“Love Goes Down the Drain” (1980) – The Monochrome Set * Written by Bid * Produced by the Monochrome Set * LP: Strange Boutique * Label: Dindisc
The notion of college rock sprouted out in a jiffy from punk as a better-read, more culturally observant version of the new rawness. London’s Monochrome Set were a good example, with their color wheel of ideas filtering through their eponymous conception of limited tone. It served them well: Their first few singles (“He’s Frank,” “Eine Symphonie des Grauens,” and “The Monochrome Set”) are clear attention-grabbers amid the era’s ocean of independent UK vinyl. Group leader Bid (Ganesh Seshadri) sings his weird words insouciantly with little raga curves while guitarist Lester Square maintains strict, sharp angles to modular and moody effect.
After 1980, the sharpness dulls, although their first album, Strange Boutique, holds on to portions of it, especially during the three-song stretch of “Love Goes Down the Drain,” “Ici Les Enfants,” and “The Etcetera Stroll.” The LP version of “Love Goes Down the Drain,” which should have been a single, is post-punk college rock 101 – an articulate, culturally literate, good-humored statement of self-loathing. The John Peel version that appeared on the B-side of their 1983 “Jet Set Junta” is more sluggish than this one.