leeds, England. The music is produced by Jez Willis and Tim Garbutt, who are joined on-stage by other musicians whenever the band plays live...
, or does their influence live on in unseen ways, permeating future cultures? A passing general of a private army has the answer. 'No', he whispers 'but the dust they gather is of the rarest quality. Each speck a universe awaiting creation, Big Bang
Big Bang
The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological model that explains the early development of the Universe. According to the Big Bang theory, the Universe was once in an extremely hot and dense state which expanded rapidly. This rapid expansion caused the young Universe to cool and resulted in...
just a dawn away'."
There have been numerous suggestions that in 1992 Drummond was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Drummond himself said that he was on the edge of the "abyss". BRIT Awards organiser Jonathan King
Jonathan King
Jonathan King is an English singer, songwriter, impresario and record producer. He is also the author of three novels, Bible Two and The Booker Prize Winner , and Beware the Monkey Man , and an autobiography, 65 My Life So Far .King first came to prominence as an...
had publicly endorsed The KLF's live performance, a response which Scott Piering cited as "the real low point". The KLF's BRITs statuette for "Best British Group" of 1992 was later "found" buried in a field near Stonehenge
Stonehenge
Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument located in the English county of Wiltshire, about west of Amesbury and north of Salisbury. One of the most famous sites in the world, Stonehenge is composed of a circular setting of large standing stones set within earthworks...
.
K Foundation and post-retirement projects
The K FoundationK Foundation
The K Foundation was an art foundation set up by Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty in 1993, following their 'retirement' from the music industry. The Foundation served as an artistic outlet for the duo's post-retirement KLF income...
was an arts foundation established by Drummond and Cauty in 1993 following their 'retirement' from the music industry. From 1993 to 1995 they engaged in a number of art projects and media campaigns, including the high-profile K Foundation art award
K Foundation art award
The 1994 K Foundation award was an award given by the K Foundation to the "worst artist of the year". The shortlist for the £40,000 K Foundation award was identical to the shortlist for the well-established but controversial £20,000 Turner Prize for the best British Contemporary artist...
(for the "worst artist of the year"). Most notoriously, they burnt what was left of their KLF earnings—a million pounds in cash—and filmed the performance.
The Help Album
The Help Album is a 1995 charity album devoted to the War Child charity's aid efforts in war-stricken areas, such as Bosnia and Herzegovina...
as The One World Orchestra ("featuring The Massed Pipes and Drums of the Children's Free Revolutionary Volunteer Guards"). "The Magnificent" is a drum'n'bass
Drum and bass
Drum and bass is a type of electronic music which emerged in the late 1980s. The genre is characterized by fast breakbeats , with heavy bass and sub-bass lines...
version of the theme tune from The Magnificent Seven
The Magnificent Seven
The Magnificent Seven is an American Western film directed by John Sturges, and released in 1960. It is a fictional tale of a group of seven American gunmen who are hired to protect a small agricultural village in Mexico from a group of marauding Mexican bandits...
, with vocal samples from DJ Fleka of Serbian radio station B92
B92
B92 is a radio and television broadcaster with national coverage headquartered in Belgrade, Serbia. The network's key demographic is chiefly urban and young audience. Its programs, including the news cover topics with fairly liberal political painted attitudes...
: "Humans against killing... that sounds like a junkie against dope".
On 17 September 1997, ten years after their debut album 1987
1987 (What the Fuck Is Going On?)
1987 is the debut album of The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu . 1987 was produced using extensive unauthorised samples which plagiarised a wide range of musical works, continuing a theme begun in The JAMs' debut single "All You Need Is Love"...
, Drummond and Cauty re-emerged briefly as 2K. 2K made a one-off performance at London's Barbican Arts Centre with Mark Manning, Acid Brass
Acid Brass
Acid Brass was a musical collaboration between Turner-Prize-winning artist Jeremy Deller and the Williams Fairey Brass Band. The project was based on fusing the music of a traditional brass band with acid house and Detroit techno....
, the Liverpool Dockers and Gimpo
Alan Goodrick (Gimpo)
Alan Goodrick is usually known by his nom de guerre Gimpo. He is best known as a friend and collaborator of The KLF and the K Foundation. He filmed the Watch the K Foundation Burn a Million Quid film, drove Bill Drummond and Mark Manning to the top of the world , and was the ski-masked person...
; a performance at which "Two elderly gentlemen, reeking of Dettol
Dettol
Dettol is the trade name for a line of liquid and solid antiseptic cleansing products manufactured by Reckitt Benckiser.It is ranked as the 48th most trust brand in India by The Brand Trust Report 2011...
, caused havoc in their motorised wheelchair
Wheelchair
A wheelchair is a chair with wheels, designed to be a replacement for walking. The device comes in variations where it is propelled by motors or by the seated occupant turning the rear wheels by hand. Often there are handles behind the seat for someone else to do the pushing...
s. These old reprobates, bearing a grandfatherly resemblance to messrs Cauty and Drummond, claimed to have just been asked along." The song performed at the Barbican – "Fuck the Millennium
Fuck the Millennium
"Fuck the Millennium" or "***K the Millennium" is an electronic protest song that was released as a single in 1997 by 2K...
" (a remix of "What Time Is Love?" featuring Acid Brass and incorporating elements of the hymn "Eternal Father, Strong to Save
Eternal Father, Strong to Save
"Eternal Father, Strong to Save" is a hymn often associated with the Royal Navy or the United States Navy and United States Marine Corps. Accordingly, it is often known as the Royal Navy Hymn or the United States Navy Hymn , and sometimes by the last line of its first verse, "For Those in Peril on...
") – was also released as single. These activities were accompanied by the usual full page press adverts, this time asking readers "***k The Millennium: Yes/No?" with a telephone number provided for voting. At the same time, Drummond and Cauty were also K2 Plant Hire, with plans to build a "People's Pyramid" from used house bricks; this plan never reached fruition.
As of 2010,Bill Drummond continues to work as a writer and conceptual artist, with occasional appearances on radio and television. Jimmy Cauty has been involved in several post-KLF projects including the music and conceptual art collective Blacksmoke
Blacksmoke
Blacksmoke a.k.a. The Blacksmoke Organisation are "an occasional art collective and musical group dedicated to the propagation of audio visual noise". The precise creative membership of Blacksmoke is a closely guarded secret. It is documented that a founding member is The KLF co-founder Jimmy Cauty...
and, more recently, numerous creative projects with the aquarium and the L-13 Light Industrial Workshop based in Clerkenwell, London.
KLF Communications
From their very earliest releases as The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu until their retirement in 1992, the music of Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty was independently releasedIndependent record label
An independent record label is a record label operating without the funding of or outside the organizations of the major record labels. A great number of bands and musical acts begin on independent labels.-Overview:...
in their home country (the UK). Their debut releases - the single "All You Need Is Love
All You Need Is Love (The JAMs song)
"All You Need Is Love" is a song by The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu, independently released as their debut single on 9 March 1987. A politically topical song concerning the UK media's AIDS furore, the track was initially given a 12" white label release because of its sampling of other records.The...
