Bound for Mu Mu Land: When Tammy Wynette Met the KLF

With their unauthorized sampling, outrageous PR stunts, and signature ice cream van, the KLF set out to blow up the music industry. Pairing electric guitars with house beats, rapping with new age lyricism, and rave culture with the art world, the mysterious U.K. duo of Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty were all about breaking rules and getting away with it. 

 

They reached their crazy sonic peak when they teamed up with country icon Tammy Wynette for the 1992 dance-pop hit “Justified & Ancient,” which became an unlikely global smash. Their response to their newfound fame? Just as fans thought they’d arrived at the fictitious Mu Mu land at the center of the song, the group abandoned music altogether and vanished, deleting their entire catalog.

 

In this episode, we explore the KLF’s wild rise and fall, from their doomed road trip to meet ABBA, to their infamous BRIT Awards performance in which Drummond took a machine gun and fired blanks into the audience, to their mind-boggling decision to film themselves burning their earnings—a shocking one million pounds.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Where Were You in ninety two is a production of
I Heart Radio. They want you to do something different,
They want the shock people. They want you to kind
of like almost destroy their own myth and that's where
it went to the dark side. Literally, Welcome to Where
Are You in nine two, a podcast in which I

(00:22):
your host Jason Lamfier, look back at the major hits,
one hit wonders, shocking news stories, and irresistible scandals that
shaped what might be the wildest, most eclectic, most controversial
twelve months of music effort this week. With their brazen sampling,
outrageous pr stunts and bizarre performances, pop house anarchists the

(00:45):
Kleft set out to blow up the music industry, pairing
electric guitars with dance beats, rapping with New Age lyricism,
and the nightlife with a contemporary art world. The mysterious
UK duo of Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cardy Or all
about breaking rules and defying expectations. They reached their crazy
sonic peak when They're left Field collaboration with the country

(01:08):
icon Tammy Wynett became an unlikely global smash, hitting number
one in eighteen countries. The response to their newfound fame.
Just as fervent fans and bewildered journalists felt like they
were arriving at the fictitious Mumu land at the center
of the song, the group abandoned music altogether and vanished,

(01:29):
taking their catalog with them. In this episode, we explore
the KLFs wild ride to stardom, from their doomed road
trip to meet Abba to their infamous performance in which
one of them took a machine gun and fired blanks
into the audience, to their mind boggling decision to film
themselves burning their earnings a staggering one million pounds. The

(01:58):
year was seven. Scotsman Bill Drummond had been toiling away
in the music industry for several years and now found
himself disillusioned. In the late nineteen seventies, he'd formed the
Liverpool punk group Big in Japan. His bandmates included Holly Johnson,
could go on to score an eighties hit called Relaxed
with his group Frankie Goes to Hollywood and Budget, who

(02:20):
would eventually become part of Susie and the Banshees. After
Big in Japan broke up, Drummond and another member, David
balf founded Zoo Records, which released early work from Echo
and The Bunnyman, whose debut album, Crocodiles they produced. In
the nineteen eighties, Drummond had taken a job as an
A and R guy for the record label Warner Electra Atlantic,

(02:40):
working out of its London office and pouring a ton
of time and energy into promoting the rock act Brilliant,
But the band never really took off, and by the
age of thirty three, Drummond was jaded with the corporate
side of the music industry. He wanted to be an artist,
so in nineteen eighties six, he resigned from his position
is shooting a fake press release. Soon after, he put

(03:03):
out his solo album The Man, a well received blend
of American country and Scottish folk. Drummond loved music, in
particularly the mystery that surrounded it. What do the songs mean?
How are they made? What were the artists behind them
really like? But he found himself bored with the pop
music dominating the charts. It had become so formulaic. While

(03:26):
out walking on January one, he decided the way forward
was hip hop. That's where innovation was thriving. He thought
trouble was Drummond didn't know how the hell to make
a hip hop record. He'd need to sample other songs,
but he didn't have a sampler. He knew someone who did, though,
Jimmy Cauty, a member of Brilliant, the group he'd signed

(03:49):
and promoted as an A n R guy. Brilliant had disbanded,
and Cauty was not only free to explore his next adventure,
but instantly intrigued by the idea of trying his hand
at hip hop. By March, the pair We're sending out
forty five with their first track to DJ's and music
journalists under the alias The Justified Ancients of Mumu a
k a. The Jams. The name was inspired by Robert

(04:12):
Shay and Robert Anton Wilson's The Illuminatous Book trilogy, a
sci fi satire peppered with sex, drugs, and conspiracy theories
that Drummond and Couty would source for ideas throughout their career.
The Jams debut song All You Need Is Love sampled
not only the Beatles song of the same name, but
also m C five's kick Out. The Jams. British pin

(04:35):
up pop vixen Samantha Foxes touch Me and the voice
of John Hurt from the British ps A Don't Die
of ignorance about the impact and dangers of AIDS, over
beat box rhythms, Drummond and his heavy Scottish accent, wrapped
with this killer of virus. Who needs war? I said, Shag, Shag,

(04:55):
shag some more. The cut also included snippets of erotic
hunting and the nursery rhyme ring around the Rosie, which
some have speculated was about the bubonic plag in Europe.
So yeah, this was a far cry from say, beastie boys,
fight for your right. Michaelangelo Mattos is a music journalist, critic,

(05:16):
and author of The Underground is Massive. How Electronic Dance
Music Conquered America. He describes the Jam's late eighties work
as a type of punk playful tongue and cheek approach
to sampling, not just more expansive, but also intentionally messy
and silly. There are all these DJ records, There was
this big efflorescence of James Brown sampling hip hop tracks

(05:38):
and in dance music. That sound became, you know, instrumental
versions of those sorts of things, cut ups that those
became very popular in clubs at that point, and so
the Kleft was like a piss take of that. Basically,
they were basically taking that idea and just throwing it
in the blender. You know, you think you know what

(06:00):
sampling can be. Here's what sampling can be. We're going
to just sample every damn thing we want. Drummond and
Catty hadn't gotten permission to use any of the samples, but,
as Ian Shirley writes in his book Turn Up the Strobe,
the Koft, The Jams, the Time Lords, a History, Drummond
rejected claims that this was theft. As he explained in

