Minimal Man - The Shroud of

Les Disques du Crepuscule
(TWI034: 708527220078/TWI035)

$13.99

Release date: 5/20/2022

18 tracks.

Les Disques du Crepuscule presents an expanded CD edition of the debut album by Minimal Man, aka challenging American underground artist figure Patrick Miller, a figure of dark talent and vision who recorded 6 remarkable albums before his untimely death in December 2003.

Formed by Patrick Miller in San Francisco in 1979, the first iteration of Minimal Man cut two albums of dark industrial punk rock. Debut The Shroud Of was originally issued by Subterranean Records in August 1981, when the core of the band comprised a trio of Miller with Andrew Baumer and Lliam Hart. The album serves up 13 slices of dissonant electronics and ‘anti-music’, together with generous side-orders of isolation, insecurity, terror and black humour. Enjoy!

Guest musicians on The Shroud Of include Tuxedomoon alumni Steven Brown and Michael Belfer. Like Tuxedomoon, Miller would subsequently relocate from California to Europe where he continued as a prolific creator of music and visual art. His four European albums are Sex with God, Slave Lullabies, Hunger Is All She Has Ever Known and Pure. Passionate and volatile, Miller returned to California in the 1990s and died at home in 2003.

Digitally remastered, this expanded CD edition of The Shroud Of runs for over 60 minutes. The 5 bonus tracks are taken from rare 7-inch singles Two Little Skeletons and He Who Falls, the latter recorded live at the legendary Deaf Club in San Francisco in September 1979. The collection closes with compilation-only track Shower Sequence.

The booklet includes a detailed Patrick Miller biography, as well as examples of his unique visual art.

1. Loneliness

2. Two People

3. High Why

4. Hospital

5. Blue Step

6. Hatemonger

7. The Shroud

8. Now I Want It All

9. The Hex of Sex

10. You Are

11. I Don’t Resist

12. Jungle Song

13. She Was a Visitor

14. Two Little Skeletons

15. Tired Death

16. He Who Falls (live)

17. She Was a Visitor (live)

18. Shower Sequence