“An eight-minute opening track… pomp, circumstance, Wagenrian bombast and epic grandeur”: Propaganda’s A Secret Wish was more prog than people knew
· louderBy Paul Lester
( Prog )
published 13 October 2024
Known as “ABBA from Hell,” the German synth-poppers’ 1985 debut had links to Yes, Mike Oldfield and Die Krupps
In 2011 Prog argued that German synth-pop band Propaganda’s 1985 debut album A Secret Wish had much more of a progressive aspect than many realised at the time.
Despite ZTT’s reputation as the ultimate home of pop-pranksterism and radical post-punk, in many ways the label kept prog’s ideals alive in the mid-80s. Apart from the fact that its in-house producer, Trevor Horn, was a sometime member of Yes, there were the bands – Frankie Goes To Hollywood with their lavish gatefold sleeves, Steve Howe guitar solos and tracks alluding to Pink Floyd; and Art Of Noise with their Close To The Edge-referencing song titles and attention to studio sorcery.
Then there was Propaganda. They were ZTT’s token arty Germans, two of them male, two female, who the label’s publicist/provocateur, ex-NME scribe Paul Morley, took to describing as “ABBA from Hell.”
One of the band, Ralf Dörper, had been a member of industrial outfit Die Krupps. But the inclusion of classically-trained musician and composer Michael Mertens pushed Propaganda’s 1985 nine-track debut album towards prog, with the assistance of Horn, his protegé Steve Lipson, and string arranger David Bedford (yes, the one who orchestrated Tubular Bells).
Dream Within A Dream - YouTube
A Secret Wish had an eight-minute opening track, Dream Within A Dream – based on a poem by Edgar Allan Poe – complete with extended flute solo and the sort of keyboard flourishes normally heard on albums bearing Roger Dean paintings.
The track Dr Mabuse had been released as a single in February 1984, but the label had been too busy with Frankie to follow it up. No matter: inspired by noir filmmaker Fritz Lang, the Horn-produced Mabuse still sounded amazing 18 months. Pomp? Check. Circumstance? Check. Wagnerian bombast and epic grandeur? Check, mate.
An unsettled Morley had given Lipson a range of post-punk albums in the hope of cleaning his palette of its prog tendencies. Both of them won out in a sense; A Secret Wish is a triumph of melodic concision and proto-techno programming as much as a victory for instrumental finesse and studio excess, from the synth swells and Chris Squire-goes-cosmic-funky bass part on The Murder of Love to Frozen Faces and its pan-piped, Teutonic froideur.
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ThebestGermanicart-prog-electro-popalbumintheworld...ever!
Propaganda - Dr. Mabuse - YouTube
Paul Lester is the editor of Record Collector. He began freelancing for Melody Maker in the late 80s, and was later made Features Editor. He was a member of the team that launched Uncut Magazine, where he became Deputy Editor. In 2006 he went freelance again and has written for The Guardian, The Times, the Sunday Times, the Telegraph, Classic Rock, Q and the Jewish Chronicle. He has also written books on Oasis, Blur, Pulp, Bjork, The Verve, Gang Of Four, Wire, Lady Gaga, Robbie Williams, the Spice Girls, and Pink.
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