THROBBING GRISTLE - DISCIPLINE @ 40

 

Marking 40 years since its release in June of 1981, Throbbing Gristle’s Discipline 12” was the last official TG single released before the group disbanded after their final performance in San Francisco in May of that year. The dissolution of the project was officially announced via the mailing of the infamous “Mission is Terminated” postcard on the 23rd of June, 1981. The single was issued by Fetish Records and was their first TG release that wasn’t a reissue of material previously published by Industrial Records.

The single contains two separate recordings of Discipline, a track which was never captured in a studio recording. The A side is the debut performance of the song, which was essentially composed on the spot with Genesis inventing the lyrics based on Cosey’s suggesting the concept before the song started. It was recorded at the SO 36 Club in Berlin on the 7th of November, 1980 and is a Digital recording. The B-side was recorded live at the Illuminated 666 Club in Manchester on 4th December, 1980 and is a binaural recording.

The front cover photo is by Stan Bingo and shows TG standing outside the ex-Nazi Ministry of Propaganda in Berlin. It uses a double exposure effect to make the group look like ghosts in front of the building. The rear cover features a photo by Peter Christopherson of a shirtless Val Denham holding a Hitler Youth dagger. The text around the photo reads “Marching Music for Psychic Youth” and is a hint of where Genesis was moving with his idea of forming a cult-like organization which would eventually manifest as Thee Temple Ov Psychick Youth. This organization would form the core support system for Psychic TV, Gen & Sleazy’s post TG regrouping along with Alternative TV guitarist, Alex Fergusson. The runoff groove of the B-side also features the phrase “Psykick Youth Squad”. The A-side runoff groove has the phrase, “Techno Primitive”, scratched into the surface, which would reappear as the title of a Chris & Cosey LP in 1985.

The first time I ever listened to this single was in December of 1984, one evening when a friend and I dropped some blotter LSD called “Flash”, which appropriately featured a lightning bolt print on the tab. We listened to a lot of TG that night and Discipline stood out in particular as it sounded like we were being swept up in some kind of manic cyclone that eventually turned into a human blender with nothing but the screech of spent whirling blades as the song ended and the last remains of human flesh were ground out of the metal.

The single was never re-pressed after it’s initial limited edition run of 10,000 copies was sold out. It was eventually included as bonus tracks on the Mute CD edition of 20 Jazz Funk Greats in 1991. After it’s inception in Berlin, it became a staple of TG live performances, both during the final days of their initial active period in 1980/81 and during their reunion from 2004 to 2010. Though it was never recorded in studio, it has become one of the most iconic representations of TG at their most fierce and confrontational. It’s not uncommon to see it propel audience members to transcendent states of ecstasy, as can clearly be seen in the final minutes of its performance at TG’s San Francisco show in 1981 and during the Astoria reunion show in 2004 where Jhon Balance can be seen undergoing some sort of altered state during its performance. It captures their raw intensity like nearly no other song in their repertoire.