The The - Soul Mining (30th anniversary)

This month marks the thirtieth anniversary of Soul Mining, the debut album from the British band The The.

Please click here for my full review of this 1983 release.

The The - Infected

Happy fifty-first birthday today (August 15th) to Matt Johnson, English musician and founder of The The.

After a marginally successful debut album Soul Mining in 1983 (click here for my review), it took a few years before The The would release its next album. The 1986 release Infected went Gold in the UK. Its chart performance showed improvements over the debut; it made it to number 89 on the US Billboard Hot 200, number 46 in the Netherlands, number 20 in Sweden, number 14 in Norway and the UK, and number 12 in New Zealand.

The The - Soul Mining

Soul Mining, released in 1983, was the debut album from the British band The The, fronted by Matt Johnson. While the band was popular in their home country, putting three singles up on the UK charts, their success didn’t translate as well in the States. Mostly their music could be heard on college radio stations that tended to showcase more alternative music.

I had actually forgotten about some of the songs on this album that I did know until about a year or so ago. My buddy Aaron in the state of Washington mentioned them, leading me to seek out the music to add to my library. That was really the first time I had listened to the whole album. Since then, it has come up a few times on my iPod album shuffling.