"Being Boiled" is a song by the British

synth-pop Synth-pop (short for synthesizer pop; also called techno-pop; ) is a music genre that first became prominent in the late 1970s and features the synthesizer as the dominant musical instrument. It was prefigured in the 1960s and early 1970s b ...

band

the Human League The Human League are an English synth-pop band formed in Sheffield in 1977. Initially an experimental electronic music, electronic outfit, the group signed to Virgin Records in 1979 and later attained widespread commercial success with their t ...

. Composed by Martyn Ware and

Ian Craig Marsh Ian Craig Marsh (born 11 November 1956) is an English musician and composer. He was a founding member of the electronic band the Human League, writing and playing on their first two albums and several singles, until leaving in 1980 to form th ...

with lyrics by Philip Oakey, it is regarded as a seminal work in early

. "Being Boiled" was one of the first mainstream British singles to use entirely electronic instruments and is strikingly different from and darker than the group's more well known songs. "Being Boiled" was released as the Human League's debut single in 1978. It has been re-issued several times since then, becoming a top-10 hit in the United Kingdom in 1982 and in West Germany four years later.

Background and composition

The song was influenced by

Kraftwerk Kraftwerk (, ) is a Germany, German Electronic music, electronic band formed in Düsseldorf in 1970 by Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider. Widely considered innovators and pioneers of electronic music, Kraftwerk was among the first successful a ...

, German

krautrock Krautrock (also called , German for ) is a broad genre of experimental rock that developed in Germany in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It originated among artists who blended elements of psychedelic rock, avant-garde composition, and electron ...

such as Can and

Neu! Neu! (; German for "New!"; styled in block capitals) were a West German krautrock band formed in Düsseldorf in 1971 by Klaus Dinger and Michael Rother following their departure from Kraftwerk. The group's albums were produced by Conny Plank, w ...

, American funk bands

Funkadelic Funkadelic was an American funk rock band formed in Plainfield, New Jersey in 1968 and active until 1982. As one of the two flagship groups of George Clinton's P-Funk collective, they helped pioneer the funk music culture of the 1970s.John, ...

and

Parliament In modern politics and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...

and the attitudes of

punk Punk or punks may refer to: Genres, subculture, and related aspects * Punk rock, a music genre originating in the 1970s associated with various subgenres * Punk subculture, a subculture associated with punk rock, or aspects of the subculture s ...

placed in a different context. It has a strong

bassline Bassline (also known as a bass line or bass part) is the term used in many styles of music, such as blues, jazz, funk, Dub music, dub and electronic music, electronic, traditional music, traditional, and classical music, for the low-pitched P ...

, compared to

Bootsy Collins William Earl "Bootsy" Collins (born October 26, 1951) is an American bass guitarist, singer, and songwriter. Rising to prominence with James Brown in the early 1970s before joining the Parliament-Funkadelic collective, Collins established himse ...

. The lyrics, described as "bizarre" and "confused", combine a protest against silk farming with vague mention of

Eastern religion The Eastern religions are the religions which originated in East Asia, East, South Asia, South and Southeast Asia and thus have dissimilarities with Western religions, Western and Traditional African religions, African religions. Eastern religions i ...

- ("Listen to the voice of

Buddha Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha (),* * * was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism. According to Buddhist legends, he was ...

/saying stop your

sericulture Sericulture, or silk farming, is the cultivation of silkworms to produce silk. Although there are several commercial species of silkworms, the caterpillar of the Bombyx mori, domestic silkmoth is the most widely used and intensively studied silkwo ...

"). In Japan, the sound of bells are referred to as "the voice of Buddha". The song's music predates Philip Oakey's joining the band. The Future, a band comprising Martyn Ware and

, had just parted company with singer Adi Newton, later of

Clock DVA Clock DVA are a musical group from Sheffield, England, whose style has touched on industrial music, industrial, post-punk, and Electronic body music, EBM. They formed in 1978 by Adi Newton (born Gary Coates) and Steven "Judd" Turner. Along with ...

. Needing a new singer, they contacted former schoolmate Philip Oakey, giving him the music to listen to. Two days later he was back, having written the lyrics. "That was the first thing I heard Phil do," Marsh recalled, "and I immediately thought, 'You've definitely got the job.'" The original version was recorded on a domestic

tape recorder An audio tape recorder, also known as a tape deck, tape player or tape machine or simply a tape recorder, is a sound recording and reproduction device that records and plays back sounds usually using magnetic tape for storage. In its present ...

, in mono, in an abandoned factory, at a cost of £2.50.Sean Turner (2001)
"Being Boiled by The Human League"
''Blind Youth''. Archived fro

on 26 July 2011. "...recorded in a disused factory on a domestic tape recorder at a cost of £2.50, demonstrated that anyone could make electronic pop music."