(06:21):
an interview in the music paper Sounds quote, it's like
saying Andy Warhol just stole other people's graphics, which he didn't.
He took other people's images and recycled them and reused them.
That doesn't mean he's robbed them and left them with nothing.
We're just doing musically what he did with the Campbell's
soup cans in a picture of Marylyn Monroe. In June seven,
the Justified Ancients of Mumu released her debut album, What

(06:44):
the Funk Is going On. To promote it, Drummond and
Catty climbed onto the roof of the National Theater of
the south bank of the River Thames and painted the
name of the record on the building. They got away
with it, a fusion of house music and hip hop.
Ninth and eighty seven included married samples. The Jams remained
unapologetic about incorporating other artists music without permission. Is Drummond

(07:08):
told the Music paper Record Mirror quote, It's like, and
you've got yourself an electric guitar, and then somebody from
the Acoustic Guitar Society comes around and says, I'm sorry,
you can't do that. It's against the law to use
electricity and instruments. And that's what it feels like. We've
got these samplers, how are we meant to use them?
Included samples from major acts like The Monkeys, James Brown,

(07:32):
Led Zeppelin, Jimmie Hendrix and Stevie Wonder, and even lifted
a bit from The Lonely goat Herd from the Sound
of Music for its final track Next. But it was
our greedious sample of a certain beloved Swedish pop group
on their song The Queen and I that caused the
Jam's trouble, says Turn up the strobe author Ian Shirley.

(07:52):
They used Whitney Houston, They sample Whitney Houston. They sampled
lots of different artists and different sounds, a bunch of
bit of hot balza. Obviously with Abba, they sampled Appa
and Apple allegedly suited them. After meeting with the Mechanical
Copyright Protection Society, who were about as fun as they sound,
Drummond and Couty received a letter notifying them that they

(08:14):
had violated the Copyright Act of nineteen fifty seven by
not seeking permission to use other musicians work to produce
their own. Not only had they breached copyright, but Abba
was not willing to grant them permission to use their
disco classic Dancing Queen, and demanded that they cease production
and distribution of their album, as well as acquire and
surrender all copies of it so they could be destroyed.

(08:38):
The Swedish darlings weren't about to uh take a chance
on these crooked pranksters. They've been slapped with a cease
and desist order and God only knew what the legal
and monetary repercussions would be. But the Jams had an idea,
why not take this as an opportunity to use Abba
again to make more art. Their next act of Loopy

(09:00):
the version to truck it to Sweden and ask the
group in person for permission to use Dancing Queen on
their song The Queen and I, Drummond asked, have you
ever met Abba? I'd love to meet Abba? Well, yeah,
who wouldn't, But now he and Cotty were actually going
to try to make that happen. Their pick or asque

(09:21):
A journey would be one of the first PR stunts
of their career. To maximize the exposure, they called on
journalist James Brown, not the musician who was then working
at the New Musical Express, and photographer Lawrence Watson to
accompany them on their quest. So I'm sure you're already

(09:42):
wondering what happened when these thieving rogues showed up at
ABBA's doorstep. What did the Swedish superstars say? Well, Drummond
and Cotty never made it to Abba. Instead, Catty's American
police car transporting the band of misfits puttered out, They
hit a moose and they ended up getting chased a
way by a piste off farmer with a shotgun. After
they sent a bunch of copies of their album seven

(10:05):
on fire on his property. Destroying your music was symbolic
They're grandiose way of apologizing to Aba and ceasing and desisting,
but it also made for good copy and imagery for
their enemy story. They also asked Watson to shoot them,
throwing copies of the album off the ferry into the
seed during the adventure, as journalist Brown recalls and Ian

(10:27):
Shirley's book Turn Up the Strobe, when they arrived in Stockholm,
they couldn't find Aba. They didn't even have their address.
So three in the morning and another symbolic gesture, they
gave a gold record to a local prostitute they encountered
on the street. On it, they had written their Maya
koopa and surrendered to the pop stars. Their message read
presented to Benny, Bjorn and Stig to celebrate sales and

(10:49):
access of zero copies of the Justified Agents of Mumu's
LP seven. Like they've done with the records, they burned
and tossed off the ferry, asked Watson to snap a
pick up the prostitute with her new gift. This whole
excursion was basically pointless, but the enemy story ran and
the Jams came one step closer to cementing their reputation

(11:11):
as tricksters. They'd go on to record other singles with
blatant samples. Their track Whitney Joins The Jams contained snippets
from the Mission Impossible theme, Isaac Hayes's Shaft theme, and
Whitney Houston's I Want to Dance with Somebody. Another Downtown
sampled the nineteen sixty whtwe the Clark song of the
same name, but Drummond and Coudy knew they couldn't continue

(11:37):
pilfering other acts music. Their next pr stunt to release
a new version called The Jams forty five edits that
left out the samples and instead included instructions on the
record sleeve for how to create the original album with
a twelve inch a turntable and the music they've used.
The only way for fans to get this version of

(11:57):
the album was that they brought their original copy into
record shops and surrendered them. Less than a year after
their botched attempt to go meet Abba, Drummond and Catty's
penchant for sampling transformed them from cult Darling's into bona
fide charttoppers, dropping their Moniker the Jams, and rebranding themselves

(12:21):
as the Time Lords. The pair released their new single,
Doctor and the Tartist, a novelty track that lifted the
theme from the Smash UK show Doctor Who, and mashed
it up with Gary Glitter's seventy two glam rock song
Rock and Roll Part two and bits from the glam
rock band Suits nineteen seventy three UK number one blockbuster.

(12:43):
Doctor and the Tartist referenced the name of the blue
phone booth, time machine and doctor Who. Tartis is an
acronym for time and relative dimension in space. The song
wasn't a house record. It's keewed closer to spacey stadium rock,
something to channel along with its sporting events. Its lyrics
simply repeated Doctor Who The Tartist, add infinitum. That's likely

(13:07):
why this song scored Drummon and Caudi their first number
one single, despite being widely panned by critics who called
it everything from quote excruciating to quote rancid. Of course,
the Time Lords were in on the joke. They recognize
the song's absurdity, but they also understood the kind of
tunes that would invigorate the British masses. Doctor and the

(13:28):
tartist spent a week at the summit of the UK charts,
inspiring the Time Lords to publish a book titled The
Manual How to Have a Number One The Easy Way.
A case studying the song's success, it offered a step
by step guide to writing a number one single with
no money or musical aptitude. They understood this was a
foolish and reductive premise, but like their sample heavy music,

(13:51):
it was more of an ironic art piece, a commentary
on the methodic nature of the pop music industry complex
and on late eighties capitalism. Drummond explained his reasoning for
putting out the book inview quote, there was an excuse
to say a lot of things I wanted to say
about how the industry worked. It was an excuse to
go out and say to people all they can say

(14:13):
to themselves. If you want to do something, go and
do it. Don't wait to be asked, don't wait for
a record company to come and want to sign you,
or a management company. Just go and do it. Also,
it was saying if you want to have a number one,
you can have it. But it won't make you rich,
it won't make you happy, but you can have it.
Of course, the book was just another chance for the

(14:35):
duo to get some media coverage, something they were adept dad,
says Michaelangelo Matos. They knew the press, They had the
press on their sides. There was a certain amount of
let's see what we can get away with because we
know exactly how much I think we can generate from this.
The Timelords other strategy for building buzz using caudis old

(14:58):
American police car, the one they've taken to try to
meet Aba for all the publicity for the single, naming
it forward Time Lord, they credited the car with writing
the song and said it to all their photo shoots,
appearances and interviews. Someone affiliated with the group would hide
in the vehicle under a pile of carpets and field
frustrated journalists questions. The singles cover featured an image of

(15:18):
it with the speech bubble that read, Hi, I'm for
a time Lord, I'm a car, and I've made a record.
The Time Lords were short lived, finished as soon as
they started. Drummond and Couty would release a second hip
hop house album as The Jams, but they were growing
uncomfortable with their rising popularity. In the flak they were
getting for all their sampling, Who Killed the Jams marked

(15:39):
the end of the justified Agents of Mumu and the
beginning of the duo's new iteration, The Kleft. Little did
they know they were about to become the most famous
they'd ever be Up next after the break, Drummond and

(16:02):
Cotty reached their commercial and creative peak, scoring a string
of worldwide hits and enlisting an American country legend to
craft one of their craziest and most enduring singles yet.
Plus will explore the staggering acts of self sabotage that
ended their musical careers. Before Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cotty

(16:33):
had spent a year audaciously experimenting with samples to make strange,
very Scottish sounding, and frankly very awkward hip hop. They'd
hit number one with their Doctor Who's Sampling novelty song
Doctor and the Tartis. With their offbeat sound collages and
over the top publicity stunts, they'd garnered the attention and
for the most part, the respect of the music press.

(16:56):
They also spent a fair share of their time pulling
the music industries etels. Now casting aside their previous stage names,
the jams and the Time Lords. They were ready to
get serious about dance music, specifically house music, and more
specifically acid house. Acid House was a direct descendant of
Chicago House and Detroit techno, a mostly underground dance movement

(17:20):
that had failed to infiltrate the mainstream. By the late eighties, however,
clubs were playing in a lot more and it eventually
became synonymous with UK rave culture. Promoters would throw DJ
parties and warehouses, fields and other clandestine places where revelers
would dance all through the night and well into the morning.
The drug ecstasy was a major player. Under their new

(17:44):
name the k LEF, supposedly an acronym for the Copyright
Liberation Front, Drummond and Couty were drawn to Acid Houses trademarks.
The basse created by the Roland TB three or three
synthesizer and beats crafted from Roland t R E O
eight drum machine. Acid House was dark, stabby, squelchy and trippy.

(18:06):
Their first true crack in an asset House influenced track
was the instrumental cut what Time Is Love? Released in October.
The song became popular in clubs across Europe. The Kleft
would go on to record two more versions of What
Time Is Love, adding vocals and flushing it out more.
In July, they released What Time Is Love live at

(18:27):
trans Central. Trans Central was their recording studio. The house
pop take on the song catapulted them into the mainstream,
peeking at number five on the UK charts. By that point,
the duo had already released chill Out, an ambient house
concept album meant to chronicle a railroad journey from Texas
to Louisiana, though neither Drummond nor Carty had been to

(18:48):
that part of the US, this was simply their impression
of what it was like, and press materials included with
revue copies of the record, they joked, quote ambient house
is that the Angels chill out too after the Christmas rush.
Sure they were being their cheeky selves with that description. However,

(19:10):
Chill Out proved that the duo were capable of more restrained,
well curated, sophisticated music, says Matos. So, basically, Jimmy Cauty
is playing as a DJ in the ambient room at
Land of Oz, which is Paul o'kin Folls Club. They're
playing ambient music and found sound recordings things like Electronic

(19:33):
Counterpoint by Steve Reich or whatever. They're playing this stuff
in that room. That's stuff would inspire. Chillout arguably the
Kalph's most influential release. Over forty five continuous minutes, steel
guitar and samples of Elvis, Fleetwood, Mac and Van Halen

(19:56):
rub up against bits of bird song, crickets, chugging, train bleating,
sheet news reports, and two in throat singers. Chill Out
manages somehow to be both barely there and to totally
envelope you. It's the sound of waking up the morning
or the afternoon after the rave. Nothing like it had
ever been put to take, but the trip depicted on

(20:24):
Chillout was just a detour. The Kaloff were still enthralled
by asset house and techno, and the success of What
Time Is Love showed that listeners were too. In March,
they released The White Room, the closest rave culture had
ever come to top forty radio. Most of the album's
cuts have been recorded in some form as the soundtrack

(20:47):
for a film of the same name, featuring scene shot
and the mountainous Sierra Nevada region of Spain. The movie
followed them as they searched for the mystical White Room
that would release them from their contract with Eternity, but
it turned out to be just another expensive k left lark,
and it was ultimately scrapped. The album in the White

(21:08):
Room came on the heels of the act's first number
one single, as the KLF three AM Eternal. It would
also become their highest charting US hit, peaking at number five.
Three A M Maternal is the quintessential Klef stadium house track,
even including the sound of rapturous stadium applause, though the
guys actually recorded it in the studio. Drummond and Caudy

(21:31):
extended this by to the whole first side of the album,
which unfurrowed like a live concert with its more polished,
accessible sound and soul full diva vocals. Three M Maternal
appealed to both American pop fans and party hopping lovers
of acid house, which had begun to seep into certain
dance clubs and underground parties, says Mike Lent. Lamata's ninety

(22:07):
one is when the sort of rave sound emerges from
European producers, basically copying underground resistance. The techno banned from Detroit,
and then by ninety two it's being sold back to America,
which is this weird euro euros thing where black American
music has been transmogrified by Europeans and sold back to

(22:31):
America under the auspices of it being European, which it
in some ways is and in many ways is not.
A lot of that music was by black people in Detroit,
and American independent labels weren't going to sell that. They
weren't gonna like put that face on it because they

(22:52):
didn't want to. They were trying to sell it to
the newly emergent alternative crowd. The follow up single to
three M Maternal Last Train to trans Central, didn't chart
in the U S Hot one hundred, but it's soward

(23:13):
to number two in the UK in the spring. It
wasn't until late November that year that The k Left
would release their next single, Justified an Ancient stand by
the Jams, but Drummond and Couty didn't want to just
release the album version of Justified an Ancient, a song
that actually showed up in its original form on the
Jams debut album on the White Room. Justified an Ancient

(23:35):
was a piano lead soul track featuring blissed out vocals
from reggae artist and multi instrumentalist Errol Nicholson a K
Black Steel, but the remix single version would follow in
its predecessor's thomping footsteps and keep the rave going with
more beats, more samples, and a very surprising choice for
a guest vocalist. Singer Maxine Harvey, who sang on three

(23:58):
M Maternal, had originally hoarded lead vocals for the updated
version of Justified an Ancient, but she couldn't take the
song subject matter seriously, specifically the lines They're justified and
they're ancient, and they drive an ice cream fan, as
she told Ian Shirley in his book Turn Up the
Strobe quote, even though I was working with different people,
I've always been conscious about lyrics, and I weren't singing

(24:20):
about ice cream. In his book, Drummond notes, without naming her,
that the singer quote unquote, sounded uninspired, but that Cody
had an epiphany one day suggesting they enlist none other
than country legend Tammy Wayne Nott for the song. A
major country fan, Drummond jumped at the idea and claims

(24:41):
he was on the phone with Wynett twenty minutes later,
playing her the track as she stood backstage at a
concert in Tennessee. As the story goes, Drummond flew to
Tennessee a week later to meet Tammy way Nett in person. Well,
she was still Country Royalty and touring. The forty nine
year old singer was no longer climbing the chart sin
she had in her sixties and seventies. Heyday, if Drummond

(25:03):
was stoked to work with a hero, why Not was
enticed by the idea of fronting a dance pop single
with some trendy new hit makers. She, Drummond, and her
manager and fifth husband, George Ritchie went to a local
studio where why Nott was such a recorder vocals over
Drummond's backing track. But there was a snag. You see,
why Not was used to singing with a live backing

(25:24):
band who took her lead. This process was foreign to
her and she kept singing too quickly or slowly for
the beats. Drummond was pretty mortified, feeling silly for forcing
one of his idols to sing about ice cream and
being quote bound for Moomoo Land. He remembers the recording
process as being a complete disaster, with him coming back

(25:44):
to the UK worried he had nothing and that you'd
have to nix the whole thing. But Collegie had good news.
By using some fancy editing program, they could sample why
Nott's vocals and sync them up with the music, turning
what Drummond thought was a shattered dream collaboration into a
sparkling singular reality. Errol Nicholson lent some backing vocals, and

(26:17):
Drummond and Couty layered in vocals from some Zulu singers.
They'd save the track and soon enjoy the fruits of
their labor. The Ice Cream Band and their retooled version
of Justified an Ancient was not only a bound from Moonmuland,
but also for the charts, parking at number two on
the UK Singles Charts, number two on the US Dance Charts,

(26:39):
and number one in several countries including Austria, Denmark, Finland
and Sweden. If the Kaleps collab with why Not sounds
like a risky, gonzo polarizing experiment, it was Justified an
Ancient as damn close to indescribable. So if you don't
know it, remember it. Pass this podcast right now and

(27:00):
go put it on. But also let me try to
describe it. What you'll hear or what you have heard
is a country rave mash up by way of South Africa,
a trancy tribal curio about yes, an ice cream band
chugging along towards MoMu. But it's also a tune sprinkled

(27:23):
with mysticism. Take for example, of the line new Style meanwhile,
always on a mission while fishing in the rivers of
life from the duo's guest rapper Ricardo di Force. Justified
an Ancient is a perfect musical specimen of cheesy hetty,

(27:43):
random all over the place, totally weird, totally fascinating. Here's
how Turn Up the Strobe author Ian Sureley describes it.
It kind of reached into the history of America of
country music, which is your kind of along with the
blues and jazz, is your photo music. So there was
a kind of modern song with this sort of element

(28:04):
of classic American folk music with it. She had singing
a line that they're justified and their ancient and they
drive an ice cream band. I mean that kind of
like lyric is just insane really when you write it down,
but when you actually put it in the context of
a song, because she's singing about their myth. She is

(28:24):
an American myth singing about this new band's own mythology.
It's all that kind of link in of myths and
kind of like old law together and it's it's just
it's so striking. That is the thing that makes it work.
And since this was the Kalf the music world ruling
stunt Kings, the video for Justivated Ancient also had to

(28:47):
represent these things. There is so much muchness in it,
says Michelangelo Matos. It's a big, splendiferous video. It's very
you know, it's a very like opulent and very ridiculous,
and so that was wonderful. I have great memories of that.

(29:08):
To execute their vision of Moonoland for the video, Drummond
and Coddy had an ancient temple constructed at Pinewood Studios,
the sound stage where some James Bond movies have been shot.
During the video's production, Alien three was being filmed there.
The pair then brought in dancers, Zulu singers, and actors
posing as warriors to join my Net, who was decked
out in a snug, sparkly blue dress. Says he and Shirley.

