Read an interview with Psychic TV’s Genesis and Paula P-Orridge featured in a rare tour zine from 1990.

Best known as the cofounder of Throbbing Gristle (alongside Cosey Fanni Tutti) in the mid-1970s and, after its dissolution, the founder of Psychic TV, Genesis P-Orridge (they/them) has been commonly referred to as an industrial artist – Throbbing Gristle coined the term, after all. But that genre tag’s not totally accurate, as P-Orridge’s work starting in the early 1980s with Psychic TV included explorations of synth-pop, seemingly innocuous lounge music, psychedelia, and also acid house.

In 1988, Psychic TV released Jack the Tab, a fake acid house compilation featuring imaginary artists (the project was largely produced by Genesis & friends) which was later described by The Guardian as “Britain’s first acid house record”. According to Genesis, the release was meant to create a sense that a healthy acid house scene existed in the UK. Jack the Tab, along with its companion album Tekno Acid Beat, heavily utilized early sampling techniques drawing material from electro, hip-hop, and techno, as well as various sound bites from television and psychedelics advocate Dr. Timothy Leary.

The following interview released around the release of Jack the Tab was conducted by Mark Spainhower with Genesis and Paula P-Orridge and originally featured in Psychic TV’s “DeTour 88 Altered States Ov America Zine,” which was for sale on their ’88 US tour. The rare zine was graciously uploaded to Internet Archive in hi-res by Oakland-based designer Dan Letson aka DJML aka Grippers’ Tips from the music forum Sound.Rodeo. The interview has been transcribed here for accessibility.

Check out the full scans of the zines:

Psychic TV – DeTour 88 Altered States Ov America Zine

Psychic TV – Back on Thee Bus Spring 90

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REWIND to 1988, where a chance encounter between the writer William JS. Burroughs and the artist Brion Gysin led to the collaborative development of the revolutionary: Cut-up technique. The World has never been the same since. No longer were words or language the privileged territory of the “artist”: ‘Cut-ups are for everyone. Anybody can make cut-ups. It’s experimental in the sense of being something to do. Right here right now. Not something to talk and argue about,” said Burroughs. The reverberation from the sound of 5,000 years of linear, sequentially structured patterns of thought being scissored and spliced at random shook the foundations of all our assumptions about media, revealing strange and wondrous implications and possibilities with each new development of technological access. When Genesis P-Orridge and friends formed Throbbing Gristle in 1975, it was the first time the cut up had actively been utilized, both in practice and in spirit, within the pop music context, giving birth to what co-conspirator Monte Cazazza named “industrial’ music, changing forever how we would took at music as information.

FAST FORWARD to the Chicago house scene of the late 1980s, where sampling and scrambling artists and DJs were taking rude liberties with sound, calling the results “acid” (slang for burning or ripping off sounds via sampling), and setting dance music on its cauliflower ear. Well things have a decidedly odd way of coming full circle: a fortuitous misunderstanding translated Chicago “acid” into English “acid” – superamped dance beats with a decided emphasis on the more psychedelic aspects of the word. And who at the English Acid forefront but Genesis P-Orridge and his brainchild Psychic TV, with anthem after larcenous dance anthem under their collective arm! The new collaboration / configuration / conspiracy/ compilation album, Jack the Tab, is a virtual treasure-chest of furious dance beats, brought to the dance floor by the sticky fingers of Genesis, Dave Ball (ex-Soft Cell), and Richard Norris (of the NML). Genesis and Paula P-Orridge spoke at length to Associate Editor Mark Spainhower about their work, plans, the Temple of Psychic Youth (the organization founded by Genesis, which is exactly what its name sounds like), the manifold implications and opportunities presented by sampling and recording technologies, and how this fits into their provocative alternative vision of tribal utopia. Like Genesis says: it’s a war [indecipherable] issue is one basic to all wars: freedom from those who would control us. [indecipherable] SCRAMBLES IS THE AMERICAN WAY.”

— William S. Burroughs

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MS: Finally, Psychic TV is giving us a domestic release. Why has it taken so long?

GP: Well like I’ve said before, Americans are blind. Not American people. Not the public. I would imagine that at least a third of all our record sales have been in America from the beginning. But for some obscure reason despite that fact and the fact that we tour here regularly, and get bigger and bigger audiences, and do more cities each time. Independent and major labels here say we’re not commercial, not viable. It’s all very vague; there are no real specifics involved, it’s just omission on the part of Americans, not us … we’ve offered everything, all the time.

