Front 242: Nostalgia or Brilliant Belgian Cold Wave Synthpop?

I fell in love this collective at one of Font 242's earliest concerts, organised by one of my then closest friends, in Ghent (where I was reading Chemistry) I promptly bought their first (then vinyl) album ('Geography'), still have it and still cherish it.

In the early eighties, there could of course be no German, Swiss ('Grauzone'), French, British or Belgian New Wave/Cold Wave without the muse of Kraftwerk. Belgium's main Cold Wave bands back then were Front 242, The Neon Judgement and the seriously cultish Snowy Red.

Front 242's raw beats, combined with unmodulated monotonic synthesisers, linguistic confusion (they use two of Belgium's languages, French and German, plus English) and visuals like a video/audio collage (at least live) made it the perfect backdrop of early eighties/Cold War angst. The band went on the showcase their 'installation-style' performances at New York's Danceteria

Despite the group's claim their lyrics don't mean anything it's hard to consider at least some of them as pure poetry: it may be about 'nothing' but a dedicated observer knows perfectly what it's about.

Here's 'Operating Tracks' (no pun intended) The video is 'pre-video' (and it shows). While maybe dated, produced on a shoestring it still packs a punch today.

And then there's 'U-men', possibly their poppiest track ever (from the first album). Again it's easy to declare that 'don't worry the lyrics are just soundscape' but from my perspective that's not true.

'Headhunter' and 'Tragedy for you' to follow later.