(29:32):
You know the funny thing about KLFT, everyone thought they
were live band because they thought that these videos were
like Parliament Funkadelic. This was just a representation of the
live show and that's why they did it. It was
to make it look like a massive performance because, like
I said, lots of house and dance bands, they were

(29:53):
literally just a couple of guys behind synthesizers or computers
and a girl seeing it, well, was this. It looked
like there was ramas, It looked like there was like
bass guitarists, they were backing singers. There was sort of
like nudency. There was closed there was you know, Tammy
Whine and all this kind of a top thing on
these massive Marshall stacks, you know, all of the amplification.

(30:16):
So this is great, big pageantry, and it's just a
shame that they actually never played live. The whole thing
was insane. But Tammy why Nott was game. I like
to think of her, Tammy why not. When Enemy interviewed
went out about the collaboration, she was ecstatic, though she
admitted she had no idea what the hell the song
was about. I know about ice cream bands, but I've

(30:38):
never heard of a ninety nine before she said, referring
to the line make mine and nine. A ninety nine
is basically a special ice cream cone with a chocolate
flake bar shoved into the top of it. Side note.
At one point Drummond and Coddy considered executing a pr
stunt in which they had a Jams ice cream vand
and they would hand out cones to people, but also
give them a hit of ecstasy if they said make

(30:59):
mine a nine nine. That plan was abandoned. One outrageous
stunt the KLEF did instigate to promote the White Room
was the Rights of Move, an exclusive and extraordinary event
in which Drummond and Catty invited a select group of
journalists to the Isle of Jura, off the coast of
Scotland for the summer solstice on June one. The invitation

(31:21):
read the KLEP require your presence, you'll be transported to
the Lost Continent Move bring your passports. As the group
arrived by ferry to Jura that weekend, sure enough, Drummond
was there to stamp the guest passports with the Jam's
signature pyramid logo. What unfolded was an elaborate ritual filmed
by Bill Botton, who had directed videos for Echo and

(31:42):
the Bunny Man and The kalf Shelves White Room Movie.
Dressed in hooded robes and faunting big tusks coming out
of their foreheads, Drummond and Catty as escort of their visitors,
who were also wearing robes. They had been provided to
a massive wicker man by the sea. They're a group
of Japanese women donning diaph in white gowns and blonde wigs.
Took a personal item from each guest and placed it

(32:05):
beneath the Wickerman. Drummond recited some nonsense language, they set
the Wickerman on fire, and then soon enough corks were
popped and drinks were poured. This was a media event,
after all. The next day, the quartet of Japanese women
hired to portray the Angels of MoU were filmed emerging

(32:26):
from the sea, with Errol Nicholson popping up to sing
John to Fide an ancient you know, to promote the
actual music. At the end of the weekend, attendees were
dropped off at the Liverpool Festival, a comedy where during
the intermission of a show at the Royal Court, some
took to the stage to sing along to justify it
an ancient and then enjoy ice cream served by Drummond

(32:48):
and Couty from their trademark ice Cream van. Ian Shirley
estimates that the rights of new event cost about seventy
thousand pounds or eighty dollars. And to think nowadays, all
you need is were some kids to do a TikTok
challenge to one of your songs. Still, the exposure of
the Kalf gout was significant, with journalists reporting on the
experience and Butts footage running on MTV, But the kalps

(33:10):
most career defining and ultimately career ending spectacles were still
to come. At one time it was stunts, which was
all good for good copy. Then as as it went on,
it got its darker because it's almost like they wanted
to sort of do something even more extreme, and that's
where it kind of got across the line into this

(33:31):
kind of strange sort of thing. What can we do
that is going to shock people more? Up next, after
the break, I talked to turn Up the Strobe author

(33:53):
and Kalf expert Ian Shirley about the band's notorious self
sabotaging performance at the eighteen ninety two brit awards and
their astonishing decision to destroy their earnings and abandon the
music industry altogether. Yea, the year was and after a

(34:23):
string of hits and stunts, the Kalif were massive and minted.
Says k left expert ian Shirley. It wasn't that they
had a big record label. They got a deal through
rough Trade and distributed their music, so if they made
a dollar a record, they kept the ballow a record.
It wasn't that big dollar went to the record label,

(34:46):
who then gave them twelve cents. They owned all their products,
They pressed up their products, so they were making a
tremendous amount of money and don't aget they weren't touring,
so there wasn't that kind of overhead to play for that.
So they were making a tremendous amount of money. It
was they were literally making millions of dollars. Jimmy Cotty

(35:07):
and Bill Drummond had loved doing press, but they were
suddenly feeling tons of requests for interviews, TV appearances and commercials,
many of which they declined. Pressure also rose for them
to tour, but as thirty something family men, they couldn't
fathom life on the Road. They even turned down an
offer to perform as guests for Prince. At that point,
the Kalif single sales were through the roof. One chart

(35:29):
declared them the third biggest selling singles act in the
UK after Brian Adams and Queen, who had become popular
again after singer Freddie Mercury's death. To commemorate their success,
the brit Awards, the UK equivalent of the American Grammys,
invited the duo to perform at their ceremony at the
Hammersmith Odeon in February. Maybe they fell honored to be

(35:49):
nominated for three awards Best British Group, Best Single and
Best Album, but Drummond and Catty agreed to actually perform live,
which they never did. Of course, this was the Kalef.
So the rendition of three Am Maternal came with a twist.
They would recruit UK hardcore group Extreme Noise Terror for

(36:09):
a thrashing, barely recognizable heavy metal version of the song.
You see. The pair had started to record their follow
up album to The White Room, titled The Black Room
with the Band, but that project was shelved now they
deserted their original plan, which was to cut up a

(36:31):
sheep corpse on stage and toss buckets of its blood
and pieces of it under the audience. But the Kaliph's
birth performance still involved some of the most mind blowing
hyjunks yet. Drummond, dressed in a kilt and holding a
crutch with a cigar pinched between his teeth, ended it
by taking a machine gun and firing blanks into the crowd,