" and the album 1987
1987 (What the Fuck Is Going On?)
1987 is the debut album of The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu . 1987 was produced using extensive unauthorised samples which plagiarised a wide range of musical works, continuing a theme begun in The JAMs' debut single "All You Need Is Love"...
- were released under the label name "The Sound Of Mu(sic)". However, by the end of 1987 Drummond and Cauty had renamed their label to "KLF Communications" and, in October 1987, the first of many "information sheets" (self written missives from The KLF to fans and the media) was sent out by the label.
KLF Communications releases were distributed by Rough Trade Distribution (a spinoff of Rough Trade Records
Rough Trade Records
Rough Trade Records is an independent record label based in London. It was formed in 1978 by Geoff Travis who had opened a record store off Ladbroke Grove...
) in the South East of England, and across the wider UK by the Cartel
The Cartel (record distributor)
The Cartel, usually known as the Cartel without capitalisation but with the definite article, was a co-operative record distribution organisation in the United Kingdom, set up by a number of small independent record labels to handle their distribution to record shops...
. As Drummond and Cauty explained, "The Cartel is, as the name implies, a group of independent distributors across the country who work in conjunction with each other providing a solid network of distribution without stepping on each other's toes. We are distributed by the Cartel." When Rough Trade Distribution collapsed in 1991 it was reported that they owed KLF Communications £500,000. (In the same feature it was reported that Drummond wished to sign Ian McCulloch
Ian McCulloch (singer)
Ian Stephen McCulloch is an English singer, born in Liverpool, and is best known as the frontman for the rock group Echo & the Bunnymen.-Career:...
to the label, but this never happened.) Plugging (the promotion to TV and radio) was handled by long time associate Scott Piering
Scott Piering
Scott Piering was a successful and influential American-born music publicist for many British music acts, including Pulp, The KLF, The Smiths, Stereophonics, The Orb, Placebo, Underworld and The Prodigy...
.
Outside the UK, KLF releases were issued under licence by local labels. In the USA, the licensees were Wax Trax (the Chill Out
Chill out
Chill out may mean:*Chill out music, a laid-back style of music*Chill Out, an album by KLF*Chill Out *Chill Out, an album by John Lee Hooker...
album), TVT
TVT Records
TVT Records was an independent US record label founded by Steve Gottlieb. Over the course of its 25 year history the label released some 25 Gold, Platinum and Multi-platinum releases. Its roster included Nine Inch Nails, Ja Rule, Lil Jon, Underworld, The KLF, Sevendust, Brian Jonestown Massacre and...
(early releases including The History of The JAMs a.k.a. The Timelords), and Arista Records
Arista Records
Arista was an American record label. It was a wholly owned subsidiary of Sony Music Entertainment and operated under the RCA Music Group. The label was founded in 1974 by Clive Davis, who formerly worked for CBS Records...
(The White Room
The White Room
Allmusic said that The White Room "represents the commercial and artistic peak of late-'80s acid-house" and Q magazine called it "strikingly imaginative" and "a more subtle form of subterfuge" than previous works...
and singles).
The KLF Communications catalogue remains deleted in the United Kingdom.
Themes
Several threads and themes unify the many incarnations of Drummond and Cauty's creative partnership. Mostly these are esoteric or opaque in nature, which has led some people to compare Drummond and Cauty's incarnations to The ResidentsThe Residents
The Residents is an American art collective best known for avant-garde music and multimedia works. The first official release under the name of The Residents was in 1972, and the group has since released over sixty albums, numerous music videos and short films, three CD-ROM projects and ten DVDs....
for their antics, if not their music. Drummond and Cauty have also been compared to Stewart Home
Stewart Home
Stewart Home is an English artist, filmmaker, writer, pamphleteer, art historian, and activist. He is best known for his novels such as the non-narrative 69 Things To Do With A Dead Princess , his re-imagining of the 1960s in Tainted Love , and earlier parodistic pulp fictions Pure Mania, Red...
and the Neoists
Neoism
Neoism is a parodistic -ism. It refers both to a specific subcultural network of artistic performance and media experimentalists, and more generally to a practical underground philosophy...
. Home himself said that the duo's work "has much more in common with the Neoist, Plagiarist and Art Strike
Art Strike 1990-1993
Campaign launched in 1986 by Stewart Home which called upon all artists to cease their artistic work between January 1, 1990 and January 1, 1993. Unlike the art strikes proposed by Gustav Metzger and the Art Workers Coalition in the 1960s, it was not merely a boycott of art institutions through...
movements of the nineteen-eighties than with the Situationist avant-garde of the fifties and sixties." Drummond and Cauty "represent a vital and innovative strand within contemporary culture", he added.
Illuminatus!
Drummond and Cauty made heavy references to DiscordianismDiscordianism
Discordianism is a religion based on the worship of Eris , the Greco-Roman goddess of strife. It was founded circa 1958–1959 after the publication of its holy book the Principia Discordia, written by Malaclypse the Younger and Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst after a series of shared hallucinations at a...
, a modern chaos-based religion originally described by Malaclypse the Younger
Malaclypse the Younger
Gregory Hill , better known by the pen name Malaclypse the Younger , was one of the two writers of the Principia Discordia, along with Kerry Wendell Thornley . He was also adapted as a character in The Illuminatus! Trilogy...
in Principia Discordia
Principia Discordia
Principia Discordia is a Discordian religious text written by Greg Hill and Kerry Thornley . It was originally published under the title "Principia Discordia or How The West Was Lost" in a limited edition of 5 copies in 1965...
, but
popularised by Robert Shea
Robert Shea
Robert Joseph Shea was an American novelist and former journalist best known as co-author with Robert Anton Wilson of the science fantasy trilogy Illuminatus!. It became a cult success and was later turned into a marathon-length stage show put on at the British National Theatre and elsewhere. In...
and Robert Anton Wilson
Robert Anton Wilson
Robert Anton Wilson , known to friends as "Bob", was an American author and polymath who became at various times a novelist, philosopher, psychologist, essayist, editor, playwright, poet, futurist, civil libertarian and self-described agnostic mystic...
in the Illuminatus!
