Marc & the Mambas -

Marc & the Mambas were an English cabaret-goth band led by singer–musician Marc Almond, conducted as a side-project while he was still a member of Soft Cell. The project yielded two double-albums on Some Bizzare during 1982 and 1983.

Members: Marc Almond, Matt Johnson, Annie Hogan

Background

Marc Almond assembled the Mambas as a side project to Soft Cell, his synth duo with musician Dave Ball. Soft Cell recently charted with its debut album, the November 1981 Some Bizzare release Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret, which spawned the UK Top 5 hits “Tainted Love,” “Bedsitter” and “Say Hello, Wave Goodbye.” Amid the duo’s promotional activities, Almond teamed with musicians Matt Johnson and Annie Hogan.

Johnson cut two 1980 albums in the post-punk trio The Gadgets and led The The, a revolving-door unit responsible for three singles: the 1980 4AD 7″ “Controversial Subject” (b/w “Black and White”) and the 1981–82 shortplayers “Cold Spell Ahead” and “Uncertain Smile,” both on Some Bizzare.

Annie befriended Almond in Soft Cell’s native Leeds, where she worked as a club DJ. She knew Johnson from their mutual involvement in Silence & Wisdom, the first of two self-released albums by Deux Filles, a “girl” duo actually composed of former child actor (and seventies pop singer) Simon Fisher Turner and Matt’s Gadgets bandmate Colin Lloyd-Tucker.

“Fun City” / “Sleaze”

Some Bizzare issued “Fun City” backed with “Sleaze (Take It, Shake It)” and “Taking It and Shaking It” as a fan-club 12″ in March 1982. The lineup comprised Almond on vocals and drums, Hogan on piano and synthesizer, Lance Rock on drums and synthesizer, and Tim Taylor on bass guitar.

The record runs on a hard, stripped pulse with Annie Hogan’s piano and synthesizer set against Lance Rock’s drum patterns and Tim Taylor’s bass underpin. Marc Almond keeps the surface terse and blunt, then lets each side stretch past pop-song length into a more extended club-cabaret form. “Fun City” holds the tightest line of the three pieces, while both versions of “Sleaze” push the set toward a rawer, looser, more repetitive pressure.

A. “Fun City” (7:47) — Ball, Almond
B1. “Sleaze (Take It, Shake It)” (7:14) — Almond
B2. “Taking It And Shaking It” (7:11) — Almond

Dave Ball produced the session at Box Studios, Heckmondwike, West Yorkshire, with engineer Bill.

Huw Feather handled sleeve design and photography for the original yellow-sleeve pressing, which also carried a dedication line on the release. Some Bizzare first issued the set through the fan-club channel.

Untitled

Marc and The Mambas released their first album, Untitled, in September 1982 on Some Bizzare.

The set opens into a sparse, exposed terrain where piano, electric piano, synthesizer, vibraphone, percussion, and guitar rarely settle into a fixed center for long. Marc Almond keeps the vocal line close and inward, while Matt Johnson and Annie Hogan pull the arrangements between bare torch-song pacing, low-lit keyboard passages, and longer pieces that widen through strings, percussion, and slow accumulations of tension. Shorter covers sit beside extended originals, so side breaks feel less like clean divisions than shifts in mood and scale.

“Untitled” opens with a slow, uneasy drift. “Empty Eyes” and “Angels” deepen that inward pull through longer pacing and heavier emotional weight. “Big Louise,” “Caroline Says,” and “If You Go Away” give the album some of its clearest shape, with “Big Louise” carrying Buckmaster’s string arrangement and “Caroline Says” and “If You Go Away” tightening the focus around song form. “Terrapin” keeps the surface bare, while the two-part “Twilights & Lowlifes” occupies the far end of the set with a long, diffuse sprawl that turns the album toward soundtrack scale.

A1. “Untitled” (4:54) — Almond, Johnson
A2. “Empty Eyes” (5:03) — Almond, Hogan
A3. “Angels” (8:34) — Almond, Johnson

B1. “Big Louise” (5:05) — Scott Walker
B2. “Caroline Says” (3:39) — Lou Reed
B3. “Margaret” (3:45) — Hogan
B4. “If You Go Away” (6:28) — Jacques Brel, Rod McKuen

C1. “Terrapin” (4:18) — Syd Barrett
C2. “Twilights & Lowlifes” (11:29) — Mambas

D1. “Twilights & Lowlifes (Street Walking Soundtrack)” (11:08) — Mambas

Marc And The Mambas recorded Untitled at Trident Studios in London between May and July 1982 with engineers Flood and Steeve Short. The band took production credit.

The album came in a gatefold double-vinyl edition, with the first disc cut at 33 RPM and the second at 45 RPM. Val Denham supplied the cover portrait.

Some Bizzare lifted no separate single from the album itself, but Untitled reached No. 42 on the UK Albums Chart.

Torment and Toreros

Marc and The Mambas released their second album, Torment and Toreros, in August 1983 on Some Bizzare.

The album widens the group from the earlier trio core into a larger ensemble with strings, reeds, double bass, timpani, and multiple rhythm supports. Annie Hogan’s piano, harpsichord, and Farfisa keep much of the material anchored in a theatrical keyboard language, while Lee Jenkinson, Steve Sherlock, Matt Johnson, Peter Ashworth, Frank Want, Billy McGee, Martin McCarrick, Anne Stephenson, and Gini Hewes thicken the texture with drums, flute, saxophone, strings, and low-register weight. Marc Almond pushes the songs through abrupt mood shifts, sharp dynamic surges, spoken or half-sung lines, and denser climaxes that keep the double set in near-constant agitation.

