THEMES FROM GREAT CITIES: Cabaret Voltaire

Tuesday, 17 February 2026

Cabaret Voltaire - The Crackdown

Apart from a single, overlooked Virgin reissue around 2000 and scattered compilations, most of the music here hasn't been available almost since it was initially released, and certainly The Crackdown alone will serve to change some opinions of the Cabs' tenure in the majors. Indeed, if the record takes a step back from the sprawling experimental tracks of 2x45 or Three Mantras, it does so by harking back to the shorter song lengths of their earlier albums. The dub influence is back to the fore, as are weird, tinny reggae horns, both of the synthesised and acoustic variety. The production is noticeably cleaner than their underfinanced independent recordings, but it's hardly less dark, and the added clarity serves to show off the diverse, layered productions, which draw equally from dub, funk, and early electro. Mallinder's vocals are easier to cipher than they had been before, but the pop tones they would later take on are evident on a few tracks from the album: the title track, 'Taking Time', 'Animation' and the cynically comical 'Why Kill Time (When You Can Kill Yourself)'. Much of the rest would not sound out of place on Red Mecca, but benefits from more transparent production, while the lyrical themes remain as fragmented and inscrutably bleak as ever. The album's second half mostly finds them sounding very recognisably like their earlier selves, especially the closing trio of sinister nearly-ambient works and prominent swaths of horns by Kirk.