(36:52):
Allah said Vicious in the nineteen documentary The Great Rock
and Roll Swindle. The Insane set concluded with an announcement
riffing on the final line of three am turtle Ladies
and Gentlemen, that KLF have now left the building. In
a more ominous definitive statement, the duo's publicists, Scott Pearing,

(37:12):
declared that KLF have left the music business. Later that night,
they deposited the dead sheep they planned to slice and
dice at the show on the red carpeted steps of
the Royal Lancaster Hotel, where the Brits after party was held.
A note attached to the carcass read, I died for
you bone appetite. For many, the stunt crossed the threshold

(37:35):
and too gratuitous and grizzly. It wasn't so much funny
as it was bewilsering and to some infuriating. Meanwhile, I
want to sort of funk you to the Brits and
to the whole notion of prestige and accolades in general.
COTTI took the Pairs Award for Best British Group that
they won that night and buried it near Stonehenge. According
to the two thousand one documentary Who Killed the KLF.

(37:57):
After it was uncovered two months later and turned over
to the police, the k left went back and buried
it deeper. Bill Drummond and Jimmy Carty seemed to think
they'd reached the pinnacle of success and that the only
place to go from there was down. Why do that?
If they could go out in a high note and

(38:18):
break up the party themselves, says he and Shirley did everything,
and it was that kind of all encompassing mad madness
that probably exhausted them. And then after a while they
realized that they've done so much they just couldn't top it,
and the fact that people love what they were doing
kind of like turn them off. That's the interesting thing.
They wanted to kind of like destroy what they left

(38:40):
their own with and the spring of shortly after their
infamous brit spectacle, the k Left stopped pressing albums and
singles and set out to obliterate their entire catalog. A
statement they released to the press and placed some ads
and music papers read. For their foreseeable future, there will
be no further record releases from the Justified Ancients of Mumu,

(39:03):
the Timelords, the Jams, the Kalf, and any other past,
present and future name attached to our activities. As of now,
all our past releases are deleted. Answering machines and fax
machines were shut off. Drummond and Cardi disappeared to Mexico,
but the story doesn't end there. After engaging in another

(39:23):
pr stunt and crashing the art world with the k
Foundation Award, which to the artists who produced the worst
body of work from the previous twelve months, the Klef
made their biggest, most shocking artistic statement yet. They decided
that they not only wanted to obliterate their music, but
obliterate any trace of their profits from it. So on

(39:44):
August they returned to the island of Jura in Scotland,
struck a match and set fire to their earnings burning
one million pounds. They had originally tried to get Lendon's
Take Gallery to allow them to display the money now
to the wall, but it, among other galleries, refused to

(40:06):
showcase this quote unquote art, so Drummond and Catty took
matters into their own hands, filming their hard earned cash
as it turned to numbers and presenting footage of their
act of self annihilation and various cities a year later.
Audiences who saw it were flabbergasted. Many were enraged, says
Michelangelo Maato's I mean, that's really the most audacious thing

(40:28):
you could do. I don't know how else to describe it.
It's just it's sort of breathtaking. I mean, in a way,
it's callous. It's an almost an act of you know,
class warfare. I tracked out Ian Shirley, Who's two thousand

(40:53):
seventeen book Turn Up the Strobe chronicles Arise and Self
Induce Fall of the Kala to discuss that notorious Brits performance,
their career literally going up Your Flames, and their decision
to finally make their music available on streaming services in
two thousand twenty one, basically right around the time that
uh you know, Justified an ancient was was charting. They

(41:16):
you know, are invited to perform at the at the
brit Awards and uh in early So tell me about
tell me about their thought process going into the brit
Awards in two and uh and what they had planned,
because I think this is maybe sort of the beginning
of the the unraveling of it all. Yeah, but it

(41:37):
already started. What happened was normally you have to submit
the song before performing because obviously the actual show wants
to know what you're going to play. And this was
such a radically different version of their own song. They
almost sort of told them that they couldn't play it,
but they had They allowed the care left to play it.

(41:59):
But and this is where he got really dark, because
there's all these talks of what they were going to
do on stage. I mean, one time Bill was going
to cut up a sheep live on stage. So on
the morning of the show, he goes and gets a
sheep that is pre ordered. He was going to throw
blood over the front of the audience, the front row
of the audience, so he went up and got all

(42:19):
this blood. Uh, he was gonna at one time chop
off on his arms or something I've read somewhere. It's
just this absolute kind of using this moment to sort
of act have this amazingly visual kind of darkness. And
what's so funny is extreme noise terror. We're all vegetarians,

(42:40):
so the thought of actually build cutting up a sheep
live on stage didn't really go down well with them.
The thought of actually build throwing blood over on the
front row of the audience didn't go well with them.
And it's a classic thing that when they did perform,
it all sort of went wrong because Jimmy talked about
having this great big guitar our solo he'd always wanted

(43:01):
he was a guitarist and won't have this massive big
guitar solo, and they had already decided it would be
the last ever performance, And of course, when he actually
went step forward to playing his guitar, he pulled the
lead out of the amplifier, and so by the time
he got it back in, it was all over and
it was just and also builded this classic thing when

(43:22):
he came out in the trench coat with a cigar
in his mouth, firing and blanks of a machine gun
at the audience, which is all very much synficious my
way thing, and of course all the audience thought this
was just part of the spectacle, you know, it was.
It was sort of transgressive, but it was just all
well done. That was exciting. Who's the next act? You

(43:44):
know the fact that they sent a courier bike courier
to click their award again, it's just sort of like
a modern kind of you know, what someone would do
today to get attention on social media, and of course
at that time there was no social media. And that
was their last performance, and that was I think they
went to the studio they were going to carry on
recording with extreme noise terror and then Jimmy said, look

(44:07):
that's it. I think we should stop, and they literally
did stop at that point. That was the last time
they actually appeared. And then obviously in the UK they
deleted their entire back catalog, they deleted everything. But in
America I don't think they could delete the back catalog
because of the deal with a rister, so records over
there sould for some time. But you know, it's insane