The Illuminatus! Trilogy
The Illuminatus! Trilogy is a series of three novels written by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson first published in 1975. The trilogy is a satirical, postmodern, science fiction-influenced adventure story; a drug-, sex-, and magick-laden trek through a number of conspiracy theories, both...
books, written between 1969 and 1971. The attitude and tactics of Drummond and Cauty's partnership matched that of the fictional cult whose name they had adopted. Throughout the partnership, these tactics were often interpreted by media commentators as "Situationist prank
Situationist prank
Situationist prank is a term used in the mass media to label a distinctive tactic by the Situationist International, consisting of setting up a subversive political prank, hoax or stunt; In the terminology of the Situationist International, stunts and media pranks are very similar to situations...
s" or "publicity stunt
Publicity stunt
A publicity stunt is a planned event designed to attract the public's attention to the event's organizers or their cause. Publicity stunts can be professionally organized or set up by amateurs...
s". However, according to Drummond, "That's just the way it was interpreted. We've always loathed the word scam. I know no-one's ever going to believe us, but we never felt we went out and did things to get reactions. Everything we've done has just been on a gut level instinct." Cauty has expressed similar feelings, saying of The KLF, "I think it worked because we really meant it".
In addition to resembling the fictional JAMs attitudinally and tactically, references to themes of Discordianism and Illuminatus! also manifested Drummond and Cauty's musical, visual and written work, meticulously and often covertly.
The JAMs' debut single "All You Need Is Love" includes the words "Immanentize the Eschaton
Immanentize the eschaton
In political theory and theology, to immanentize the eschaton means trying to bring about the eschaton in the immanent world. It has been used by conservative critics, foremost William F. Buckley, as a pejorative reference to certain utopian projects, such as socialism, communism and transhumanism...
!", in reference to the opening line of Illuminatus!, "They immanentized the Eschaton", interpreted as "they brought about the end of the world" or "they brought heaven to Earth". In The JAMs' "The Porpoise Song", from the album Who Killed The JAMs?, King Boy D and a talking porpoise
Porpoise
Porpoises are small cetaceans of the family Phocoenidae; they are related to whales and dolphins. They are distinct from dolphins, although the word "porpoise" has been used to refer to any small dolphin, especially by sailors and fishermen...
converse, referencing Howard, the talking porpoise in Illuminatus!. The KLF's single version of "Last Train to Trancentral" opens with the demand "Okay, everybody lie down on the floor and keep calm", which is also taken from Illuminatus!.
The refrain "All bound for Mu Mu land", from The KLF's "Justified & Ancient (Stand by The JAMs)" is a reference to the Lost Continent of Mu
Mu (lost continent)
Mu is the name of a hypothetical continent that allegedly existed in one of Earth's oceans, but disappeared at the dawn of human history.The concept and the name were proposed by 19th century traveler and writer Augustus Le Plongeon, who claimed that several ancient civilizations, such as those of...
, which Shea and Wilson identify with the fictional land Lemuria in Illuminatus!. Some research suggests that archeological remains located in waters off the coast of Japan may be Mu; at the end of the "Justified & Ancient" music video, The KLF exit in a submarine
Submarine
A submarine is a watercraft capable of independent operation below the surface of the water. It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability...
.
Drummond and Cauty's output is also highly self-referential
Self-reference
Self-reference occurs in natural or formal languages when a sentence or formula refers to itself. The reference may be expressed either directly—through some intermediate sentence or formula—or by means of some encoding...
, in common with Illuminatus!. In particular, original vocal samples are reused in a variety of musical contexts. For example, the ring modulated
Ring modulation
Ring modulation is a signal-processing effect in electronics, an implementation of amplitude modulation or frequency mixing, performed by multiplying two signals, where one is typically a sine-wave or another simple waveform. It is referred to as "ring" modulation because the analog circuit of...
"Mu Mu!" sample that first appeared on "Burn the Bastards" is also to be found on "What Time Is Love? (Live at Trancentral), "Last Train to Trancentral (Live from the Lost Continent)" and "Fuck the Millennium".
The number 23
23 (numerology)
The 23 enigma refers to the belief that most incidents and events are directly connected to the number 23, some modification of the number 23, or a number related to the number 23.-Origins:...
, significant within numerology
Numerology
Numerology is any study of the purported mystical relationship between a count or measurement and life. It has many systems and traditions and beliefs...
, is a theme of Illuminatus!, where instances of the number are both overtly and surreptitiously placed. Similarly, an abundance of such occurrences were deposited throughout Drummond and Cauty's collective output, for example:
- In lyrics to the song "Next" from the album 1987: "23 years is a mighty long time".
- In periods of time: for instance, they reportedly signed a contract preventing either of them from publicly discussing the burning of a million pounds for a period of 23 years; their 1997 return as 2K was "for 23 minutes only".
- In numbering schemes: for instance, the debut single "All You Need Is Love" took the catalogue number JAMS 23, while the final KLF Communications Information Sheet was numbered 23; and Cauty's Ford Galaxie police car had on its roof the identification mark 23.
- In significant dates during their work: for instance, a rare public appearance by The KLF, at the Liverpool Festival of Comedy, was on 23 June 1991; they announced the winner of the K Foundation award on 23 November 1993; and they burned one million pounds on 23 August 1994.
When questioned on the importance that he attaches to this number, Drummond has been evasive, responding enigmatically "I know. But I'm not going to tell, because then other people would have to stop having to wonder and the thing about beauty is for other people to wonder at it. It's not very beautiful once you know". Drummond's penchant for living by numbers has also been observed in his choosing to align the ages at which he undertook creative projects The Man and 45
45 (book)
45 is a non-fiction book by Bill Drummond, referred to by The Guardian as a "charmingly barking [mad] memoir". It collects various short stories written by Drummond between 1997 and 1998.-Content:* Forty-Five Today* The Winner Takes It All...
with the standard revolution speeds of a turntable (33.3 and 45 rpm).
The "Pyramid Blaster" is a logo and icon
Iconography
Iconography is the branch of art history which studies the identification, description, and the interpretation of the content of images. The word iconography literally means "image writing", and comes from the Greek "image" and "to write". A secondary meaning is the painting of icons in the...
frequently and prominently depicted within the duo's collective work: a pyramid
Pyramid
A pyramid is a structure whose outer surfaces are triangular and converge at a single point. The base of a pyramid can be trilateral, quadrilateral, or any polygon shape, meaning that a pyramid has at least three triangular surfaces...
, in front of which is suspended a ghetto blaster
Boombox
Boombox is a colloquial expression for a portable cassette or CD player. Other terms known are ghetto blaster, jambox, or radio-cassette. It is a device capable of receiving radio stations and playing recorded music , usually at relatively high volume...
displaying the word "Justified". This references the All-Seeing Eye
Eye of Providence
The Eye of Providence is a symbol showing an eye often surrounded by rays of light or a glory and usually enclosed by a triangle...
icon, often depicted as an eye within a triangle or pyramid, a significant symbol of Illuminatus!. The pyramid was also a theme of the duo's 1997 re-emergence, with the proposed building by K2 Plant Hire of "a massive pyramid containing one brick for every person born in the UK during the 20th century".
