Zodiac Mindwarp And The Love Reaction - Tattooed Beat Messiah

Too knowing to be a genuine guilty pleasure, there is nonetheless much to recommend Tattooed Beat Messiah, by Zodiac Mindwarp and the Love Reaction. Fronted by Zodiac Mindwarp aka Mark Manning, a British music magazine art director, produced by David Balfe and Bill Drummond (soon to be of the KLF) Tattooed Beat Messiah is a credible attempt to outdo the hard rock sounds and out-there lyrics of the Cult's American breakthrough album Electric. In the early 80s, Zodiac set about to explode every hard-rock cliché he could find and created a band, ability to actually play not necessarily necessary. He got some guys together with names like Slam Thunderhide, Cobalt Stargazer, Kid Chaos, Trash D. Garbage, Flash Bastard and what he created was a cross between AC/DC, Deep Purple, The Cult and the Porky’s movies. The music this filthy bunch of loud-ass leather-clad faux bikers made had big fat simple riffs, sneering, snarling vocals and incomprehensible lyrics about sex, drugs, booze and going as long as possible without taking a bath. Zodiac takes lyricism to outer space, claiming to have fallen out of heaven, as well as being a "sex fuhrer", "Christ in shades" and a "funky alligator" all in just the first song, "Prime Mover" (and honestly, he's just getting started). Before flagging near the end of side two with a power ballad, the album is full of great guitar riffs, ridiculous and ridiculously catchy lyrics, and dumb fun. There is nothing else like it on this planet.

I now give you 10 Things You Need To Know about Zodiac Mindwarp and the Love Reaction

1.      Zodiac named the band after a lyric in Bruce Springsteen’s Dancing in the Dark

2.      Guitarist Cobalt Stargazer used to be in Wham!

3.      Rob Zombie would be nothing without the Mindwarp.

4.      Bassist Kid Chaos quit after High Priest of Love joined the Cult and then formed The Four Horsemen in the U.S.

5.      The band covered Born to be Wild on Tattooed Beat Messiah because Zodiac thought they could do a better job than the Cult (on Electric)

6.      Zodiac wrote Feed My Frankenstein for Alice Cooper

7.      Before he was a dirty little rock star, Mark Manning was a magazine editor.

8.      Manning wrote a book called Bad Wisdom with Bill Drummond of The KLF. It’s really fucked up.

9.      Some people thought they were a real band and didn’t like them because they didn’t get the joke

10.   Those people were stupid.

Ripped from the 1988 CD to MP3

Zodiac Mindwarp And The Love Reaction; Tattooed Beat Messiah

1.      Prime Mover

2.      Skull Spark Joker

3.      Back Seat Education

4.      Bad Girl City

5.      Untamed Stare

6.      Tattooed Beat Messiah

7.      Born To Be Wild

8.      Let’s Break The Law

9.      Spasm Gang

10.   Driving On Holy Gasoline

11.   Planet Girl

12.   Kid’s Stuff

13.   Messianic (Reprise)

You can still find the High Priest Of Love hanging out here