This Heat (album)

This Heat is the debut studio album by English experimental rock band This Heat. Recorded between 1976 and 1978, it was released in September 1979 by record label Piano.[1]

This Heat
A blue background with the words "This Heat" written in small, yellow handwritten font in the top-right quarter of the image.
Studio album by
This Heat
ReleasedSeptember 1979
Recorded1976–1978
StudioThe Workhouse Studios, Old Kent Road; Cold Storage, Brixton
Genre
Length48:24
LabelPiano
Producer
This Heat chronology
This Heat
(1979)		 Health and Efficiency
(1980)

Reception
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
All About Jazz[2]
AllMusic[3]
Cokemachineglow93%[4]
The Great Alternative & Indie Discography8/10[5]
Mojo[6]
Pitchfork9.0/10[7]
Popmatters[8]
Record Mirror[9]
Sounds[10]
Uncut9/10[11]

In a contemporary review for NME, Andy Gill wrote: "For much of This Heat's album, it's difficult and at times impossible to decipher which instrument is playing what. This is some indication of their intentions, and the way This Heat set about realising those intentions."[12] Vivien Goldman, writing in Melody Maker, remarked that This Heat "takes you to ten movies in the space of a one-year-old album".[13] NME listed it as the 35th best album of 1979.[14]

Legacy

Retrospectively, Dean McFarlane of AllMusic wrote: "There are very few records that can be considered truly important, landmark works of art that produce blueprints for an entire genre. In the case of this album, it's clear that this seminal work was integral in shaping the genres of post-punk, avant rock and post-rock, and like all great influential albums, it seemed it had to wait two decades before its contents could truly be fathomed."[3] Peter Marsh of BBC Music called it "one of the strongest and strangest debut records of all time. Seemingly born out of the fervent experimentalism of the UK post-punk scene, This Heat's beautifully skewed mix of improvisation, lo-fi tapework and stretched, ghostly songform actually had more in common with maverick longhairs like Henry Cow and Faust. [...] The music here seethes with an economy, invention and power that still shocks a quarter of a century on."[15] Steven Grant of Trouser Press wrote: "Though insolent and withdrawn, the music is adventurous and, in its own peculiar way, engrossing."[16]

Pitchfork included the song "24 Track Loop" on their list of the "Greatest 500 Songs from Punk to the Present".[17]

Track listing

All tracks composed by This Heat

  1. "Testcard" – 0:47
  2. "Horizontal Hold" – 6:56
  3. "Not Waving" – 7:26
  4. "Water" – 3:10
  5. "Twilight Furniture" – 5:06
  6. "24 Track Loop" – 5:57
  7. "Diet of Worms" – 3:09
  8. "Music Like Escaping Gas" – 3:40
  9. "Rainforest" – 2:55
  10. "The Fall of Saigon" – 5:10
  11. "Testcard" – 4:09

Personnel
This Heat
  • Charles Bullen – vocals, guitar, clarinet, drums, tapes
  • Charles Hayward – vocals, drums, keyboards, guitar, bass guitar, tapes
  • Gareth Williams – vocals, bass guitar, keyboards, tapes
Technical
  • This Heat – production, engineering
  • Chris Blake – engineering
  • Frank Bryan – engineering
  • David Cunningham – production, engineering
  • Kevin Harrison – engineering
  • Anthony Moore – production
  • Rik Walton – engineering

References
  1. "This Heat announce three vinyl reissues". The Wire. 3 March 2014. Retrieved 8 September 2015.
  2. Staff (2 April 2006). "This Heat: This Heat". All About Jazz (in Italian). Retrieved 16 November 2020.
  3. McFarlane, Dean. "This Heat – This Heat". AllMusic. Retrieved 3 August 2012.
  4. Ford, Sean (2 February 2006). "This Heat: This Heat". Cokemachineglow. Archived from the original on 16 January 2008. Retrieved 19 October 2019.
  5. Strong, Martin Charles (1999). The great alternative & indie discography. ISBN 9780862419134.
  6. Barnes, Mike (March 2016). "Hot fuzz". Mojo. No. 268. p. 108.
  7. Sherburne, Philip (26 January 2016). "This Heat: This Heat / Health and Efficiency / Deceit". Pitchfork. Retrieved 19 August 2016.
  8. "1979's 'This Heat' Remains a Lodestone for Avant-Rock Adventure, PopMatters". 27 October 2020.
  9. Westwood, Chris (15 September 1979). "Cold Heat". Record Mirror. p. 14.
  10. McCullough, Dave (8 September 1979). "This Heat: This Heat (Piano Records This 1)". Sounds. Retrieved 11 November 2020 – via Rock's Backpages.
  11. Bonner, Michael (17 March 2016). "This Heat – This Heat/Health & Efficiency/Deceit reissued". Uncut. Archived from the original on 21 March 2016. Retrieved 19 August 2016.
  12. Gill, Andy (8 September 1979). "This Heat: This Heat (Piano)". NME. Retrieved 4 February 2018 – via Rock's Backpages.
  13. Goldman, Vivien (1 September 1979). "This Heat: This Heat (Piano Records)". Melody Maker. Retrieved 4 February 2018 – via Rock's Backpages.
  14. "Albums and Tracks of the Year for 1979". NME. Archived from the original on 14 November 2011. Retrieved 3 November 2020.
  15. Marsh, Peter (5 April 2006). "This Heat This Heat Review". BBC Music. Retrieved 15 April 2015.
  16. Grant, Steven. "This Heat". Trouser Press. Retrieved 15 April 2015.
  17. Schreiber, Ryan; Plagenhoef, Scott, eds. (2008). The Pitchfork 500: Our Guide to the Greatest Songs from Punk to the Present. Simon & Schuster. ISBN 978-1-4165-6202-3.
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