(44:28):
that an artist, you imagine, like Snoop Dogg or mcdonna's
saying I've stopped now performing. I'm not doing anything more.
No more streaming of my music, no more physical product.
I mean, look at the weekend saying, right, I become
a born again Christian. Music is wrong. So suddenly next
month you can't stream his music no more, you can't

(44:50):
download his music no more. It's not a YouTube, you
can't buy the physical product. It's that kind of level
of success that they turned their back up. They just
literally said we will press no more records and no
more CDs, and therefore people will not be able to
buy it anymore. It was an amazing sort of like
and they cut off their own income stry, you know,

(45:11):
because really they would have actually made quite a lot
of money over the years by actually their back catalog
selling it was it would sell forever. What was the
catalyst or what were the catalysts for them to call
it quits? I don't. I mean, this is the thing.
I mean, when I wrote my book, I never got
I met I met Finn and Jimmy afterwards. But they,

(45:35):
you know, they kept very tight lipped about their reasons.
I mean, they had their reasons to stop him. Maybe
they've had enough, Maybe they got you know, Bill and
Jimmy thought that what how much more successful. Can we
be We've had worldwide hits, a worldwide top seven album.
You know, there's no there's no much there's not much
further you can do. And that's why when they they

(45:58):
transitioned into these sort of found nation where they actually,
you know, did the prize, remember the Turner Prize, and
then they gave their own awards and things like that,
and they started doing stunts after that where lots of
the journalists would come along and say, oh, this looks great.
But when they realized there was no music, there was
no kind of new video, new song, that they lost

(46:20):
interest in them. That the interest weighed because it was
no longer these guys doing the merry pranks and there's
some great music coming out. It was these guys doing
these quite dark things which kind of like turn people off,
and they lost kind of a lot of traction, which
I think in some respects they enjoy it and other
times they thought, well, we want more attention. It was

(46:43):
when that's why the ultimate thing of burning a million pounds,
this insane kind of idea that all the money they
made from music was tarnished, so therefore they had to
burn it. And you know, it's kind of It's that
kind of what mental eight were there in to sort
of come up with that, and then what mental state
were they actually actually follow through with it. And I

(47:06):
know that from you know that some of the wives
weren't happy after that. You know that why why and
exactly how do they go about doing it? But I
don't I mean, I think even today, I mean, you know,
they was one of the things is sad in some
respects that they're remembered more for burning the money than
they're after the music. It's something that they decided to

(47:27):
do and they had to live with it after that,
and you know, obviously they you know that they actually
had to we had to pay tax on it or
something because it was you know, they burnt. It's the
money that had earned you know, it wasn't not wasn't unearned,
you know, the money that in fact that the fact
that I love the fact that they could get a
million pounds out of the bank. People were very upset

(47:48):
because you know, you're it's their money. They can do
what they want with it. But people thought it was
a very kind of strange thing to do. And the
fact that they didn't come out, they didn't come out
of it people saying, well, that's amazing. People thought, you know,
you're stupid, why are you burning money? And unfortunately became
a coda. You know, they are the band that burned
a million dollars or you know, a million pounds, and

(48:11):
you know, I think for a long time it was
a shadow whatever Bill and Jimmy did it sort of cut. Mean,
Jimmy's done lots of art, and Bill's written lots of
books and done lots of different things. But that's the
one thing they remember me, if they're remembered by I mean,
it's rather than the music. Music is great. I can
see how some people would have thought it was in partaste,
why not take that million pounds and donated to some charities,

(48:34):
you know anything, I do wonder if they're plotting some
sort of comeback or or what is in the works,
because it was a little strange, you know, the beginning
of two thousand twenty one, when you know, some of

(48:55):
their tracks were released on streaming and digitally the first
time really since they took it all away, right, did
you did you know this was coming or did you
wake up surprised to discover that as well? They did
the twenty after twenty years. They did the thing in
Liverpool which I went to, where that they had like
a sort of three day k or ethics traffic anzer.

(49:18):
I didn't know the music was coming, A lot of
people didn't, but it's the sort of thing they would do.
But I don't think they have any plans. I mean,
Jimmy has been you know, it's quite well known as
an artist who sort of you know, in a sort
of banksy moment really, and Bill has always done different
things from choirs to cook into people. It's just it's

(49:39):
just not like part of their history. I know they've
got a very rapid fan base, but I don't think
they are looking to make new music, to do different things.
I mean, I think the fact that they put the
music out is sort of like the fact that you know,
they said, right, people have forgotten the ballot, so now
and let people listen to it again. I mean obviously
were streaming now, I mean to make millions and millions

(50:01):
of plays for them to make any money. They probably
do make money from it, but I think it's very
much part of their past. You know, they're not looking
now to come back and restore the KLF, and nor
should they. I mean I think what they did now
sounds sort of test of time. With music. It's still
the time, test of time of visuals, it's still the

(50:22):
test of time as sort of pranksters and kind of
what they did as artists, and you know, people can
look back on it and enjoy it now. You can
watch the video and not you know, it's funny they
I think they've spent a quarter million pounds on some
of the songs and videos, but no one sort of
like writes that off against them burning a million pounds.

(50:43):
I mean Michael Jackson remember when he was doing history
or something. He was like, I don't think he's like
paying a million dollars attract to work with people or
something like that. You know, all the pop industry at
one time, the amount of money that is spent on
promo videos and things like that, and it just doesn't
scene to matter. But if you go out and burn
a million pounds, it's kind of like people do get offended.

(51:07):
It's interested, it's resonated. Yeah, it's interesting. That is a
really that is a really fascinating take on it, because
it almost makes me wonder if it was at least
partly commentary on the fleeting nature of music and all
the money that is dumped into these you know, like

(51:28):
you said, a single, one single perhaps, right, and then
let's say that single tanks doesn't go anywhere, you know,
barely scrapes the top forty or not even. And but
yet they all this money was dumped into the promo video,
you know, remixes maybe, and and that's just gone. It's

(51:49):
but it's like with politics. And look in America, every
time there's a Democratic or Republican campaign, a presidential campaign,
billions of dollars spent on advertising on all of these things,
and no one questions that is a waste of money.
No one questions it. Every day on the TV. I mean,
I like American football when it's on. I watched endless

(52:10):
adverts for pizza Pizza Hut or these insurance companies, and
they spend obviously millions of dollars to have it on
during the American football. No one questions that this money
is spent just to reinforce the brand. It doesn't make
a blind bit of difference. I mean whether I buy
a pizza or not. You know, all of these things
whereby money is spent willy nearly on things. If you

(52:33):
can sum up You've touched on this a little bit already,
but if you could sum up the legacy and impact
of the kl AFT in music specively, but then you know,
in pop culture as a whole, how would you how
would you sum up their impact and legacy. I think
the KFT have left sort of like musically as a tombstone.