There is no definitive explanation of The KLF's name, nor of the origin of 'K' in the names of the K Foundation and 2K, although it is widely believed that the correct spelling was "Kopyrite" in order for the full title to comprise of 23 letters. KLF has been variously reported as being an acronym for "Kopyright Liberation Front" and "Kings of the Low Frequencies". This mirrors Illuminatus!, where the fictional JAMs are in alliance with The LDD—who regularly change the origins of their name—and The ELF ("Erisian
Eris (mythology)
Eris is the Greek goddess of strife and discord, her name being translated into Latin as Discordia. Her Greek opposite is Harmonia, whose Latin counterpart is Concordia. Homer equated her with the war-goddess Enyo, whose Roman counterpart is Bellona...
Liberation Front").
Although Drummond accounted for the adoption of The JAMs name in the first KLF Communications Info Sheet, the reasoning behind Drummond and Cauty's decision to reference the Illuminatus! mythology with such consistent intricacy is unknown. Indeed, it has been suggested by journalist Steven Poole
Steven Poole
-Biography:Poole studied English at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and has subsequently written for publications including The Independent, The Guardian, The Times Literary Supplement, The Sunday Times, and the New Statesman...
that the public's inability to fully understand The KLF results in all their subsequent activities (as a partnership or otherwise) being absorbed into The KLF's mystique. In a review of Drummond's 1999 book, 45, and an appraisal of The KLF's career, Poole stated that "[Bill Drummond] and collaborator Jimmy Cauty are the only true conceptual art
Conceptual art
Conceptual art is art in which the concept or idea involved in the work take precedence over traditional aesthetic and material concerns. Many of the works, sometimes called installations, of the artist Sol LeWitt may be constructed by anyone simply by following a set of written instructions...
ists of the [1990s]. And for all the eldritch beauty of their art, their most successful creation is the myth they have built around themselves." He concluded,
Trancentral, eternity, sheep
Trancentral (aka the Benio) was the operations centre of The KLF, their mythological home, and their studios. Despite the grandiose lyrics of "Last Train to TrancentralLast Train to Trancentral
"Last Train to Trancentral" is a song released, in different mixes, as a series of singles by The KLF, including "Last Train to Trancentral ", a commercially successful single of April 1991 that reached # 2 in the UK Singles Chart and achieved international top ten placings...
", Trancentral was in fact Cauty's residence in Stockwell
Stockwell
Stockwell is a district in inner south west London, England, located in the London Borough of Lambeth.It is situated south south-east of Charing Cross. Brixton, Clapham, Vauxhall and Kennington all border Stockwell...
, South London
South London
South London is the southern part of London, England, United Kingdom.According to the 2011 official Boundary Commission for England definition, South London includes the London boroughs of Bexley, Bromley, Croydon, Greenwich, Kingston, Lambeth, Lewisham, Merton, Southwark, Sutton and...
, "a large and rather grotty squat
Squatting
Squatting consists of occupying an abandoned or unoccupied space or building, usually residential, that the squatter does not own, rent or otherwise have permission to use....
" according to Melody Maker
Melody Maker
Melody Maker, published in the United Kingdom, was, according to its publisher IPC Media, the world's oldest weekly music newspaper. It was founded in 1926 as a magazine targeted at musicians; in 2000 it was merged into "long-standing rival" New Musical Express.-1950s–1960s:Originally the Melody...
s David Stubbs: "Jimmy has lived [there] for 12 years. ('I hate the place. I've no alternative but to live here.') There's little evidence of fame or fortune. The kitchen is heated by means of leaving the three functioning gas rings on at full blast until the fumes make us all feel stoned.... And, pinned just above a working top cluttered with chipped mugs is a letter from a five-year-old fan, featuring a crayon drawing of the band."
Eternity
Eternity
While in the popular mind, eternity often simply means existence for a limitless amount of time, many have used it to refer to a timeless existence altogether outside time. By contrast, infinite temporal existence is then called sempiternity. Something eternal exists outside time; by contrast,...
is a recurring theme in song titles ("3 a.m. Eternal", "Madrugada Eterna") and lyrics. Drummond and Cauty also asserted that 'Eternity' was the author of an ambiguous, far-reaching contract offered to The JAMs. (See The KLF films: The White Room
The KLF films
The KLF released three long form videos during their career - Waiting, The Rites of Mu, and The Stadium House Trilogy. They also worked on an ambitious road movie - The White Room - which was never released...
.)
Following the February 1990 release of Chill Out, sheep had recurring roles in the duo's output until their 1992 retirement. Drummond has claimed that the use of sheep on the Chill Out cover was intended to evoke contemporary rural rave
Rave
Rave, rave dance, and rave party are parties that originated mostly from acid house parties, which featured fast-paced electronic music and light shows. At these parties people dance and socialize to dance music played by disc jockeys and occasionally live performers...
s and the cover of the Pink Floyd
Pink Floyd
Pink Floyd were an English rock band that achieved worldwide success with their progressive and psychedelic rock music. Their work is marked by the use of philosophical lyrics, sonic experimentation, innovative album art, and elaborate live shows. Pink Floyd are one of the most commercially...
album Atom Heart Mother
Atom Heart Mother
Atom Heart Mother is the fifth studio album by English progressive rock band Pink Floyd, released in 1970 by Harvest and EMI Records in the United Kingdom and Harvest and Capitol in the United States. It was recorded at Abbey Road Studios, London, England, and reached number one in the United...
, insisting that the dead sheep gesture at the BRIT Awards was a compromise, replacing his earlier intention to literally cut off his hand at the ceremony. Sheep feature in The KLF ambient video Waiting, and some sheep were guests of honour at the first screening of The KLF's ultimately unreleased film The White Room. It is unclear whether the theme of sheep had any particular artistic meaning. Indeed, the inner sleeve of The White Room CD pictured Drummond and Cauty each holding a sheep, with the caption "Why sheep?".
Ceremonies and journeys
Drummond and Cauty's work often involved notions of ceremony and journey. Journeys are the subject of the KLF Communications recordings Chill Out, Space, "Last Train to Trancentral", "Justified & Ancient" and "America: What Time Is Love?", as well as the aborted film project The White Room. The Chill Out album depicts a journey across the U.S. Gulf Coast. In his book 45, Drummond expressed his admiration for the work of artist Richard LongRichard Long (artist)
Richard Long is an English sculptor, photographer and painter, one of the best known British land artists. Long is the only artist to be shortlisted for the Turner Prize four times, and he is reputed to have refused the prize in 1984...
, who incorporates physical journeys into his art.
