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7 - INCH FAST 4: BEING
BOILED (FAST VERSION) - (3.45) / CIRCUS OF DEATH (FAST VERSION)
- (4.47)
7 - INCH SV 105: HOLIDAY
80 (1982 VIRGIN RE-ISSUE)
BEING BOILED - (4.22) / MARIANNE - (3.17) / DANCEVISION -
(2.22)
Being Boiled
OK, ready - let's do it.
 Here
we are, April 2003 and (in a round about way) Being Boiled
has been in the UK Top Ten again, albeit with Richie X vs
Liberty X. I can't slate the reworked/Chaka Khan version,
but let's start at the beginning...
Well, I say the beginning, but my head and heart wasn't with
the Human League (or the 'trendy hippies' if you were to listen
to Johnny Rotten) at the real beginning, after all in 1978
at the age of 4 my mind was probably about how many spiders
I could catch in a jar, and in 1982 on the song's re-release
my heart was definitely with Bucks Fizz, learning their new
dance routines with my friends.
Thankfully, the Human League came my way in 1989 when a friend
let me hear the League's Greatest Hits compilation. I remember
going on a school trip and we had two tapes on the bus : the
Greatest Hits and the coolest album of the time in my school
year, INXS' Kick.
As history shows,
the Human League were hardly setting the world alight in 1989,
and as 15 year old girls we were really sticking our necks
out to admit to liking this band. On goes the tape. Since
the League's big hits are embedded in our psyche, it turned
out the tape went down well enough.
Then Being Boiled
comes on. Listening to this tape with a bunch of people gave
me a different perspective. Being Boiled sticks out like a
sore thumb. It's not that it's bad, it's not that I particularly
perceive it as sounding that dated (unlike it's Travelogue
version, ugh!) it's just...raw, I suppose. Production wise,
it has an innocence to it (I would imagine because of the
technology available at the time), but I never hear it as
being 'thin' - there's a lot going on in it. The intro has
a creepy feel, almost, to it for me. There's that fantastic
loop running through the verses (definitely not through the
choruses - there ain't any). It's got to be one of the first
examples I knew of programming.
 It
is true that electronica can be cold and to some lack 'soul',
for want of a better word, but Being Boiled is a good example
of how it creates an ambiance and, in turn, emotion within
the listener. It's definitely not a happy, singalong record,
both in terms of the moodiness of the music and not with its
subject matter either. That said, it never brings me down
- hell, you can even dance to it if you want to, but it's
more likely a song for looking serious whilst dancing to it
and probably with a lot of posing involved.
Phil sings like he
recorded his vocals in his kitchen. We know now that with
what he was singing about he got his religions mixed up, but
given that many people live their lives by their own religions
I don't think that's such a harsh criticism. I hear the lyrics
and could even recite them but I don't analyse them or even
think about them (sorry, Phil): I think the music is too hypnotic
to get too caught up in what Phil's point is.
The B side is another
track with a jovial title, Circus of Death. By all intents
and purposes I really should not like this song, as I really
do not like circuses, nor death for that matter...so with
a title like that it's not a good starting point to draw me
in. However, I don't dislike the song at all though it's not
a song I'd have 'up there' in my essential League list.
When I listen to Being
Boiled now it amazes me that this record was produced in 1978.
Rightly so, even though it was re-issued on the back of their
Dare! success, the 1982 re-issue reached a highly respectable
UK chart position of no 6.
Being Boiled is an astounding piece of electronica, not least
for its time. The Human League's Greatest Hits release at
that time may of carried a promotional tag of (I'm paraphrasing)
"the group that shaped the sound of today" - their
PR people were not half kidding. Whether Oakey/Ware/Marsh
had the foresight or not that this was the future (no pun
intended) they couldn't of hit the nail on the head better.
It cannot be coincidence that we have a new wave of bands
sounding like this track was their creative blueprint. It
is true that there is not much originality in terms of new
music these days; that is not such a bad thing in itself.
Sometimes you have to look back at the beginning to see where
you've arrived. "The Human League : someday all music
will be made like this...and it is!"
Secrets Online Rating: 9.5/10
 Lyrics
OK, ready. Let's do it
Listen to the voice of Buddha
Saying stop your sericulture
Little people like your offspring
Boiled alive for some god's stocking
Buddha's watching, Buddha's waiting
Just because the kid's an orphan
Is no excuse for thoughtless slaying
Children don't forget this torture
Just because you call her mother
Doesn't mean that she's your better
Once more with the voice of Buddha
He'll say carry on your slaughter
Who cares for the little children
You may slice with no conviction
Blind revenge on a blameless victim
All lyrics are property and copyright of their owners and
are provided for non-profit purposes only.
Text ©
Louise 2003
- screen grabs showing the League out and about in Sheffield
kindly provided by Tony B
'I remember hearing 'Being Boiled' by the Human League about
a quarter of a century ago - a mix up of glam Sheffield steel,
Dali melt, Fausty distortion, Meek DIY sound effects, dinky
Kraftwerk electronics and the deadest of pans (it advocated
a ban on the cruel abuse of silk worms) and Johnny Rotten
dismissed the group as 'trendy hippies'. I felt that this
was the sound of the future, and hoped that by, say, the year
2003, songs like this were filling the charts. In some ways
that prediction might be coming true. '
PAUL MORLEY - rock journalist
and former ZTT operative - naming Being Boiled as the song
that changed his life (January 2003 - The Guardian)
Orac's Trivia
 (1)
Back in the early 80s, artists could get away with lifting
chunks from other songs without crediting the original composers.
'You stole my song!' court cases were fairly common back in
the days when singles actually shifted vast units. By default
or design (and depending on the cynical mind), Visage's much
loved 1981 classic Fade To Grey (written by Bill Currie and
Midge Ure) contains a major 'snippet, nod, steal' (delete
were appropriate) from Being Boiled in the form of the distinctive
three-bar analogue synth arrangement (as Steve Strange sings
'ahhhh we fade to grey). This three-bar arrangement is perhaps
the most crucial element of Being Boiled and even recently,
some radio DJs and music journalists wrongly referred to the
music of Richard X's Being Nobody as Fade To Grey. One can
turn a blind eye though as the Visage 'Being Boiled tribute'
is such a fine record in it's own right (not even Ultravox
would go on to match it artistically).
(2) There
was no promo video shot for Being Boiled - not even a cheap
Queen Bohemian Rhapsody style effort with dodgy 70s TOTP camera
effects. Nor did Virgin put together a video montage when
Being Boiled unexpectedly crept up to number 6 during the
snow laden winter of January 1982. TOTPs viewers had to make
do with a bizarre and slightly scary dance routine (inspired
by Kate Bush/LSD?) from Legs & Co/Hot Gossip (hilarious
female dancers employed by the BBC to replace the bands when
they were unable to appear in the studio).
(3) Being
Boiled represented Phil Oakey's first known attempt at songwriting
and naturally he was quite shy before revealing them to Ian
and Martin having just joined the band. The following comments
are taken from BBC-2's 1999 Young Guns Documentary:
Phil and League MRK1 on Being Boiled:
Phil Oakey
- 'I think I wanted to see If I could get away with it, they'd
done a really good backing track and I didn't know If I was
up to the task of being in the group. So I just took a tape
home and wrote some stuff over and I was just amazed when
they said it's alright, I just went and sang it too them,
which is like one of the scariest things I have ever done
in my life, and they said yeah that's alright.'
Martin Ware
- 'I thought It was brilliant.'
Ian Craig Marsh
-' err jaw dropping I think.'
Academics were mystified and intrigued by the bizarre lyrics
of silkworm torture and Phil admitted that it was all down
to religious confusion on his his part as he explains here;
'...I'd got some religions
mixed up and I thought that like Buddhism was the same as
Hinduism, and it was sort of a plea for vegertarism really
against killing the silkworms to make socks or something?
I got really confused about it.'
MPG3
You can download a rare live
version of Being Boiled performed by the League on John Peel's
legendary Radio One 'Peel Sessions' show in July 1978 by clicking
here.
Love
Action / Don't
You Want Me / Mirror
Man / Louise / I
Need Your Loving /
Tell Me When / AIEW
Sound Of The Crowd
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