“I’ve always wanted to be in a band with people who can’t play anything”, or: “It was just going to be one thing for this exhibition opening party”. This is what Tommi Tokyo has told The Quietus respectively Wire Magazine about the beginnings of Group A, the project she and Sayaka Botanic are collaborating on. What this sounds and looks like came to our attention during CTM festival 2016: Shrieking noises met screaming chants and a violin, all on top of hyper mechanized and heavy delayed rhythms. All this was presented by two women who wore next to nothing—and conical hats.

All of this seems to bear some resemblance to industrial music’s wreckers of civilisation aka COUM/Throbbing Gristle. But Group A is not some wannabe copy of long gone glory. Having digested these resemblances one gets quickly absorbed into the DIY-post-punk-fun the two now Berlin-based women produce.

After some cassette-, CD- and digital releases, last year’s brilliant album 70+a= is now getting a vinyl release on Mecanica Records. It features the additional track “Deadly 16”, which we are very happy to be premiering here:

https://soundcloud.com/mecanica/groupadeadly16/s-52HEP

P.S. the duo plays Switzerland soon—on October 1st, 2016 at St. Gall’s A-Synth Fest, on November 18 at Saint Ghetto Festival at Dampfzentrale Bern and on November 19 at Südpol Lucerne.