MUSIC
Info on all of our CD releases, including MP3 samples. The audio quality has been reduced to make for faster downloading time. Right click and choose 'save as' to download.
For full track listings click here.
We Are Your Gods [2000]
22 tracks. 73 mins. 16 page booklet with full colour cover. Lyrics and song descriptions in booklet. Cover by Dave.
This CD collects together all the tracks from the first two singles (‘a’ and ‘b’ sides) and the very first Unit album (all of which are now deleted and no longer available) plus an additional track intended for the album but not included on it at the time. Many of the songs on this CD are tracks originally recorded by The Apostles (Dave and Andy's first band). All this material features the first, formative version of the group which included Nathan Coles (who now leads the art rock group The Unbelievables), Lawrence Burton (now famous as alternative rapper LDB) and Pete Williams (now a professional astronomer). Almost all of these are re-recorded versions of old Apostles pieces.
Sons Of The Dragon [2001]
23 tracks. 77 mins. 24 page booklet with full colour cover. Lyrics and song descriptions in booklet. Cover by Gieng San Man.
Unit
changed their line-up with the arrival of Gieng San Man (guitars), Lang
Kin Tung (keyboards) and Ngo Achoi (drums). This new line-up took
the group’s music to a completely different and unique direction.
The album is a mixture of pop songs, progressive rock and traditional
Chinese folk melodies.
:
The
Boy From Hanoi / Cambodian
Kim / War
Crime
Fire & Ice [2003]
18 tracks. 78 mins. 28 page booklet with full colour cover. Full lyrics and song descriptions in booklet. Cover by Dave.
The
most bitter, spiteful and angry album we've released. This is our reply
to the bigotry, prejudice and unjust criticism the band had been
subjected to not long after ‘Sons Of The Dragon’ was released.
When the album was finished Gieng San Man and Lang Kin Tung left the
band - the reasons for why can be found on the CD. In addition to
the usual hard rock and punk songs, most of the tracks are progressive
pieces heavily featuring compound time signatures, vocal harmonies, and
interesting structures.
:
National
Suicide / Why
Should We Not? / Too
High Too Soon / When
We Were Friends
Untied & Untied volume one [2004]
37 tracks. 77 mins. 24 page booklet with full colour cover. Lyrics and song descriptions in booklet. Cover by Lawrence.
A compilation of previously unreleased material. It features all 6 tracks from the EP 'Richard Dawkins Is Together With Us!' plus the complete studio sessions recorded between 1998 and 2002. This CD contains more punk rock than we'd normally allow... Contains a whopping thirty seven tracks!
: For Sarah Strange / This Hour’s Mine / c (∆λ / λ)
Dare To Be Different [2004]
21 tracks. 75 mins. 12 page, full colour booklet. Lyrics and song descriptions in booklet. Cover by U-J.
The most varied album we’ve so far released. In musical terms, technically superior to ‘Fire & Ice’. Breaking from the band’s convention, the flute is extensively used as the lead instrument. Contains a mixture of progressive, punk, pop, and rock. Achoi left his post as fulltime drummer after the album was complete in order to pursue a university course. No drummer? No problem! The group simply elected (forced) Andy to take over whenever required.
: Race Traitors / Hello, Playmates / The Unforgiven
School Farm Bungalow [2005] cover by Michael Felton.
Long overdue pop CD to be released some time this year... Info coming soon!
Rock In Opposition: Phase One [2006]
19 tracks. 78 mins. 16 page, full colour booklet. Lyrics and song descriptions in CD booklet and A5 booklet. Cover by Andy.
This
is the result of our first venture into avant garde/experimental
territory, with our more conventional pieces playing a far lesser role.
Taking a more serious political approach than our previous releases,
here we mostly address various issues that result from the tyranny of
global capitalism. The CD is accompanied by a 44 page A5 booklet
containing various essays relating to the album content. A couple
of these have been posted under the 'Articles' section. This CD is
definitely recommended for the texts and subjects highlighted, if not
for most of the music that some might find a little difficult to
assimilate!
:
One
Life / Resonance
FM Rocks Out / Hungary
1956
Rock In Opposition: Phase Two (Double album) [2007]
24 tracks. 74.32 mins (CD1) 76.14 (CD2). 14 page, full colour booklet. Lyrics and song descriptions in CD booklet. Cover by Andy.