MS: Do you think they’re afraid of taking a chance?

GP: I think they’re ignorant; I don’t think they can see the writing on the wall, like all establishments. And all praise to Fundamental for finally putting their little tiny tootsies in the ice-cold bathwater. They’ve done it: nobody else would. I mean, that’s a beginning. It’s like all these things, you get the tiny wedge in, and hopefully it’s going to get easier and quicker. Because we’ve already decided, as a sort of communal policy, that we want to concentrate at least equally as much on America, if not more. Because our long-term vision suggests that America is a more fertile place for a lot of our ideas to expand. Because there’s more space, physically. And more renegade teenagers. It may sound odd for us to say as outside observers, but our feeling is that young people in America may not be as formally educated en masse as the British: the British are very literate. But they’ve not got very good general knowledge at all. And my experience of over fifteen years of coming here is that people of all classes and creeds and so on have an incredibly high general knowledge. People know at least a bit about most things, and it’s usually quite well-informed, that bit that they know. That’s not the case in Britain, and we find that really stimulating, to be able to not have to keep going back to the beginning, and saying, “Well, I am called Genesis because …” Here, we kind of work from now onwards. In Britain, we have to keep stepping back twice. It’s getting really frustrating and dull, and not really worth the effort. People in Britain have this leftover empirical view (i.e., in terms of empire, not scientific empiricism) where they just assume that they know everything.

“They remember the difference between feeling aggressive, and feeling happy. Between wanting to attack and defend their territory as an animal, and realizing that they can be communal, and feel unthreatened.”

Genesis P-Orridge

MS: Can we expect Jack the Tab to come out on domestic?

GP: I wish we could. We asked Fundamental to release it in America. And the response we got back via their representative in Britain was that they only want indie pop. And it’s dance music. And as we pointed out, Jack the Tab is not pure dance music, by any means. In fact, hardly at all. And the stuff that we’ve done that’s been exported here, that’s pure dance remixed on 12″, has been in the independent and dance charts and DJ’s charts, and over America. AND in Britain. Just in terms of performance — I mean Tracks magazine, that DJ magazine, we were like Number 2 in the charts Top 100, over big names like Joyce Sims … so it just doesn’t [make any sense] at all. Because it’s quite obvious that we sold something like 10,000 singles in America with no adverts, no posters, no promotion and very little radio play. That means that it’s hit people on the dance floor, and they go out and ask for it. Which is the best way, of course. So it’s just crap. If the can sell that many when no one’s heard of it … if you just multiply that by logic, to being heard of and distributed properly, they could be cleaning out. So it’s not like it’s worn off, or a joke or something. We’ve already got another album, which is called Techno Acid Beats, which is all dance mixes. We’ve got another 12” single called “Joy,” which is really pure acid remix. And we’ve got another one already recorded called Love War Riot. And we’re going back to do another Jack the Tab Volume Il. So, we get told “why not do another one?” We’ve done about twenty more! How many do we have to do, and how many good reviews do we have to get? How often does Bomb the Bass and S-Express have to say — which they have, in interviews — that they were influenced by us? It just doesn’t add up. There is some weird paranoia or fear… without being arrogant, maybe they‘re just terrified of the fact that we can’t be controlled. We are out of control.

PP: Even if you just have a look at this [pointing to various NME House Funk and US Import charts], the US Import chart, you’ve got Bomb the Bass at Number One, and it was Number One in England. And then you’ve got Number Nine, Psychic TV.

GP: And in England, all the mix DJs are using our stuff all the time. It’s become an anthem. Especially the bit on that record where I go [a dramatic hiss] “ACID…” like that. We’ve been to lots of acid house clubs in London and three hours can go by of nonstop mixing with everything. and then it’s stop dead, and the DJ will go. “ACID…” with our record, and everyone just cheers, and screams “ACID'” and waves their arms. It’s become the anthem, the one word … symbolizes a whole change of attitude, a reassessment of sound, and color, and even people being non-aggressive instead of aggressive. Taking different drugs.

MS: That brings me to my next question: How do you think the whole acid house scene, that’s going strong in London now, will go over in America with its endless screeching about “Just Say No?”

