Creep Show release their new album Yawning Abyss on June 16 via Bella Union. Having previously shared the album’s title track and recent single “Bungalow”, today they share a video for album track “Moneyback” created by director Peter Care.

Creep Show’s Stephen Mallinder and Peter Care first worked together in the early ‘80s when Care directed a number of videos for Cabaret Voltaire, most notably ‘Sensoria’ (1984), which became the most requested independent music video on MTV, was voted Best Video of the Year 1985 by the LA Times and became one of the first music videos acquired by the New York Museum of Modern Art. Care subsequently went on to direct music videos for a whole host of artists, including Depeche Mode, R.E.M. and Bruce Springsteen. In 2005, he received a Lifetime Achievement Award for his videos from the Music Video Production Association.

Commenting on the video Peter Care says: “The idea was to shoot in a way that could not be done on a digital camera or a bunch of filters on a smart phone. Hence the blurry long exposures, scratches, flashes etc using a clockwork camera. I knew the result would match the energy of the track.”

Commenting on the track John Grant says: “Moneyback follows the travails and vicissitudes of a naive young woman from the suburbs who runs afoul of a grifter named Rusty Boygans in the big city and the hijinks which ensue.”

In the five years since Creep Show’s acclaimed Mr Dynamite album was released it’s fair to say that we’ve all been through a fair bit. Sitting here, in 2023, things don’t seem to be getting any better. There’s the cost of living crisis and political meltdowns; we’re in deep water with global warming and to top it all there’s a war on our doorstep.

Back in 2018 everything seemed less complicated. Sure, there was stuff to get riled about, but we knew nothing about what was to come. Mr Dynamite was a fairground ride into the dark corners of a world that was on the brink of being blitzed in a blender. It was a record teetering on the edge. Five years down the line you’d expect the follow-up, Yawning Abyss, would double-down and bring the white-knuckled, teeth-gritted fury of the last five years to the boil. And yet….

A quick recap? No problem. Wrangler + John Grant = Creep Show. And Creep Show? “A band of musical misfits who have found a voice or two”, says Wrangler’s Ben “Benge” Edwards, whose Bond villain studio on the edge of a moorland is Creep Show Grand Central as well as home to an analogue synth arsenal that could sink ships.

Wrangler have known each other for a while. Tunng’s electronics wizard Phil Winter and Cabaret Voltaire’s trailblazing, pioneering frontman Stephen Mallinder go way back, while Phil and Benge crossed paths in the 21st century when they seemed to be increasingly in the same venues at the same times. Meanwhile, Mal had been living in Australia since the mid-90s and when, in 2007, he returned to the UK his old pal Phil suggested he meet Benge and the three of them immediately began working together.

Wrangler collectively bumped into Grant at their soundcheck for Sheffield’s Sensoria Festival in 2014 where they were playing with Carter Tutti. A friendship blossomed and when they were invited to perform together for Rough Trade’s 40th anniversary show at London’s Barbican in 2016, well, they jumped at the chance… and Creep Show was born.

Creepshow
Yawning Abyss
Tracklist
Bella Union

1. The Bellows
2. Moneyback
3. Yawning Abyss
4. Matinee
5. Wise
6. Yahtzee!
7. Bungalow
8. Steak Diane
9. The Bellows Reprise

Pre-order Yawning Abyss by Creep Show HERE