After years of playing primarily conventional pop music / rock works (with only rare excursions into less orthodox music), Rock In Opposition: Phase 1 introduced a new element into our idiom: almost two thirds of the pieces were examples of avant garde soundscapes and occasional ventures into free improvisation. Phase 2 celebrates a complete project devoid of all rock and pop cliché, where non-commercial (and by implication anti-capitalist) musical idioms are adopted. With perhaps just 2 exceptions, this entire project (our first double album although it sells for the same price as a single album) leaves behind all previous attempts at a rapprochement with commercial music...and probably leaves behind all previous attempts at making our music accessible to our long suffering supporters, too. Electronic sounds, electronic manipulation of live instruments, samples, saxophones, flutes, recorders, keyboards, piano, bass guitar and percussion are used in a variety of interesting and adventurous ways. The intense agitational propaganda content of the lyrics is essential for the present time and in this we were ably assisted by Helen Dinh, Jan Dinh and Linda Hong. This album is a brief but necessary digression from what we normally do. Rock In Opposition: Phase 3 is already finished and over half of it features what others might call ‘our real music’. i.e. songs with melodies, harmonies and beats!
Rock In Opposition: Phase Three [2008]
11 tracks. 76.07 mins. 12 page, full colour booklet. Notes, lyrics and song descriptions in CD booklet. Cover by Andy.
After Rock In Opposition Phase 2, our venture into the avant garde increased at a rate occasionally beyond our collective technical abilities. This album is split between pure free improvisation (often with texts) and electronic manipulation of pre-recorded voices and instruments, in other words, music that is as far removed from the immediacy of improvisation as possible. The major achievement here is Roads – Bridges – Space, a 23 minute exposition on a text in English and Cantonese where live and pre-recorded performers (voices, saxophone and flute) are mixed, juxtaposed and weaved in a hypnotic
sound-scape hidden in a cloud of bird song recorded in Epping Forest. Unusually, every group member plays almost every instrument available to us at some time during the album, regardless of their proficiency. This whole album can be construed as a massive homage to Resonance, the radio station that has continually assisted and supported us since 2005. However, because the music on this album is by its nature extremely uncompromising and unequivocal in its mode of expression (there is no rock or pop music here and usually no melody, harmony or rhythm in the conventional sense), U-J suggested we release this album for half the price of our usual new releases, to which the groups’ agreement was unanimous. Achoi rates this as his favourite UNIT album. Trung calls it a boring, tedious racket. You decide!
The CD label is by Carol Zac Lewis and Malcolm Lewty who provided a beautiful image at short notice.
Rock In Opposition: Phase Four [2008]
27 tracks. 70.27 mins. 12 page, full colour booklet. Notes, lyrics and song descriptions in CD booklet. Cover by Andy.
Claims that we recorded this in response to complaints and criticism with regard to the style and idiom of the previous album are proved utterly false when it is revealed that over two thirds of Rock In Opposition Phase 4 was recorded during the same sessions used for Phase 3. Both albums were originally intended to be released on the same day which, in the event, is what we did. This album can justifiably be regarded as the older brother of Dare To Be Different: political and personal texts set to pop songs, rock anthems and even post-punk pieces designed to be as accessible as possible. It was Achoi who suggested we record our own interpretations of works by The Apostles and 4 pieces by 1980s anarchist band Anthrax. Both these albums mark a turning point in the career of UNIT since, at the end of the recording sessions, Dave, Trung and Achoi all retired from the group although Achoi will still provide CD booklet notes and management duties. This also concludes the series of Rock In Opposition albums we commenced way back in 2005 and these 5 discs represent one of the most innovative (if not always successful) adventures into breaking barriers in modern music that any independent group has attempted.
The CD label is by Dave and marks the end of his fine series of sword tsuba designs which have graced our albums since We Are Your Gods way back in 2000.
'godspunk' compilations [2001- ]
Unit is a regular contributor to the 'godspunk' compilation albums released on PUMF Records, (Visit www.pumf.net for more details, or ask us), run by Stan Batcow from 'The Ceramic Hobs'. We normally submit four exclusive tracks per CD. Other artists on the compilations include: Howl In The Typewriter, LDB, Hebetation, the taurus board, Litterbug, Stream Angel, Gays in the Military, Las Vegas Mermaids, pinkeye, Pissed Off, Higgins++, RooHmania, The 3 Ages Of Elvis, Norman, Razor Dog, Time Flies!, Kate Fear & Nigel Joseph, and The Reverends.