PP: Well, we were asked this question before, and one can only give their opinion. But there’s a lot of difference between Europe and America, and there’s a lot of difference between Britain and America. We would like it to really take off. It’d be a very good thing for everyone. The reason why I don’t think that it will take off one hundred percent in America like it has in Britain is because, for one, there’s too much polarization here between people. You’re either this, or you’re that. Whereas in Britain, most things are quite mixed. And the acid house clubs have been very mixed between people, their class and their color and their culture; it doesn’t matter who you are. Your common denominator, if you like, is the music that you’re listening to. And when you go to these clubs, there’s like total autonomy between people. And yes, people are probably taking illegal substances. But they‘re the sort of happier illegal substances, rather than the ones that the CIA gives you. And also, no one’s touching alcohol. It’s strange.

MS: In British clubs?

PP: In the acid house clubs, [they drink] Perrier, or lemonade… But going back. I think it would be really great if the acid house thing takes off here. But people have got to start forgetting what’s on the outside. It’s what’s on the inside. It’s what’s coming from the heart. And if it does come here, and it works, everyone’s just going to have a really good time. We’ve had this “Just Say No” campaign a couple of years ago in England, but it was mainly directed towards smack. It wasn’t directed at all drugs. And now everyone’s kind of forgotten it.

“So, we stunted doing Acid House music, almost in ignorance. It’s like when the Stones, or the Beatles heard rhythm & blues from America [and] got it wrong. But made it kind of new, and fresh.”

Genesis P-Orridge

GP: My view is a bit different. I think Paula’s overview is accurate. First of all, I don‘t like exclusivity. I like inclusivity. And I don‘t think that our abilities or perceptions are any more intelligent than those of most people on the street. And if I feel like that, and therefore we made, a year ago, “Tune In Turn On The Acid House,” and everyone said, “What? Timothy Leary? And ‘tune in’? That’s all hippy stuff!” And now In England, thousands of t-shirts, even in chain stores, with “Tune In Turn On The Acid House!” Smily Faces! Upside-down peace signs! All the things we designed a year ago, everywhere! In Oxford Street. And football hooligans are taking ecstasy at acid house clubs, and smiling, and giving you a hug! And dancing with each other! And not trying to pick up girls! They‘re dancing until they‘re in a trance, like a dervish, for five hours … and going home, beaming and ecstatic; as well as being Ecstatic. And it’s quite incredible. That’s happened in three months. And the main slogan in London, even in the national papers, is “The Summer of Love – 1988.” And people like it. And they don’t give a shit what the people at the top are telling them, because they know different. Plus, people have memories. They remember the difference between feeling aggressive, and feeling happy. Between wanting to attack and defend their territory as an animal, and realizing that they can be communal, and feel unthreatened. That only has to be remembered once. And the newspapers are all screaming, “Raid these clubs! There’s all these young people taking Ecstasy and Acid!” But what can they do? They swallow it before they come in. People aren’t dumb. They know how long it lasts. They drop it as they‘re going down there, and then they walk in, and there’s nothing on anyone. They’ve tried it — they’ve raided clubs. What can they do — arrest 900 people,and test their piss?

MS: They’d do it here.

GP: Well, in England there’s no case. If it’s in your blood, it’s not illegal. It’s actually having it in your Possession [that’s illegal]. Which is very useful. I don’t know who was the stupid person who drafted it, but it was all about possession and dealing, but nothing about having a bit of sport. So, the other thing that has happened is that the name “acid” was originally stolen by the British from Chicago, because we misunderstood. There was the Acid Trax record, Acid House: everyone, us included, that first heard of it thought, “What a great idea!” Because we’d been saying, for two or three years, with “Godstar” and everything, the only thing we were lacking was a good 12″ dance mix. We were doing hyperdelic music, technological psychedelic music. But we hadn’t quite sussed how to have hyperdelic dance music, acid dance music. So we heard this name, and when we were in Chicago we went into shops and said, “We want the weirdest records you’ve got,” and they were called Acid House. So we bought them, and the guy looked at us a bit weird, you know, “Why do they want that?” We took it back to England and thought, “Well, that’s not what we thought it was. We thought it was acid acid dance!” But we thought, “Well, that beat’s good.” That sort of fast, high energy stroke, world-wide trance beat. And once you’ve got that beat, that speed, you can lay anything on top, and it’s going to work, with a little bit of subtlety. It’s like a cut-up, anyone can do a cut-up, but choosing the right material is something else. That’s what separates the good from the average.