(52:53):
They've got the White the White Room album, you know,
Justified and Ancient Free Am E Turn or What Timer's Love.
You know, these are records and songs that will just
go on forever and people will discover them because they're great.
It's great music, and you know, and they do they
did the right thing, which has to make these amazing

(53:13):
videos to promote the songs, so that when people look back,
these young people who look on Spotify, they will think
that the k left for a big band that toured.
They will think that they filled stadiums around the world
because they see these videos. I think that's just a
little more replication of what they did live on stage.
So what they've done, they've created this myth and in

(53:36):
some respects what they did by stopping, they actually solidify
what they did because there's no kind of post White
Room albums that don't cut it. There's no kind of
working with you know, they did Tammy win It, and
then they decided to work with someone like I don't know,
Tony Christie, or they work with you know, Kirk Gabay

(53:58):
which didn't come off, or there's no kind of coda
where the music just sort of like gets tired. They
stopped making music right at the peak. And that was
the kind of most savvaest thing they did. They went
out on top and everything that happened afterwards, people will
look back and see what they did. These prez absolute

(54:20):
monster singles, one bigger than the other, in the music,
in the visuals, and in the chart places around the world.
And they went out and said, thank you very much.
Was it mic drop? As they said, A very big,
very billowy, very smoky, very mic drop. Three decades later,

(54:56):
the smoke is long cleared, but we're still left wondering
if that money burning on the Isle of Jurro was
a the most expensive and dramatic dissilusion of the band
ever be the product of the k left guys teetering
on the edge of sanity see the result of a
lot of drugs and alcohol or d all the above,

(55:16):
says Mottoes. There's nothing on the record where they ever
come clean about any other intention other than let's see
what it's like regardless. On August seventeen, Drummond and Catty
barreled into Liverpool, England and they're now old and battered
ice cream van to prove that they still had a

(55:36):
few treats to serve up to their die hard fans.
Exactly twenty three years after they scorched all that cash,
Drummond and Catty resurrected the Justified Ancients of Mumu, releasing
a dystopian novel two a trilogy, and hosting a three
day happening called Welcome to the Dark Ages. The event,

(55:56):
which some four quote unquote volunteers attended, included various role
playing and a panel debate that posed the eternal question
why did the k Foundation burn a million quid? Conceptual
artists and academics weighed in. When Drummond and Caughty themselves
were asked the question, they simply replied, whatever, So, after

(56:16):
all that time had passed, still no answer, but guests
were given torn out pages of the Jam's new novel
for their time. The Jams also announced their latest endeavor
no not music, but a literal pyramid scheme, The People's Pyramid,
a massive structure made of bricks from human ashes. Those

(56:40):
who wish to contribute to the momification could pay pounds
to have their remains packaged into said bricks. The slogan
for the process was by now Die Later. The pyramid
would be erected in Talks Death in Liverpool and updated
each year on Talks Death Day of the Dead. After
the annount Samanth, a yellow robed choir, took to the

(57:02):
stage of the event held at the Arts Venue the floor.
They were joined by a blue hooded figure, soon revealed
to be Jarvis Cocker, the lead singer of the UK
brit pop band Pulp, who led them in a gospel
version of Justified an Agent. The happening culminated with the
volunteers assembling in a field around a large pyramid, onto

(57:24):
which structure is called Coffins for life were stacked. Then,
like the Wickerman at the rights of move and like
the Kleft Millions and Earnings, the whole thing was set
on fire, Drummond and Caudi sporting horns like they had
at the rights of the Moon. Nearly thirty years before
stood in the night, watching from the sidelines. Depending on

(57:48):
who you are, welcome to the Dark Ages was either
the comeback of the decade, a failed attempt to recapture
the chaotic magic of a bygone era, or just a
bunch of nonsense. But if you cared to remember the
Kaleps and music as much as their mischief, this wild
and wooly story has a happy ending. It does for
me anyway. On January one, two one, I, along with

(58:11):
many others, awoke to discover with glee that the Kalif
had finally put some of their songs on streaming services
Solid State Logic one, a collection of eight remastered singles,
including three m Maternal and Justified an Ancient, had dropped
at midnight, while several of their official videos had been
published for the first time on the duo's YouTube channel.

(58:32):
Three more releases, including new versions of the album's Chill
Out in the White Room, followed. The kal Lef had
re entered the building, their strange and boundary pushing dance music,
re emerging from its thirty year moratorium. Like an acid
house Lazarus. I was reminded of their loony, impish brilliance
and all the ship that went down to those seven

(58:53):
short years, says Michelangelo Mattos, like fucking Kalef for the coolest,
Like they're fucking more masks and a wore like Hosmat suits,
and they were like anonymous and sarcastic, and they pulled stocks. Well,
it was not to like the records were great. Who
knows why Bill Drummond and Jimmy Carty decided to break

(59:13):
their musical silence and make a large chunk of their
discography available again. Perhaps, like Ian Shirley suggests, they figured
many had forgotten about it, so why not? And the
kalf Mythos motives tend to remain mysteries. Logic can't be
applied here, so then maybe it's best to just hit
your eye in the ice cream van, follow the trail

(59:34):
to Mumu Land, and lose yourself in the crazy. Where

(01:00:11):
Were You in ninety two was a production of I
Heart Radio. The executive producers are Noel Brown and Jordan
run Talk. The show was researched, written and hosted by
me Jason Laffier, with editing and sound design by Michael
Alder June. If you like what you heard, please subscribe
and leave us a review. For more podcasts for my
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(01:00:34):
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.