“Boss Cat” cuts through with a brisker pace and a sly refrain, while “Catch a Fallen Star” wraps its in in a broad string arrangement anchored by cello. “The Untouchable One” closes on a dark turn that runs straight into “Blood Wedding,” whose short instrumental passage tightens the sense of fatality. “Black Heart” lands on a firmer beat and a cleaner line, and “Medley: Narcissus/Gloomy Sunday/Vision” opens with sax before it folds several pieces into one long sequence. “Torment” starts with a taut, dramatic line, then breaks into a louder, more crowded final stretch. “A Million Manias” drives at high pressure, and “Beat Out That Rhythm On a Drum” closes the album with counter-lines, repetition, and a hard theatrical push.

A1. “Intro” (3:17) — Almond, Sally Mambas
A2. “Boss Cat” (4:17) — Almond, Anne Stephenson, Gini Hewes
A3. “The Bulls” (2:18) — Jacques Brel
A4. “Catch a Fallen Star” (5:12) — Almond
A5. “The Animal In You” (7:19) — Almond, Mambas

B1. “In My Room” (3:01) — Joaquin Prieto, Lee Pockriss, Paul Vance
B2. “First Time” (3:38) — Almond
B3. “(Your Love Is A) Lesion” (5:38) — Almond
B4. “My Former Self” (2:45) — Almond, Hogan
B5. “Once Was” (5:10) — Almond, The Venomettes

C1. “The Untouchable One” (6:03) — Almond, Jenkinson
C2. “Blood Wedding” (1:51) — Traditional Spanish, arr. Marc And The Mambas
C3. “Black Heart” (4:50) — Hogan, Almond
C4. “Medley: Narcissus / Gloomy Sunday / Vision” (11:46) — Almond, Steve Sherlock, Sam M. Lewis, Rezső Seress, Peter Hammill

D1. “Torment” (4:21) — Almond, Steven Severin, Robert Smith
D2. “A Million Manias” (5:52) — Almond, Foetus
D3. “My Little Book of Sorrows” (5:59) — Almond
D4. “Beat Out That Rhythm On a Drum” (5:00) — Georges Bizet, Oscar Hammerstein II

Marc And The Mambas recorded Torment And Toreros at Trident Studios in London between January and May 1983 with co-producer Flood. Almond took the main production credit, and Flood handled the mix with him.

Huw Feather handled cover design and Peter Ashworth supplied photography. Val Denham painted the cover image.

Some Bizzare issued “Black Heart” as a 12-inch in June 1983 with “Your Aura” and “Mamba.” The label issued “Torment” as a 12-inch later in 1983 with “First Time,” “You’ll Never See Me On A Sunday,” and the Foetus-linked “Megamillionmania – Multimaniamix.” Torment And Toreros reached No. 28 on the UK Albums Chart.

Bite Black + Blues (as Raoul And The Ruined)

Raoul and The Ruined released the live album Bite Black + Blues in May 1984 through the Gutter Hearts fan club.

The record catches the Mambas in a tougher stage setting built from piano, guitar, bass, saxophone, strings, and a more direct backbeat than the studio albums. Annie Hogan keeps the cabaret center in place, but the live band hits harder and leaves more open space for abrupt turns, spoken tension, and loose transitions. Several songs arrive in shorter, more muscular form than their studio versions, while “Sleaze” stretches out into a long closing performance that folds in an improvised passage from “Walk On The Wild Side.”

A1. “The Plague” (4:30) — Scott Walker
A2. “In My Room” (7:47) — Joaquin Prieto, Lee Pockriss, Paul Vance
A3. “Fun City” (2:52) — Ball, Almond
A4. “Gloomy Sunday” (3:27) — Rezső Seress, Sam M. Lewis

B1. “Switchblade Operator” (3:26) — Jack Hammer
B2. “Muleskinner Blues” (4:10) — Lonnie Donegan
B3. “Blue Prelude” (4:10) — Gordon Jenkins, Joe Bishop
B4. “Sleaze” (10:44) — Almond

Raoul And The Ruined recorded Bite Black + Blues live at the Duke Of York’s Theatre on December 18, 1983. Flood mixed the album with Clive Martin.

Huw Feather handled cover photography and design. Gutter Hearts first issued the LP as an official fan-club release with permission from Phonogram. Blue Star Music reissued the album on CD in December 2000 and added concert material from the same shows: “Black Heart,” “My Former Self,” “Love Amongst The Ruined,” “Catch A Fallen Star,” and “Nobody Loves You When You’re Down And Out.”

Postlude

The Mambas did not stop with the end of the group name. Marc Almond carried key members into his solo work under later banners such as The Willing Sinners and La Magia, and that follow-through kept much of the project’s musical language alive across the next phase of his catalog. Annie Hogan remained a central writing and arranging partner. Anne Stephenson, Gini Hewes, Martin McCarrick, and other Mambas-connected players also stayed close to Almond’s orbit across later recordings and stage work.

La Magia held together until 1988. Martin McCarrick left that band in 1987 for Siouxsie and The Banshees, while Lee Jenkinson later cut a single with Flood under the name The Poppyfields and then joined Jellynail. Almond kept Mambas material in his live repertoire, and he reunited with former associates for later concerts, including the 2004 Sin, Songs and Romance shows at the Almeida.

In August 2012 he returned to Torment and Toreros in full at London’s Meltdown Festival, which confirmed that the Mambas project had fed directly into his solo stage and studio life long after the original records disappeared from print.

Discography: