The Bureau -

The Bureau was an English new wave/ska band from Birmingham that released a 1981 self-titled album on WEA. Four members came from the original lineup of Dexys Midnight Runners.

Members: Archie Brown (vocals), Pete Williams (bass), Rob Jones (guitar, 1980-81), ‘Stoker’ [aka Andy Growcott] (drums), Mick Talbot, Geoff Blythe (tenor saxophone), Steve Spooner (alto saxophone), ‘Big’ Jimmy Patterson (trombone, 1980), Jake (trombone, 1980-81), Paul Taylor (trombone, 1981), Pat Cunningham (guitar, 1981)

Background

The Bureau formed in late 1980 in Birmingham when bassist Pete Williams, drummer Andy “Stoker” Growcott, saxophonists Geoff Blythe and Steve Spooner, and keyboardist Mick Talbot left Dexys Midnight Runners and regrouped under former Dexys manager Dave Corke.

Williams learned clarinet at school and bought a bass guitar at fourteen, after which he played social clubs across the industrial West Midlands. An old school friend invited Williams into an unnamed new-wave soul group four years later, and the group became Dexys Midnight Runners. Blythe studied performance and composition at Coventry School of Music and played saxophone with Geno Washington and the Ram Jam Band before he joined Dexys. Talbot played keyboards in South London mod group the Merton Parkas, which released the 1979 Beggars Banquet album Face in the Crowd. Talbot joined Dexys after the Parkas split, following the UK No. 40 single “You Need Wheels.”

Archie Brown grew up in Uganda, where his father worked as a mining engineer. Brown joined Newcastle group the Young Bucks as a saxophonist in 1976 and became lead singer after a 1979 lineup change. Brown subsequently formed the Upset, whose lineup included guitarist Rob Jones, formerly of the Back Numbers. The Upset opened a 30-date Dexys tour in 1980 and issued “Hurt” (b/w “(10-9-8) Lift Off”) on the Upset label through Phonogram. The Bureau added Brown and Jones in December 1980 and rehearsed with trombonist Jake, formerly of Gonzalez.

WEA signed the Bureau in February 1981 after the group promoted Birmingham concerts to raise working funds. The band recorded “Only for Sheep” (b/w “The First One”) with Pete Wingfield at Vineyard Studios in London. The Bureau added trombonist Paul Taylor before debut dates in Apeldoorn and Amsterdam, where the Paradiso show went out on Dutch radio. The band played its first British show at Ronnie Scott’s in London on March 12, after WEA issued “Only for Sheep” that month. The group entered album sessions with Wingfield in April for WEA.

Bureau

The Bureau released their self-titled debut album in 1981 on WEA in Canada; WEA issued the same ten-track program in Australia as Only for Sheep. The album never received a contemporary British LP release.

Bureau combines horn-led soul and R&B with taut post-punk rhythms across the established eight-piece lineup. Talbot adds organ beneath a brass section formed by Blythe, Spooner, and Taylor, while Jones alternates guitar and trumpet. Brown based “Let Him Have It” on the Derek Bentley–Christopher Craig murder case; the group also adapts the Elmer Bernstein theme from The Carpetbaggers.

“Only for Sheep” bristles with excited brass inside a restrained arrangement. “Let Him Have It” rasps through gritty, contoured lines as Archie Brown delivers a throaty lead. “Find a Way” slows through brooding passages as Brown carries a rich lead beside close ensemble phrases. “Bigger Prize” quickens through taut horn bursts as Brown rides brisk momentum.

A1. “Only for Sheep” (3:40)
A2. “The First One” (2:56)
A3. “Sentimental Attachment” (3:03)
A4. “Got to Be Now” (5:23)
A5. “Looking for Excitement” (3:34)

B1. “Let Him Have It” (3:15) – takes its title from the disputed phrase central to the 1952 Derek Bentley case. Nineteen-year-old Bentley accompanied armed sixteen-year-old Christopher Craig on a break-in at a Croydon warehouse. Police arrested Bentley on the roof, where officers testified that he called, “Let him have it, Chris”; Craig then shot and wounded Detective Constable Frederick Fairfax and fatally shot PC Sidney Miles. Prosecutors construed the phrase as an order to fire, while the defense argued that Bentley could have meant for Craig to surrender the gun. Bentley, who had severe intellectual limitations and did not fire a weapon, was convicted of murder under contemporary joint-enterprise law and hanged in January 1953; Craig escaped capital punishment because of his age. The Court of Appeal quashed Bentley’s conviction in 1998 after finding his original trial unfair. Elvis Costello revisited the case on “Let Him Dangle” from Spike, which explicitly addresses the disputed phrase, Craig’s age, and Bentley’s execution.
B2. “Find a Way” (3:44)
B3. “Bigger Prize” (3:07)
B4. “The Carpetbaggers” (3:18)
B5. “Helpless” (5:28)

The Bureau cut “Only for Sheep” and “The First One” in February 1981 at Vineyard Studios in London with producer Pete Wingfield. The group resumed album sessions in late March and April under Wingfield, who followed his work on the 1980 Dexys Midnight Runners album Searching for the Young Soul Rebels with this project and subsequent 1981 sessions for the Belle Stars.

Phil Smee designed the sleeve, which frames a night-time group photograph with car headlamps and starburst lights beneath a red Bureau nameplate. Smee also designed 1981 packaging for Hawkwind (Sonic Attack) and Bill Nelson (Quit Dreaming and Get on the Beam).

WEA lifted “Only for Sheep” as a March 1981 single (b/w “The First One”); the song reached No. 5 on the Australian Kent Music Report. “Let Him Have It” followed in May (b/w “The Noose”). The Australian album reached No. 59 on the Kent Music Report.

Warner Strategic Marketing first issued the album in Britain in February 2005 as an expanded two-CD edition with four additional studio titles and an eleven-song live disc.

Postlude

The Bureau finished their 1981 touring schedule with a Dec. 23 show at the Venue in London. The members dispersed after the tour. Mick Talbot began working with Paul Weller in 1982 and co-founded the Style Council, whose first singles appeared the following year on Polydor. Archie Brown formed Flag with former Secret Affair guitarist Dave Cairns. Scotti Brothers issued the U.S.-only album Flag in 1985.

Pete Williams formed These Tender Virtues with Fred Skidmore and toured Britain through the mid-1980s. The group released the single “Waltz” and the six-song mini-album The Continuing Saga through the Cartel distribution network. Geoff Blythe joined the TKO Horns and played on the 1983 Elvis Costello album Punch the Clock. Andy “Stoker” Growcott subsequently played with General Public before establishing a production and engineering career in Los Angeles.

Warner Music UK issued The Bureau (Remastered & Expanded) on Feb. 21, 2005, which gave the 1981 album its first official British release. The two-disc edition paired the studio recordings with live material and the “Only for Sheep” video. The Bureau marked the release with reunion shows at the Glee Club in Birmingham and the Borderline in London. Those concerts prompted Archie Brown, Pete Williams, Geoff Blythe, Mick Talbot, and Paul Taylor to develop new material with drummer Crispin Taylor.

The Bureau released the 12-track …And Another Thing on Sept. 30, 2008 through the group’s own imprint. The band supported the album with October shows at the Sound Bar in Birmingham, the Cluny in Newcastle, and the Jazz Café in London. A remixed version of the album followed in 2010.

Brown and Blythe subsequently reunited in GI Blythe with former Dexys trombonist Big Jim Paterson. The group released Lost in Space in 2012. Williams and Talbot rejoined Kevin Rowland in Dexys for One Day I’m Going to Soar, released that year on BMG.

Discography: