It's nice to find someone else who remembers Propaganda (and remembers them fondly, too). A good start to the day. For those who don't and have nothing better to do than read my nonsense:
Propaganda were the ideal pop band: great tunes; distinctive sound; intelligent; short-lived (but not ephemeral, oh no); interesting; good subject matter and lyrics; and great presentation, no doubt thanks in part to the mighty ZTT Records, who were unbeatable at that time.
Another of their songs,
p:Machinery, is about the dehumanising effect of industry and big government, and the faceless obsequiousness that it tries to create. They could have been prophesising Tony Blair's government. Pretty decent lyrics, doubly so by the standards of 1980's pop!:
Another hope
Feeds another dream.
Another 'truth'
Installed by the machine.
A secret wish,
A marrying of lies,
Today comes true
what common sense denies
The videos for 'Duel' and 'p:Machinery' are not so good, but this eerie black-and-white promo for
'Dr Mabuse' (directed by Anton Corbijn) is rather nice.
They did one LP, 'A Secret Wish', and a remix LP called 'Outside World' . Anything released after that is not the original line-up, and just not the same!