Fire and sacrifice
Sacrifice
Sacrifice is the offering of food, objects or the lives of animals or people to God or the gods as an act of propitiation or worship.While sacrifice often implies ritual killing, the term offering can be used for bloodless sacrifices of cereal food or artifacts...
were recurring ceremonial themes: Drummond and Cauty made fires to dispose of their illegal debut album and to sacrifice The KLF's profits; their dead sheep gesture of 1992 carried a sacrificial message. The KLF's short film The Rites of Mu
The KLF films
The KLF released three long form videos during their career - Waiting, The Rites of Mu, and The Stadium House Trilogy. They also worked on an ambitious road movie - The White Room - which was never released...
depicts their celebration of the 1991 summer solstice
Midsummer
Midsummer may simply refer to the period of time centered upon the summer solstice, but more often refers to specific European celebrations that accompany the actual solstice, or that take place on a day between June 21 and June 24, and the preceding evening. The exact dates vary between different...
on the Hebridean
Hebrides
The Hebrides comprise a widespread and diverse archipelago off the west coast of Scotland. There are two main groups: the Inner and Outer Hebrides. These islands have a long history of occupation dating back to the Mesolithic and the culture of the residents has been affected by the successive...
island of Jura
Jura, Scotland
Jura is an island in the Inner Hebrides of Scotland, situated adjacent and to the north-east of Islay. Part of the island is designated as a National Scenic Area. Until the twentieth century Jura was dominated - and most of it was eventually owned - by the Campbell clan of Inveraray Castle on Loch...
: a 60 feet (18.3 m) tall wicker man
Wicker Man
A wicker man was a large wicker statue of a human used by the ancient Druids for human sacrifice by burning it in effigy, according to Julius Caesar in his Commentarii de Bello Gallico...
was burnt at a ceremony in which journalists were asked to wear yellow and grey robes and join a chant
Chant
Chant is the rhythmic speaking or singing of words or sounds, often primarily on one or two pitches called reciting tones. Chants may range from a simple melody involving a limited set of notes to highly complex musical structures Chant (from French chanter) is the rhythmic speaking or singing...
. Chanting also featured in "3 a.m. Eternal", Chill Out and—aggressively—"Fuck the Millennium".
Promotion
Top of the Pops
Top of the Pops, also known as TOTP, is a British music chart television programme, made by the BBC and originally broadcast weekly from 1 January 1964 to 30 July 2006. After 25 December 2006 it became a radio program, now hosted by Tony Blackburn...
), at which they were often costumed. They granted few interviews, communicating instead via semi-regular newsletters, or cryptically phrased full-page adverts in UK national newspapers and the music press. Such adverts were typically stark, comprising large white lettering on black. A single typeface
Typeface
In typography, a typeface is the artistic representation or interpretation of characters; it is the way the type looks. Each type is designed and there are thousands of different typefaces in existence, with new ones being developed constantly....
became characteristic of all KLF Communications' and K Foundation output, being used almost exclusively on sleevenotes and record labels, merchandise and adverts.
From the outset of their collaborations, Drummond and Cauty practised the guerrilla communication
Guerrilla communication
Guerrilla communication and communication guerrilla refer to an attempt to provoke subversive effects through interventions in the process of communication....
tactic that they described as "illegal but effective use of graffiti
Graffiti
Graffiti is the name for images or lettering scratched, scrawled, painted or marked in any manner on property....
on billboards
Billboard (advertising)
A billboard is a large outdoor advertising structure , typically found in high traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertisements to passing pedestrians and drivers...
and public buildings" in which "the original meaning of the advert would be totally subverted". Much as The JAMs' early recordings carried messages on the back of existing musical works, their promotional graffiti often derived its potency from the context in which it was placed. For instance, The JAMs' "SHAG SHAG SHAG" graffiti, coinciding with their release of "All You Need Is Love
All You Need Is Love (The JAMs song)
"All You Need Is Love" is a song by The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu, independently released as their debut single on 9 March 1987. A politically topical song concerning the UK media's AIDS furore, the track was initially given a 12" white label release because of its sampling of other records.The...
", was drawn over the "HALO HALO HALO" slogan of a Today
Today (UK newspaper)
Today was a national newspaper in the United Kingdom, which was published between 1986 and 1995.-History:Today, with the American newspaper USA Today as inspiration, launched on Tuesday, 4 March 1986, with the front page headline, "Second Spy Inside GCHQ". At 18 pence, it was a middle-market...
billboard that depicted Greater Manchester
Greater Manchester
Greater Manchester is a metropolitan county in North West England, with a population of 2.6 million. It encompasses one of the largest metropolitan areas in the United Kingdom and comprises ten metropolitan boroughs: Bolton, Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, Stockport, Tameside, Trafford, Wigan, and the...
Police Chief Constable James Anderton
James Anderton
Sir Cyril James Anderton CBE is a British former police officer who served as Chief Constable of Greater Manchester from 1975 to 1991.-Career:...
, who had decried homosexuals
Homosexuality
Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...
amidst the UK media's AIDS furore.
Music press journalists were occasionally invited to witness the defacements. In December 1987, a Melody Maker reporter was in attendance to see Cauty reverse his car Ford Timelord alongside a billboard and stand on its roof to graffiti a Christmas
Christmas
Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual holiday generally celebrated on December 25 by billions of people around the world. It is a Christian feast that commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ, liturgically closing the Advent season and initiating the season of Christmastide, which lasts twelve days...
message from The JAMs. In February 1991, another Melody Maker journalist watched The KLF deface a billboard advertising The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times (UK)
The Sunday Times is a Sunday broadsheet newspaper, distributed in the United Kingdom. The Sunday Times is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News International, which is in turn owned by News Corporation. Times Newspapers also owns The Times, but the two papers were founded...
, doctoring the slogan "THE GULF
Gulf War
The Persian Gulf War , commonly referred to as simply the Gulf War, was a war waged by a U.N.-authorized coalition force from 34 nations led by the United States, against Iraq in response to Iraq's invasion and annexation of Kuwait.The war is also known under other names, such as the First Gulf...
: the coverage, the analysis, the facts" by painting a 'K' over the 'GU'. Drummond and Cauty were, on this occasion, caught at the scene by police and arrested, later to be released without charge.
In November 1991, the slogan "It's Grim Up North" appeared as graffiti on the junction of London's M25
M25 motorway
The M25 motorway, or London Orbital, is a orbital motorway that almost encircles Greater London, England, in the United Kingdom. The motorway was first mooted early in the 20th century. A few sections, based on the now abandoned London Ringways plan, were constructed in the early 1970s and it ...
orbital motorway with the M1
M1 motorway
The M1 is a north–south motorway in England primarily connecting London to Leeds, where it joins the A1 near Aberford. While the M1 is considered to be the first inter-urban motorway to be completed in the United Kingdom, the first road to be built to motorway standard in the country was the...
, which runs to Northern England. The graffiti, for which The JAMs denied responsibility, led to a House of Commons
British House of Commons
The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which also comprises the Sovereign and the House of Lords . Both Commons and Lords meet in the Palace of Westminster. The Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 650 members , who are known as Members...
motion being timetabled by Member of Parliament
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
Joe Ashton
Joseph Ashton (politician)
Joseph William Ashton OBE , usually known as Joe Ashton, is a British Labour Party politician who was known for his defence of the rights of Labour Members of Parliament against the demands of the left-wing of the party to subject them to mandatory reselection.-Early career:Ashton was born and...
regarding regional imbalance. In September 1997, on the day after Drummond and Cauty's brief remergence as 2K, the graffiti "1997: What The Fuck's Going On?" appeared on the outside wall of London's National Theatre
Royal National Theatre
The Royal National Theatre in London is one of the United Kingdom's two most prominent publicly funded theatre companies, alongside the Royal Shakespeare Company...
