6 Music - Music News
6 Music News
Tributes to Peter Christopherson
Friends and colleagues pay tribute to Throbbing Gristle's Peter "Sleazy" Christopherson, who has died aged 55.
- 19/11/2010
Peter "Sleazy" Christopherson, a founding member of pioneering post-punk group Throbbing Gristle, has died aged 55.
The musician, artist and provocateur "passed away peacefully in his sleep" at his home in Bangkok, Thailand, according to a statement on the band's website.
Throbbing Gristle were one of the first Industrial bands, renowned for their use of machine-like noises, tape loops and found sounds.
They courted controversy by playing naked and vomiting on stage, leading MP Nicholas Fairbairn to label them "the wreckers of civilisation" in the Daily Mail.
After they split in 1982, Christopherson - a former graphic designer and record sleeve artist - went on to play with groups like Coil and Psychic TV, before rejoining his first band in 2004.
"Peter was a kind and beautiful soul. No words can express how much he will be missed," said Throbbing Gristle bandmates Cosey Fanni Tutti and Chris Carter in a statement.
Mute Records boss Daniel Miller said everyone at the label, which released some of the group's later albums, was "saddened and devastated by the news."
"Peter was very talented as an artist, and he was also very generous with his ideas," he told BBC 6 Music.
"He was very warm and decent as a person - which sometimes the music didn't really reflect."
"There are probably more people who have been inspired by Throbbing Gristle than have perhaps heard of them," he added.
"He had an ability to work with electronics and composition that took from the past, but looked to the future."
Robin Rimbaud
Another musician to pay tribute was electro musician Robin Rimbaud, also known as Scanner.
He had known Christoperson for over 25 years, both as a collaborator and a friend, and said the musician would leave an important legacy.
"If you can imagine the musical scene that was happening in the 1980s, when suddenly a group came through that produced this thunderous cacophony of noise and tape loops, who spoke about writers like William Burroughs and basically spoke against the system.
"They inspired so many people, and if it wasn't for their actions at the time, we wouldn't have people like Nine Inch Nails and even Joy Division.
"Names are sometimes invisible to people and listeners might have thought, 'who is this character?' but then they realise they would have seen his work on record sleeves for Pink Floyd or Peter Gabriel.
"And he was largely responsible for the credits to the film Se7en, so he took something like Nine Inch Nails' music and perversely deconstructed it.
"He had an ability to work with electronics and composition that took from the past, but looked to the future."
Throbbing Gristle played their final gig as a quartet last month.
Frontman Genesis P-Orridge quit on 27 October, and the remaining members had vowed to continue under the name X-TG before Christopherson's death.
Lauren Laverne
Sessions most weekdays with Lauren.
Marc Riley
A live session most nights from Manchester.
bbc.co.uk navigation
Site links
BBC links
© 2012
The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read more.
This page is best viewed in an up-to-date web browser with style sheets (CSS) enabled. While you will be able to view the content of this page in your current browser, you will not be able to get the full visual experience. Please consider upgrading your browser software or enabling style sheets (CSS) if you are able to do so.
Have your say
Comments
To quote Unkle himself:-
'Nobody knows the future, after all.... All we can do is try to make it as enjoyable, inspiring, helpful, encouraging and illuminating for everyone as possible, in the time that we have left'.
Goodnight Sleazy......catch you in the aether!
Complain about this comment
RIP. Uncle Sleazy
Complain about this comment
Great man. His music will live on.
Complain about this comment
Peter 'Sleazy' Christopherson was one of the most important & influential artists of the last 30-odd years. His early work with Hipgnosis found him working on iconic record sleeves - he was responsible for Animals/A Nice Pair/Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd & the first three Peter Gabriel albums. Sleazy took iconic early photographs of the Sex Pistols btw.
With COUM Transmissions and then Throbbing Gristle, Sleazy was behind one of the most interesting and influential acts of all time. They pushed the enevelope and produced everything from disco-inspired techno to walls of intense sound. They invented 'Industrial' and also predicted elements of electronica & post-punk. Their reformation was fantastic, revisting old work and producing equally brilliant new material. I saw them in Heaven last year and they were fantastic and still moving forwards.
Sleazy was also a key member of the early line-up of Psychic TV with Genesis P-Orridge, Alex Fergusson, & Jhonn Balance. The albums 'Force the Hand of Chance' and 'Dreams Less Sweet' are genius - 'Force...' and the later PTV 'Godstar'-material mapped out what Primal Scream are getting revered for with 'Screamadelica' btw...
Sleazy & Balance then went on to work in Coil, who again were hugely influential and their material was a huge influence on bands like Depeche Mode and Nine Inch Nails who found a mass audience with elements of their sound (compare 'The Wheel' to the Mode's 'Behind the Wheel'). Trent Reznor worked with Christopherson on the 'Lost Highway' soundtrack and Coil remixed NIN - that version of 'Closer' used in the brilliant credit sequence of Se7en was the Coil-take. Later Coil-material has more in common with stuff like Boards of Canada and Aphex Twin and was rightfully mentioned in Rob Young's excellent book 'Electric Eden.' Last year's tribute LP 'This Immortal Coil' reminded us of their influence and has a great version of 'Ostia...' by Bonnie'Prince'Billy.
As well as all that, Sleazy was a great video-director - filming much of the excellent 'Infected' video album by The The. He also shot promos for NIN, Ministry, Rage Against the Machine, Van Halen, Marc Almond & Robert Plant (I always thought he did a Cabaret Voltaire video - 'Sensoria' - but might be mistaken). He even managed to make a subversive torture-themed promo to Yes' 'Only of a Lonely Heart' - though his best video is found on the BFI DVD reissue of Pasolini's 'Salo, or, the 120 Days of Sodom.' This was a video to Coil's great 'Ostia - The Death of Pasolini' where Pasolini's murder, Bangkok rent boys, Tuol Sleng/the Khmer Rouge were fused with Salo. A brilliant 5 minutes that I'd recommend people seek out on You Tube.
Sleazy was all about collaboration and should be the model for new artists - people that want to make music and make a statement and aren't concerned about career or money. The world is missing a great artist. RIP
Complain about this comment
View these comments in RSS