The Sweets of Sin

The Sweets of Sin
Origin	Adelaide, South Australia
Genres	Crossover pop Classical music Jazz
Years active	1985–2006
Labels	Kip Records
Members
Frank Mankyboddle Thomas Pertzel Andreas Peters

The Sweets of Sin are an experimental crossover "pop"-band with strong modern classical, jazz and performance influences. It was founded in Adelaide, South Australia, in 1985 by Frank Mankyboddle and Steve Z. The name of the band was taken from Ulysses by James Joyce on the instigation of Steve Z.

History

Adelaide 1985/1986

Frank Mankyboddle (vocals, percussion, guitar, songwriting) who previously was the lead-singer of the 8-piece new soul band Del Webb Explosion and Steve Z (French horn, saxophones, keyboard, composition) previously playing with the band Empty Vessels decided to team their efforts in 1985, because both felt strongly about shedding musical dogmas. Both from a mixed "classical" and "pop" background they were influenced by a wide variety of music. From modern classical (but also baroque) composers like Stravinsky, Ravel, Messiaen, Debussy, Reich, Arvo Pärt and Cage to pop bands and musicians like Japan, Talking Heads, Kate Bush, Laurie Anderson, Dead can Dance, Hector Zazou and King Crimson, they forged their own distinctive sound around modal harmonies and intensive rhythmic patterns.

The band started performing in Adelaide as a weird two-piece with theatrical antics, at concert nights sometimes wedged between plain rock bands like Celibate Rifles and Mad Turks, irritating conservative reviewers. The band quickly realised that Adelaide would not support them and decided to move to Sydney adding Daniel O'Shea Clements (previously trumpeter in Del Webb Explosion) as drummer to the band.

Sydney 1986 - 1989

The move to Sydney proved fruitful insofar as the band managed to secure a first record release with the prominent world music label Larrikin (under the sublabel Jarra Hill) after being discovered by Bill O'Toole (of Larrikin) at a Balmain world music venue.

Even though the band was uneasy with the "world-music" label they were open to world music influences which showed in pieces like "Can Hatice" (their rendition of a Kurdish song made famous by Ibrahim Tatlises) and "The Gang of Four on Holiday in Sudan".

Critics lavished praise on the band which they however could not translate into making a living. Deciding that a Tuesday residency at the legendary Sandringham Hotel (which they held, on and off, for a couple of years) would not promote their artistic ambitions they decided that their music was, after all, more likely to interest a larger and more experimental-minded European audience. After all, as many reviews said, the band certainly sounded more Berlin than Sydney.

Berlin 1989-1994

Though Berlin was not immediately on the agenda when they left Australia, Berlin inevitably became their destination after living in the West German countryside for six months in early 1990.

The Sweets of Sin's early days in Europe were characterised somewhat by an 'I've got mine!' manifesto, with members varying greatly in their joy at having to share everything, from money and cigarettes to space for three on the bedroom floor of a family's flat in the industrial Ruhr region of provincial Germany.

Still The Sweets of Sin developed strongly musically, not least by venturing into jazz, playing jazz standards and some jazz originals by Steve Z under the name "Kool Skool". They added a fourth member - Dirk Lang on bass - , and got to live in one of the more interesting corners of the world, the inner eastern Berlin suburb of Prenzlauer Berg, just as the Wall came down.

There were memorable concerts at Volksbühne, the Franz Club, Objekt 5 in Halle, tours to Poland, Prague, the Metz Festival in France and through Belgium, plus excellent reviews in Tagesspiegel, Tip etc. However, personal differences led to a break up in 1994. In 2002, Frank Mankyboddle reformed the Band with Dirk Lang, now on guitar.

2002 and beyond

After reforming in 2002, the band played acoustically for a while and with a new acoustic bass player, Helge Krause. 2004 finally saw their second official CD-release on KIP-records, which had also released their first as a CD in Europe. (Larrikin in Sydney could not be convinced to skip vinyl - in 1988!)

After the departure of Helge Krause in 2004 and Dirk Lang in 2006, Mankyboddle restructured the band back to the classic line-up with new members, Thomas Pertzel and Andreas Peters, playing electronics, drums and wind instruments around Mankyboddle's vocals.

Members

Current

• Frank Mankyboddle
• Engel Musehold
• Andreas Peters

Former

• Thomas Pertzel
• Steve Z
• Daniel o'Shea Clements
• Dirk Lang
• Helge Krause
• Mirko Breder

Discography

• The Sweets of Sin - Jarrah Hill Records (1988) LP - Kip-Records (1991) (KIP 8008) CD

• Me-ISM (2004) Kip-Records (KIP 8009)

External links

• The Sweets of Sin website
• http://nla.gov.au/nla.cs-ma-an25665059