, ten years after the slogan "1987: What The Fuck's Going On?" had been similarly placed to mark the release of The JAMs' debut album.
Legacy
Despite their protestations of 1988 about not wishing to be seen as crusaders for samplingSampling (music)
In music, sampling is the act of taking a portion, or sample, of one sound recording and reusing it as an instrument or a different sound recording of a song or piece. Sampling was originally developed by experimental musicians working with musique concrète and electroacoustic music, who physically...
, The JAMs continue to be associated with the cultural movement which retrospectively bundles together those literary and artistic works that make use of 'creative plagiarism
Plagiarism
Plagiarism is defined in dictionaries as the "wrongful appropriation," "close imitation," or "purloining and publication" of another author's "language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions," and the representation of them as one's own original work, but the notion remains problematic with nebulous...
'. 1987: What the Fuck Is Going On? is considered a landmark work in the early history of sampling music in the United Kingdom. (See mashup.)
Mixmag
Mixmag is a British dance music and clubbing magazine. It styles itself as "the world's biggest selling dance music magazine", with an Audit Bureau of Circulations audited circulation of approximately 21,250...
named Chill Out the fifth best "dance" album of all time, describing Cauty's DJ sets with The Orb's Alex Paterson as "seminal". The Guardian has credited The KLF with inventing "stadium house" and NME named The KLF's stadium house album The White Room the 81st best album of all time. Elements of The KLF's stadium house concept (sampled crowd noise, and signatory vocal samples reused on different songs) were adopted by several less successful rave acts of the early 1990s, including Utah Saints
Utah Saints
Utah Saints is a dance band based in Leeds, England. The music is produced by Jez Willis and Tim Garbutt, who are joined on-stage by other musicians whenever the band plays live...
, N-Joi
N-Joi
N-Joi is a house music and techno production duo from Southend, Essex, England, consisting of Nigel Champion and Mark Franklin, with sometime vocalist/front person Saffron. Champion went to Framlingham College and Franklin to Felsted School but met up again after school in 1987.Between 1991 and...
and Messiah.
Sound on Sound
Sound on Sound
Sound on Sound is an independently-owned monthly music technology magazine published by SOS Publications Group, based in Cambridge, UK. The magazine includes product tests of electronic musical performance and recording devices, and interviews with industry professionals...
magazine credited The KLF with "set[ting] the trend for a new approach to mixing". Engineer Mark Stent
Mark Stent
Mark 'Spike' Stent is a British record producer, and audio engineer who has worked with The KLF, Björk, Keane, Depeche Mode, Muse, Erasure, Hard-Fi, Massive Attack, Janet Jackson, Madonna, Christina Aguilera, Marilyn Manson, Pet Shop Boys, Dave Matthews, No Doubt/Gwen Stefani, CSS, Beth Orton,...
is quoted as saying:
Opinions of contemporaries
In 1991, Chris LoweChris Lowe
Chris Lowe is an English musician, who, with colleague Neil Tennant, makes up the pop duo Pet Shop Boys.-Childhood:...
of the Pet Shop Boys said that he considered the only other worthwhile group in the UK to be The KLF. Neil Tennant
Neil Tennant
Neil Francis Tennant is an English musician, singer and songwriter, who, with bandmate Chris Lowe, makes up the successful electronic dance music duo Pet Shop Boys.-Childhood:...
added that "They have an incredibly recognisable sound. I liked it when they said EMF
EMF (band)
EMF were an indie dance band from the United Kingdom. The band, from the Forest of Dean in Gloucestershire, came to prominence at the beginning of the 1990s. During its initial eight year run , EMF had released three studio albums and had gone on hiatus and reformed twice...
nicked the F from KLF. They're from a different tradition to us in that they're pranksters and we've never been pranksters."
At the time of The KLF's retirement announcement, Drummond's old friend and colleague David Balfe
David Balfe
David Balfe is most notable for playing keyboards with The Teardrop Explodes, founding the Zoo and Food record labels, signing Blur and for being the subject of their number one hit - "Country House".-Biography:...
said of Drummond's KLF career that "the path he's trod[den] is a more artistic one than mine. I know that deep down I like the idea of building up a very successful career, where Bill is more interested in weird stuff.... I think the very avoidance of cliche has become their particular cliche".
In March 1994, members of the anarchist band Chumbawamba
Chumbawamba
Chumbawamba is a British musical group who have, over a career spanning nearly three decades, played punk rock, pop-influenced music, world music, and folk music...
expressed their respect for The KLF. Vocalist and percussionist Alice Nutter referred to The KLF as "real situationists" categorising them as political musicians alongside the Sex Pistols
Sex Pistols
The Sex Pistols were an English punk rock band that formed in London in 1975. They were responsible for initiating the punk movement in the United Kingdom and inspiring many later punk and alternative rock musicians...
and Public Enemy. Dunst Bruce lauded the K Foundation, concluding "I think the things The KLF do are fantastic. I'm a vegetarian but I wish they'd sawn an elephant's legs off at the BRIT Awards."
Direct influence
The KLF have been imitated to some degree by German techno band ScooterScooter (band)
Scooter are a German hard dance band founded in Hamburg, who have sold over 25 million records and earned over 80 gold and platinum awards. Scooter are considered the most successful single-record German act with 23 top ten hits. The band is currently composed of members H.P. Baxxter, Rick J....
, being sampled on virtually every album Scooter have released. KLF were themselves apparently the victims of a "hoax" when an outfit called "1300 Drums featuring the Unjustified Ancients of M.U." released a novelty single to cash-in on the popularity of Manchester United
Manchester United F.C.
Manchester United Football Club is an English professional football club, based in Old Trafford, Greater Manchester, that plays in the Premier League. Founded as Newton Heath LYR Football Club in 1878, the club changed its name to Manchester United in 1902 and moved to Old Trafford in 1910.The 1958...
footballer Eric Cantona
Eric Cantona
Eric Daniel Pierre Cantona is a French actor and former French international footballer. He played for Auxerre, Martigues, Marseille, Bordeaux, Montpellier, Nîmes and Leeds United before ending his professional footballing career at Manchester United, where he won four Premier League titles in...
. 1300 Drums even made a KLF-style Top of the Pops appearance, with the "band" wearing Cantona masks. The authorship of "Ooh Aah" remains unresolved: at least one source maintains that Drummond and Cauty themselves were 1300 Drums.
