The 1981 Listening Post - Toyah - Anthem

 Toyah - Anthem

#189

May 22 1981

Toyah

Anthem

Genre: New Wave

3.5 out of 5

Highlights:

Jungles of Jupiter

We Are

After two very strong and weird records it was really only a matter of time before Toyah, who always sounded like she was trying to be a more accessible Kate Bush, would shoot for the pop charts. 

Listening to her sing about how she wants to “be free” of things that lock her down like..school? I am reminded of how Charlie XCX would mine the same tropes 3 decades later. From High School Confidential to Toyah to Charlie…kids are just really oppressed by school. 

As much as she decries what makes a “Pop Star” she also seems to be shooting for that status. I don’t begrudge her doing either of those things. I just wish the songs were better.

She is tripling down on her theater-weirdness on stuff like “Elocution Lesson” and it’s ugly and oh so early 80s. At the time this album was Toyah’s biggest selling record. And I can not imagine a time where people queued up to buy this but, damn, I’m happy that that’s who we as a music consuming public, were. If but for a short time. 

Toyah falls into that Bowie/Bush nexus but she isn’t as wistful as the latter or, really, as creatively able as the former (who was a master at stealing other people’s ideas and making them into something terrific). So, she comes across as a bit chiding and, to be honest, she reminds me at times of Wendy O. Williams, vocally.  

https://music.apple.com/us/album/anthem/1524088687

The 1980 Listening Post - Toyah - The Blue Meaning

Toyah - The Blue Meaning


#242

June 6 1980

Toyah

The Blue Meaning

Genre: Kate Bush if much much weirder

4 out of 5

Highlights:

Leya

She

A second Toyah album in one year and boy is it something to behold. It’s confident and weird and determined and I have no idea what any of the songs are about but, to steal from my favorite book of the era, listening to this is like like having your brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped round a large gold brick.

I would probably soak that in a towel first, however.

All the aggressive weirdness sort of runs out of steam by Side Two, though, and it feels like it would have been better as an EP. But then I would have never heard it. 

https://music.apple.com/us/album/the-blue-meaning/539458271

 

The 1980 Listening Post - Toyah - Sheep Farming in Barnet

Toyah - Sheep Farming in Barnet

#49 LISTENING POST ADMIN DISCOVERY

February 22 1980

Toyah

Sheep Farming in Barnet

Genre: Post-Rock

4.5 out of 5

Highlights:

Neon Womb

Elusive Stranger

The Last Goodbye

Kate Bush + Laurie Anderson + Yoko Ono. 

But, without the ethereal wistfullness of Kate or the determined performance art of Laurie or the atonal unlistenable aspect of Yoko. There’s some Nina Hagen in there as well. 

Toyah seems to come from the no wave bowels of London or New York’s punk clubs. This is a sound that will almost completely disappear in short order, the very few allowed to play around like this being named Bjork. I don’t know if we credit the women of the early 80s enough. They were on the edge of experimentation and creativity. It feels like every decade there’s a burst of female musical energy and the world talks about it with surprise as though they have finally found their collective voices and then finds a way to tamp them down only to be shocked in 5 years when women do it again. 

Toyah is less all the people I mentioned up top and more the female David Bowie. 

https://music.apple.com/us/album/sheep-farming-in-barnet/539676948

The 1985 Listening Post - Toyah - Minx

Toyah - Minx

#278/912

July 1985

Toyah

Minx

Genre: SynthPop

3.25 out of 5

Highlights:

Sympathy

World in Action

Remember when we all discovered (or rediscovered) Cristina in 1984? 

This is like that except that it’s not good. 

But here’s what this reminds me of: that we are saying goodbye to an entire sound; New Wave, synth driven pop influenced, I think, by Peter Gabriel as much as anything else and moving on to the Taylor Dane era of “synthPop”, which will morph into dance music. Which is what it really already is. 

Toyah isn’t Taylor Dane. Nor does she aspire to be that kind of pop star. I don’t know what kind of artist she wants to be but, based on this, she’s just as confused. 

She’s left her band behind and gone solo and the result is a mixed bag, ranging from new wave to dance to Weillian chanteuse, which I wholly endorse. 

https://music.apple.com/us/album/minx/1168535085