Different versions

"Being Boiled" was first released as a single in 1978 on the Fast Product label. The band recorded a new version as part of a session for the

John Peel John Robert Parker Ravenscroft (30 August 1939 – 25 October 2004), better known as John Peel, was an English radio presenter and journalist. He was the longest-serving of the original disc jockeys on BBC Radio 1, broadcasting regularly from ...

radio programme in the summer of 1978. The session was recorded 8 August 1978 and broadcast on 16 August. Among the four songs recorded, "Being Boiled" is the only one which has had an official release. A totally re-recorded version of "Being Boiled" was included on the band's '' Holiday '80'' EP, which reached number 56 in 1980 and number 46 in 1982. This version was also included on their 1980 '' Travelogue'' album, and is also available on the ''Original Remixes and Rarities'' compilation album (2005). A stereo remix of the original mono Fast Product version was released as a single in August 1980 through

EMI EMI Group Limited (formerly EMI Group plc until 2007; originally an initialism for Electric and Musical Industries, also referred to as EMI Records or simply EMI) was a British transnational conglomerate founded in March 1931 in London. At t ...

Records, failing to chart. This stereo remix was then reissued in January 1982, this time reaching Number 6 in the UK Charts, shortly after the band's commercial breakthrough with '' Dare'' and "

Don't You Want Me "Don't You Want Me" is a song by British synth-pop group the Human League (credited on the cover as the Human League 100). It was released on 27 November 1981 as the fourth single from their third studio album, '' Dare'' (1981). The band's be ...

". It was later included on their ''

Greatest Hits A greatest hits album or best-of album is a type of compilation album that collects popular and commercially successful songs by a particular artist or band. While greatest hits albums are typically supported by the artist, they can also be creat ...

'' anthology released in 1988. It has also been released on subsequent greatest hits albums, as well as on CD releases of the band's debut album ''

Reproduction Reproduction (or procreation or breeding) is the biological process by which new individual organisms – "offspring" – are produced from their "parent" or parents. There are two forms of reproduction: Asexual reproduction, asexual and Sexual ...

'' as a bonus track. The song has also been covered by

KMFDM KMFDM (originally Kein Mehrheit Für Die Mitleid, loosely translated by the band as "no pity for the majority") is a multinational industrial rock band from Hamburg led by Sascha Konietzko, who founded the band in 1984 as a performance art proje ...

on their 2009 album Blitz.

Reception

The song received a mixed reception among established artists of the time.

David Bowie David Robert Jones (8 January 194710 January 2016), known as David Bowie ( ), was an English singer, songwriter and actor. Regarded as one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century, Bowie was acclaimed by critics and musicians, pa ...

declared it to be "the future of music", but former

Sex Pistols The Sex Pistols are an English punk rock band formed in London in 1975. Although their initial career lasted just two and a half years, they became culturally influential in popular music. The band initiated the punk movement in the United Ki ...

singer

John Lydon John Joseph Lydon ( ; born 31 January 1956), also known by his former stage name Johnny Rotten, is a British-born singer, songwriter, author, and television personality. He was the lead vocalist of the punk rock band the Sex Pistols, which was ...

, reviewing the single for the ''

New Musical Express ''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming and culture website, bimonthly magazine, and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a " rock inkie", the ''NME'' would become a maga ...

'', dismissed the band as "trendy hippies". Peter York in '' Harper's and Queen'' cited the cover as an example of "

post-modern Postmodernism encompasses a variety of artistic, cultural, and philosophical movements that claim to mark a break from modernism Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experi ...

packaging". The song has become an influence on several musicians.

Gary Numan Gary Anthony James Webb (born 8 March 1958), known professionally as Gary Numan, is an English singer, songwriter and musician. He entered the music industry as frontman of the New wave music, new wave band Tubeway Army. After releasing two st ...

has named it one of his favourite songs.

Andy McCluskey George Andrew McCluskey (born 24 June 1959) is an English singer, songwriter, musician and record producer. He is best known as the lead singer and bass guitarist of the electronic band Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (OMD), which he founded ...

of OMD called it "a great piece of music".

Track listings

7-inch single (1978 Fast Product release) # "Being Boiled" (original version) # "Circus of Death" (original version) Holiday '80 EP (Virgin Records release) # "Being Boiled" (re-recorded version) # "Marianne" # "Dancevision" # "Rock 'N' Roll"/"Nightclubbing" medley 1980 EMI release and 1982 EMI reissue # "Being Boiled" (stereo remix of the original version) # "Circus of Death" (stereo remix of the original version)

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

References

{{Authority control 1978 debut singles 1982 singles The Human League songs Songs written by Philip Oakey Songs written by Martyn Ware Songs written by Ian Craig Marsh 1978 songs Virgin Records singles