Gang of Four Break Up... Again

Well, the original lineup of the groundbreaking post-punk group Gang of Four have broken up. Again. It was thirty years ago that Gang of Four began making music that would forever change the way I and millions of others looked at the world, forcing us to question the validity of social and political realities. Their debut album Entertainment! remains in my opinion, as well as others, the single greatest rock album of all time. To an admittedly small cadre of those in the know, Gang of Four were what The Clash, for all their greatness, aspired to be. By Gang of Four's third album the original four were down to three and by the fourth album and beyond Gang of Four should more accurately have been called Gang of Two.

Then a few years ago came the miraculous news that all Gang of Four fans were hoping to hear, but had despaired of living long enough to do so. The original lineup was not only back, but redoing those songs on Entertainment!, going on tour, and even making plans for a new album. Admittedly, the intervening years and the breakup were not conducive to catching lightning in a bottle again, but even lesser Gang of Four is superior to most of what passes for rock music today. There was always the distinct potential that the new Gang of Four could actually be even better than the old. Some of the remixes on the Entertainment! songs had actually been a slight improvement over the original, though most were definitely inferior. You just never know. Reunions of original members of rock groups typically spell disaster, of course, but you just never knew. Or, at least, you could always hope.