The Timelords' book, The Manual
The Manual
The Manual is a 1988 book by The Timelords , better known as The KLF. It is a tongue-in-cheek step by step guide to achieving a No.1 single with no money or musical skills, and a case study of the duo's UK novelty pop No...
, was reportedly used by the one-hit-wonders Edelweiss
Edelweiss (band)
Edelweiss was an Austrian electronica/dance band consisting of remixers Martin Gletschermayer, Matthias Schweger and Walter Werzowa. The group is best known for their 1988 worldwide hit "Bring Me Edelweiss", and their European hit "Starship Edelweiss"....
to secure their hit "Bring Me Edelweiss".
"Last Train to Trancentral" is used in the finale of Blue Man Group
Blue Man Group
Blue Man Group is an organization founded by Chris Wink, Matt Goldman and Phil Stanton. The organization produces theatrical shows and concerts featuring popular music, comedy and multimedia; recorded music and scores for film and television; television appearances for shows such as The Tonight...
's theatrical shows and was covered by them on an EP
Last Train to Trancentral (Blue Man Group EP)
Last Train to Trancentral is a digital EP by Blue Man Group, released on October 31, 2006 through the iTunes Store. The EP features a cover of the KLF song "Last Train to Trancentral", which is played during the paper finale at Blue Man Group's theatrical shows...
. The group's Rock Concert Instruction Manual is a tribute to The Manual.
Ninthwave Records
Ninthwave Records
Ninthwave Records is a U.S. synthpop record label founded in 2001.-History:Ninthwave Records is an independent record company specializing in electronic pop. It was founded in 2001 as part of Lexicon Magazine but was made a separate company upon the magazine's demise...
recording artists POP INC name check The KLF in their 2010 micro-hit "Looking 4 The KLF", which starred a voice over by BBC actor Simon Jones
Simon Jones (actor)
Simon Jones is an English actor, most famous for his appearances in the television and radio series of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, in which he played the lead role of Arthur Dent from 1978 to 2005...
.
Career retrospectives
Drummond and Cauty have made frequent appearances in the British broadsheetBroadsheet
Broadsheet is the largest of the various newspaper formats and is characterized by long vertical pages . The term derives from types of popular prints usually just of a single sheet, sold on the streets and containing various types of material, from ballads to political satire. The first broadsheet...
s and music papers since The KLF's retirement, most often in connection with the K Foundation and their burning of one million pounds. It is worth noting that The KLF in their various incarnations have been to an extent "media darlings" who have received largely unqualified praise from the printed media. This may or may not be due to what NME called their "Master[y] of manipulating media and perceptions of themselves".
In 1992, NME referred to The KLF as "Britain's greatest pop group" and "the two most brilliant minds in pop today", and in 2002 listed the duo in their "Top 50 Icons" at number 48. The British music paper also listed The KLF's 1992 BRIT Awards appearance at number 4 in their "top 100 rock moments". "What's unique about Drummond and Cauty", the paper said in 1993, "is the way that, under all the slogans and the sampling and the smart hits and the dead sheep and the costumes, they appear not only to care, but to have some idea of how to achieve what they want."
"[Of their many aliases,] it is as the KLF that they will go down in pop history," wrote Alix Sharkey in 1994, "for a variety of reasons, the most important being the resolute purity of their self-abnegation, and their visionary understanding of pop." He added: "By early 1992 the KLF was easily the best-selling, probably the most innovative, and undoubtedly the most exhilarating pop phenomenon in Britain. In five years it had gone from pressing up 500 copies of its debut recording to being one of the world's top singles acts." The same piece also quoted Sheryl Garratt, editor of The Face
The Face (magazine)
The Face was a British music, fashion and culture monthly magazine started in May 1980 by Nick Logan.-1980s:Logan had previously created the teen pop magazine Smash Hits, and had been an editor at the New Musical Express in the 1970s before launching The Face in 1980.The magazine was influential in...
: ""the music hasn't dated. I still get an adrenaline rush listening to it." Garratt believes their influence on the British house and rap scene cannot be overestimated. "Their attitude was shaped by the rave scene, but they also love pop music. So many people who make pop actually despise it, and it shows.""
In a largely cynical piece, Trouser Press
Trouser Press
Trouser Press was a rock and roll magazine started in New York in 1974 as a mimeographed fanzine by editor/publisher Ira Robbins, fellow Who fan Dave Schulps and Karen Rose under the name "Trans-Oceanic Trouser Press" ...
reviewer Ira Robbins referred to The KLF's body of work as "a series of colorful sonic marketing experiments". The Face called them "the kings of cultural anarchy".
In 2003, The Observer
The Observer
The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
named The KLF's departure from the music business (and the BRITs performance in which the newspaper says "their legend was sealed") the fifth greatest "publicity stunt" in the history of popular music (Elvis
Elvis Presley
Elvis Aaron Presley was one of the most popular American singers of the 20th century. A cultural icon, he is widely known by the single name Elvis. He is often referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll" or simply "the King"....
joining the army being hailed as the greatest). A 2004 listener poll by BBC 6 Music
BBC 6 Music
BBC 6 Music is one of the BBC's digital radio stations, was launched on 11 March 2002 and originally codenamed Network Y. It was the first national music radio station to be launched by the BBC in 32 years....
saw The KLF/K Foundation placed second in a list of "rock excesses" (after The Who
The Who
The Who are an English rock band formed in 1964 by Roger Daltrey , Pete Townshend , John Entwistle and Keith Moon . They became known for energetic live performances which often included instrument destruction...
).
Instrumentation
Early releases by The JAMs, including the album 1987, were performed using an Apple IIApple II series
The Apple II series is a set of 8-bit home computers, one of the first highly successful mass-produced microcomputer products, designed primarily by Steve Wozniak, manufactured by Apple Computer and introduced in 1977 with the original Apple II...
computer with a Greengate DS3 sampler peripheral card
Apple II peripheral cards
The Apple II line of computers supported a number of Apple II peripheral cards, expansion cards which plugged into slots on the motherboard, and added to and extended the functionality of the base system....
, and a Roland TR-808
Roland TR-808
The Roland TR-808 Rhythm Composer was one of the first programmable drum machines . Introduced by the Roland Corporation in early 1980, it was originally manufactured for use as a tool for studio musicians to create demos. Like earlier Roland drum machines, it does not sound very much like a real...
drum machine. On later releases, the Greengate DS3 and Apple II were replaced with an Akai S900
Akai
Akai is a consumer electronics brand, founded by Saburo Akai as , a Japanese manufacturer in 1929. It is now headquartered in Singapore as a subsidiary of Grande Holdings, a Hong Kong-based conglomerate, which also owns the formerly Japanese brands Nakamichi and Sansui. The Akai brand is now used...
sampler and an Atari
Atari
Atari is a corporate and brand name owned by several entities since its inception in 1972. It is currently owned by Atari Interactive, a wholly owned subsidiary of the French publisher Atari, SA . The original Atari, Inc. was founded in 1972 by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney. It was a pioneer in...
computer respectively. The house music of Space and The KLF involved much original instrumentation, for which the Oberheim OB-8
Oberheim OB-8
The Oberheim OB-8 is a subtractive analog synthesizer launched by Oberheim in 1983 and discontinued in 1985. It belongs to the OB-X product line of polyphonic compacts synthesizers and is successor to the OB-Xa...
analogue synthesiser was prominently used. Of the two Oberheims The KLF used, only one remains. It is now owned by James Fogarty
James Fogarty
James Fogarty is an English multi-media artist. Concentrating mainly on music crossing over between metal and sampled based music, his projects past and present are The Blacksmoke Organisation, The Bombs Of Enduring Freedom, Ewigkeit, Jaldaboath and producing occasional releases for Death To...
