THE ART OF NOISE have a reputation as the gurus of high-tech, all Fairlights
and found sound.  So it might come as a surprise that, having recorded part
of their new album, _Below the Waste_, with a black South African vocal
group, they feel that they are going back to their roots.  "In the early
80's," says J.J. Jeczalik, "before we became THE ART OF NOISE, we worked on
Malcolm McLaren's Duck Rock.  He used a lot of tapes of Mahlathini & The
Mahotella Queens.  We never met them back then, but they were very
influential on our own early stuff."

They finally got together with the Queens in Paris last spring and the four
tracks they feature on include the single Yebo!.  In terms of the whole
album, their presence is a starting point for the instrumental explorations
that have made THE ART OF NOISE one of the least predictable denizens of the
Top Twenty.

THE ART OF NOISE was conceived in one of those Eureka! moments.  In 1983,
late at night and momentarily fed up with being mechanics on Yes's _90125_
album, synthesize-and-sample wizard Jeczalik and studio engineer Gary Langan
digressed into a couple of wacky ideas of their own.  By the early morning
they were looking at five minutes of lip-smacking cacophony.  They liked it,
but they called in their friend, keyboards player and string arranger Anne
Dudley, to "provide the melodic and harmonic interest," as she puts it, and
give the public something to get a handle on.  They called it Beat Box.

Island Records, who had just signed the ZTT label, thought the track could
be commercial.  Someone remembered an Italian Futurist track with a title
both good and rather apt that became the band's name and the title of their
first release, a 12": _Into Battle With The Art of Noise_, that included
Beat Box.  A few months later a 7-inch beat Box shot to the top of the
dance charts in America and resulted in them being voted second best black
music act of the year.

Since then, although they like to maintain to their image as an
instrumental, unfashionable and generally faceless outfit (publicity shots
tend to be of wrenches or sea cliffs), the smash hits have kept on coming
in all over the world.  To name a few: Close (To The Edit) ('84), Peter
Gunn (with Duane Eddy), Paranoimia (with "Max Headroom", both '86), and Kiss
(Prince's song, Tom Jones' vocal, '88).  Moments in Love ('85), which
achieved notoriety when it replaced the Wedding March at the nuptials of
Madonna and Sean Penn, has just been re-released.

Now a duo through Langan's departure in '86, they toured America and Japan
in 1987 and did one British gig that proved slightly frustrating.  They
enjoyed it, but having taken a nine person band with them and stuck
scrupulously to a "no-tapes" policy to show what they could do live, they
were galled to find most of the reviews saying, "Great show, shame they were
miming."

Anne Dudley and J.J. Jeczalik also enjoy considerable individual success
outside of THE ART OF NOISE.  Both work, individually and together, as
record producers.  Most recently Anne did the music for the Phil Collins
movie "Buster", and J.J. has recently done commercials for Xerox and
Southern Comfort and is currently working on ex-Traffic drummer Jim
Capaldi's new album.  In addition, J.J. is the proprietor of Monsterrat
recording studios.


THE ART OF NOISE
_Below the Waste_
October 1989