So, we stunted doing Acid House music, almost in ignorance. It’s like when the Stones, or the Beatles heard rhythm & blues from America, tried to do it properly in England, and those British rhythm & blues bands got it wrong. But made it kind of new, and fresh. And then re-exported it back to America.

MS: Where we gobbled it up.

GP: I have an optimistic suspicion that the same process is going to happen. That there’s going to be a new British beat invasion, if you like. Our idea of Acid House, which is acid Acid House, in England, that’s what we all understood it [to be]. So, the doors are opened. What’s really happened is all sound, ever recorded so far on the Planet, is available to be re-used, chopped-up, re-assessed, re-assembled. It’s no one’s property. Like what Brion Gysin said, “Poets do not own words.” Musicians don’t own music anymore. I think that’s good. Nobody owns it, and the people involved that we know, they don’t care that we sample, mutate it, they take it as a compliment. If I found a good noise, and the people like it, great!

MS: A lot of people seem to be upset; that is, American companies seem to be very paranoid about this.

GP: Maybe that’s the real reason behind them not wanting to have our sound, they re all scared … they have their possessions, you know. Even little people — it’s something we’ve all been conditioned to accept. “This bits mine, and l compete with you to keep mine, and get more that’s mine. That whole Syndrome is destroying everything, on every level of society. That’s what sampling, or burning, or acid burning, whatever they want to call it, that is what it challenges, right up there against your nose —BAM! Fuck you. I’ll take it. Sue me.

MS: Has anyone made any legal noises?

GP: There’s been about forty attempts at the beginning of the year to sue people. They all failed. What are they going to do? Are they going to bankrupt people who spent six hundred quid on making a record? So what? It’s too late, it’s out, the cat’s out of the bag.

They’re giving us all these Casios, and all these trickeries, and all these children’s versions of samplers, loads of 4-track tape recorders. Walkmans, cheap studio time, 8-track machines … what do they expect to happen? People play with toys.

They want the money for the equipment that they’ve invested millions in developing for their uses, which is to control us. And what I always loved in society is that they [invent] things like Xerox, they invent that to make bureaucracy easier. It makes anti-bureaucracy easier… you can do fanzines, you can do pamphlets, and manifestos as well. And they can’t afford to keep it from us, because they’ve blown so much money. So they have to give it to us. Polaroid cameras [for making] I.D. — you can do uncensored photography. They make videos, for whatever reasons, and then we get them and we can make home movies they can’t censor. So every time they make these moves to boost their control pyramid, they’re also handing weapons to the enemy! It’s like this continuous stand-off … and I really like that. I always thought it really funny, the way they‘re so pompous about, “Well, we made this, we’ll shut ‘em up this time.” And then they’ll go, “Well, here’s this new gun that can blow twenty of you weirdos away … so, have one!” What? You mean I can blow twenty policemen away? It’s a really odd psychology they have … they’re dumb. Because they believe their own stories. It just makes everything full of disbelief.

Monte [Cazazza] and I were talking this morning, saying “Let’s do a series of records called Burn This Record!” Which is a spoof of the Sixties’ thing, Steal This Book, and also “burn” being slang for sampling. Just collate all the best noises you get… sell them as cheaply as possible. And after you’re done Burn This Record, you have Third Degree Burns, which is like really serious noises … then you can have Thoroughly Charred … And then, you can have … Cinders! I mean, the whole thing … the absurd notions, the sort of double-plays on Sixties Slogans, turned around to Eighties technology. It’s like the Sixties find a new life through being irrelevant. But the words … so accurate again! It’s uncanny. It’s really odd … but not to me. I always thought there was a continuity in culture, that’s why I’m doing it. I love it.

MS: You seem to be having a great time …

GP: Yeah, well, there’s all these people like Monte — lots of them, everywhere! People have been storing all this stuff: books, files, information… you do it, with your work. We’ve all sussed the importance, we’ve grasped all this information, it’s all integrated, really. It’s all part of the panorama. And we’re all in it. And certainly, the vehicle’s there. Ready [to be] exploited …

MS: The fascists don’t like it much …

GP: And there’s all these people making 25 million dollar movies, with million dollar sound effects, and you can steal it. You can have a million dollars worth of sound effects for four pounds, renting a movie. And instead of having to read like a hundred books, or listen to 2 thousand albums, you can condense them onto like four records, and two books. So It’s saving time … it’s like hieroglyphic shorthand. And the potency of that is really magical. It’s invocation, it’s ritual. All our threads that we’ve always been stressing, we understand ourselves more, we were just going by intuition — “This feels like it has some importance; we’re not sure what yet, but I’m going to hold on to it…” All these threads that we’ve kind of grasped …

“What I always loved in society is that they [invent] things like Xerox, they invent that to make bureaucracy easier. It makes anti-bureaucracy easier… you can do fanzines, you can do pamphlets, and manifestos as well.”