(with whom Cauty founded Blacksmoke
Blacksmoke
Blacksmoke a.k.a. The Blacksmoke Organisation are "an occasional art collective and musical group dedicated to the propagation of audio visual noise". The precise creative membership of Blacksmoke is a closely guarded secret. It is documented that a founding member is The KLF co-founder Jimmy Cauty...
).
The KLF's 1990–1992 singles were mixed
Record producer
A record producer is an individual working within the music industry, whose job is to oversee and manage the recording of an artist's music...
by Mark Stent
Mark Stent
Mark 'Spike' Stent is a British record producer, and audio engineer who has worked with The KLF, Björk, Keane, Depeche Mode, Muse, Erasure, Hard-Fi, Massive Attack, Janet Jackson, Madonna, Christina Aguilera, Marilyn Manson, Pet Shop Boys, Dave Matthews, No Doubt/Gwen Stefani, CSS, Beth Orton,...
, using a Solid State Logic
Solid State Logic
Solid State Logic is a manufacturer of high-end mixing consoles and recording studio hardware headquartered in Begbroke, Oxfordshire, UK.- Company information :...
(S.S.L.) automated mixing desk, and The White Room LP mixed by J. Gordon-Hastings using an analogue desk. The SSL is referenced in the subtitle of The KLF single "3 a.m. Eternal (Live at the S.S.L.)". The Roland TB-303
Roland TB-303
The Roland TB-303 Bass Line is a bass synthesizer with built-in sequencer manufactured by the Roland corporation from late 1981 to 1984 that had a defining role in the development of contemporary electronic music.-History:...
bassline and Roland TR-909
Roland TR-909
The Roland TR-909 Rhythm Composer is a partially analog, partially sample-based drum machine built by the Japanese Roland Corporation in 1983. The brainchild of Tadao Kikumoto, the engineer behind the Roland TB-303, it features a 16-step step sequencer and a drum kit that aimed for realism and...
drum machine feature on "What Time Is Love (Live at Trancentral)".
Several of Drummond and Cauty's compositions feature distinctive original instrumentation using non-synthesised instruments. Drummond played a Gibson ES-330
Gibson ES-330
The Gibson ES-330 is a thinline hollowbody electric guitar model produced by the Gibson Guitar Corporation.Though similar in appearance to the popular Gibson ES-335 semi-hollow guitar, the ES-330 was a fairly different guitar in construction and sound...
semi-acoustic guitar on "America: What Time Is Love?", and Cauty played electric guitar
Electric guitar
An electric guitar is a guitar that uses the principle of direct electromagnetic induction to convert vibrations of its metal strings into electric audio signals. The signal generated by an electric guitar is too weak to drive a loudspeaker, so it is amplified before sending it to a loudspeaker...
on "Justified & Ancient (Stand by The JAMs)" and "America: What Time Is Love?". Graham Lee
Graham Lee (Australian musician)
Graham Lee is an Australian rock musician and record producer, best known as the steel guitar player of the 1980s band The Triffids, where he was nicknamed 'Evil Graham Lee'....
provided prominent pedal steel
Pedal steel guitar
The pedal steel guitar is a type of electric guitar that uses a metal bar to "fret" or shorten the length of the strings, rather than fingers on strings as with a conventional guitar. Unlike other types of steel guitar, it also uses pedals and knee levers to affect the pitch, hence the name "pedal"...
contributions to The KLF's Chill Out
Chill out
Chill out may mean:*Chill out music, a laid-back style of music*Chill Out, an album by KLF*Chill Out *Chill Out, an album by John Lee Hooker...
and "Build a Fire". Duy Khiem played clarinet
Clarinet
The clarinet is a musical instrument of woodwind type. The name derives from adding the suffix -et to the Italian word clarino , as the first clarinets had a strident tone similar to that of a trumpet. The instrument has an approximately cylindrical bore, and uses a single reed...
on "3 a.m. Eternal" and "Make It Rain". The KLF track "America No More" features a pipe band
Pipe band
A pipe band is a musical ensemble consisting of pipers and drummers. The term used by military pipe bands, pipes and drums, is also common....
, and 2K's "Fuck The Millennium" incorporates a full brass band
Brass band
A brass band is a musical ensemble generally consisting entirely of brass instruments, most often with a percussion section. Ensembles that include brass and woodwind instruments can in certain traditions also be termed brass bands , but are usually more correctly termed military bands, concert...
.
Discography
- The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu: 1987 (What the Fuck Is Going On?)1987 (What the Fuck Is Going On?)1987 is the debut album of The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu . 1987 was produced using extensive unauthorised samples which plagiarised a wide range of musical works, continuing a theme begun in The JAMs' debut single "All You Need Is Love"...
(The Sound of Mu(sic), 1987) - The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu: Who Killed The JAMs? (KLF Communications, 1988)
- The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu/The KLF/The Timelords: Shag TimesShag TimesShag Times, sometimes called Shag Times , is a UK compilation and remix double album released in 1989 by The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu...
(KLF Communications, 1988) - The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu/The KLF/The Timelords: The History of The JAMs a.k.a. The Timelords (TVT Records, 1989)
- The KLF/Various Artists: The "What Time Is Love?" Story (KLF Communications, 1989)
- The KLF: Chill OutChill outChill out may mean:*Chill out music, a laid-back style of music*Chill Out, an album by KLF*Chill Out *Chill Out, an album by John Lee Hooker...
(KLF Communications, 1990) - Space: Space (KLF Communications, 1990)
- The KLF: The White RoomThe White RoomAllmusic said that The White Room "represents the commercial and artistic peak of late-'80s acid-house" and Q magazine called it "strikingly imaginative" and "a more subtle form of subterfuge" than previous works...
(KLF Communications, 1991)
External links
- The Library of Mu - archive of press articles
- KLF Communications Website, Blog, youTube, Subsites TV, Artwork, Database
- KLF Mailing List
- The KLF and Illuminatus! - including a list of their references to the number 23
- The KLF at Acclaimed Music - artist rank #395
www.theflk.com/ Website for Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cautys new project