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Clock DVA

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Clock DVA

Clock DVA are a musical group from Sheffield, England, whose style has touched on industrial, post-punk, and EBM. They were formed in 1978 by Adi Newton (born Gary Coates) and Steven "Judd" Turner. Along with contemporaries Heaven 17, Clock DVA's name was inspired by the Russian-influenced Nadsat language of Anthony Burgess's novel A Clockwork Orange. Dva is Russian for "two".

Newton had previously worked with members of Cabaret Voltaire in a collective called The Studs and with Ian Craig Marsh and Martyn Ware in a band called The Future. He formed the first line-up of Clock DVA in 1978 with Judd Turner (bass), David J. Hammond (guitar), Roger Quail (drums), and Charlie Collins (saxophone, clarinet) (born 26 September 1958, Sheffield).

Clock DVA was originally known for making a form of experimental electronic music involving treated tape loops and synthesizers such as the EMS Synthi E. Clock DVA became associated with industrial music with the 1980 release of their cassette album White Souls in Black Suits on Throbbing Gristle's Industrial Records.

Paul Widger joined on guitar. The LP Thirst, released on Fetish Records, followed in 1981 to a favourable critical reaction, and reached the top of the NME Indie Charts, by which time the band had combined musique concrète techniques with standard rock instrumentation. "4 Hours", the single from Thirst, was later covered by former Bauhaus bassist David J on his 1985 solo EP Blue Moods Turning Tail.

The band split up in 1981, with the non-original members of the band—Quail, Collins, and Widger—going on to form The Box.

Turner died in September 1981 due to an accidental drug overdose.

In 1982, Newton formed a new version of the band that included future Siouxsie and the Banshees guitarist John Valentine Carruthers and signed a deal with the major label Polydor Records. The single "High Holy Disco Mass" (which was released under the name DVA) and the EP Passions Still Aflame were released in 1982, preceding the release of the album Advantage (with singles "Resistance" and "Breakdown") in 1983. Trouser Press characterized Advantage as "their strongest, most powerful LP, a funky concoction of intense dance-powered bass/drums drive with splatters of feedback, angst-ridden vocals by Newton, tape interruptions and dollops of white-noise sax and trumpet."

After a European tour in 1983, however, the band split acrimoniously. Adi Newton went on to form The Anti-Group, or T.A.G.C. They released several albums, continuing in a similar vein to the early Clock DVA, yet more experimental.

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