Genesis P-Orridge

MS: And all of a sudden, it kind of comes together — serendipity …

GP: Ooh, you get that shiver… and you think, this is great, because not only does it all make sense, and it balances, but everyones got access into the game. And it’s fun, too! And it’s destructive of all the things the fascists like! Ecstasy’s like all the good bits of the old drugs, and none of the damage. That’s what’s so weird, also; the drug arrives that goes with the mood. There’s always these symbolic parallels. It seems to happen that way, its very shamanic. Ecstasy is very shamanic, and it Increases that faculty, too. I really do believe this. So: Say no to drugs? Which ones? TV? Alcohol? Tobacco? Start with the death drugs.

MS: Tell us about the tour.

GP: Well, the tour is to publicize the Temple of Psychic Youth in America, as well (contact: T.O.P.Y., P.O. 18223, Denver. CO 80218 for further information, publications, etc.). And there’ll definitely be at least one live album after this tour.

MS: Your promo material said you’ve got 23 live albums in the works.

GP: We’re up to about 14. You’ve heard of the Guinness Book of World Records? Well, we’re in the next issue of it, for Issuing the most number of different LPs in one territory, of any band, ever. For 14 in one year… so, we Il be in there, with Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson.

MS: Right where you belong.

GP: Yeah, in a strange kind of way … holding up the banner for the alternative. We don’t see it as ego gratification for us; we see it as for the whole scene. And the most we see ourselves as, on a good day, Is just the Kamikaze troups, smashing holes on behalf of everyone who wants to be a renegade.

“Show by example that there are alternative ways of working, in an extended family situation. Where people support each other when they need to, in a crisis.”

Genesis P-Orridge

MS: Tell me more about what’s going on in the Temple in the U.S.

GP: It’s getting healthier. This tour couldn’t have happened without the Tempie of Psychic Youth U.S. They‘re based in Denver. We sent them the cash to get a school bus, but they found one, and they rebuilt it, and they’ve done ten thousand leaflets to give out at all the concerts. They‘re the road crew. When we broke down in the desert, near Salt Lake, they came out in cars, and ferried us back and forth, and fixed the bus. They let us stay in their houses, to save money, they printed the T-shirts. It’s really good. I mean, the whole idea of having an alternative tribal network is working. And that’s the other thing with America; it’s built for a new kind of tribalism. It’s a war. We’re in a war. And we’re all guerilla troops in the war. And we’re fighting for survival. For everyone who matters. And the only ways to do that are to know that you don’t have to watch your back with people who are supposedly allies and friends, and to show by example that there are alternative ways of working, in an extended family situation. Where people support each other when they need to, in a crisis. And they don’t rip each other off, and destroy each other, suck each other dry. It’s not easy, but it’s the only thing to aim for. And we’re all in the same boat. There’s no fixed lines, it’s just them and us. It’s that’s simple. I like all these stupid politicians, they make it easy. You’re looking right down somebody’s huge wide-open rectum full of bullshit, and you know what they are. I don’t want to walk in there … And you look the other way, and you see somebody who is very quick and discrete, with these eyes that are full of vision, and you think, “Yeah, I’d like to speak to that one. They look like they might help me a bit … And which way do you turn?

MS: You go for the light at the end of the tunnel.

GP: As opposed to the light at the end of the asshole. That was probably just a lit cigarette in Reagan’s mouth… It’s interesting, it’s very interesting right now, but it’s hard work.

MS: I think it was Monte who said in an interview that anything that’s worth doing is usually hard work.

GP: Yeah, he’s good at slogans. I like slogans. Everything that saves time, and condenses, things that help to trigger people or reinforce people. There’s too much snobbery about literacy, literary skills and articulacy, and being able to spell right. I get asked questions in interviews like, “Why can’t you spell?” Stupid questions … Or, “Are you a Satanist?”

MS: Like at the New Music Seminar, the co-panelist on the Sex and Rock panel with his rather disturbing obsession with your penis.

GP: Well, that’s what mean. I’m not embarrassed. I’m just not interested, I’m thinking about the fight …