The 1981 Listening Post - Mother Gong - Robot Woman

 Reviewed by Rob Slater

Released: January 1981 Mother Gong Robot Woman Genre: Disco Jazz Prog (I didn’t really hear any rock, but the lyrics are sort of early Yes) Rating: 1 out of 5 (your mileage may vary if you love Devo, you love (or tolerate) wanking jazz, Prog, and bad disco. I think it is well done for whatever it is) Highlights: (The first 8 bars of Billi Bunker's Blues until the second line of lyrics. I think it’s supposed to be ironic. The music under it is nice. DNF) 1. Disco at the End of the World/Mother's Place: Benny Hill runs into Devo with special guest Peter Gabriel in his Sledgehammer mode with a large helping of Disco Jazz. 2. Robot Woman: This one is at least interesting. I like the Robot Woman’s Voice-over better than the music. In fact the voice overs and background noises are preferable to the music. 3. Machine Song/The Sea: This one is weird, kinda listenable, but I didn’t remember it after the next songs. Spacy themes, I think. I had to go back and listen to the beginnings twice to differentiate. Voice over sample: “I need your screwdriver,” she says in a very sexy voice. I think this might be a decent song, but DNF. 4. Searching The Airwaves: Poor recording I could hardly hear it at max volume on my laptop, but the video helped me figure out that if I was listening to this when it came out AND a stoner, I might have thought it was cool. DNF. The videos for the songs that have them are weird (I expect fans made them), but appropriate for getting high and watching. 5. Military Procession/Customs Man/Fire/Red Alert/Stars: 16 minutes and 51 seconds of bizarreness. I couldn’t listen all the way through. [Oh, it’s actually like 4-5 individual songs. If they’d been different videos, I might have listened to each of them, but I was done. DNF These might be individual songs (6-9), but I don’t care enough to check. 6. Billi Bunker's Blues: Decent music, but I couldn’t stand the “Kill a Commie for Mommie,” theme. 7. (or 11) Australia: Reggae disco Devo. This might be listenable, but I was so tired by the other songs that I didn’t listen to the whole song. I was SO DONE, by this time. I think I’ve done a pretty good job of describing this album so people could tell if they’d like to listen to it. It is almost weird enough to listen to, but some sort of mind altering substance is probably necessary for enjoyment. DNF. It seems this album is a trilogy, and there are supposedly some serious fans, but I don’t get it. I feel like I took one for the team on this one. I’d be happy to have my hour back. Seriously, I intended to write about 12 words, but I don’t like to do things half-assed anymore.