Missing Foundation

Missing Foundation
Origin Hamburg, Germany
Genres Industrial
Years active 1984–92, 2012-Present
Labels Restless, Dais Records
Members Peter Missing
Past members Mark Ashwill
Chris Egan
En Esch
Sascha Konietzko
Florian Langmaack
Jim Moffitt
Adam Nodelman
Chris Tsakis
Vern Toulon

Missing Foundation was an industrial music and performance art project active in the late 1980s and early 1990s and led by Peter Missing. Their live shows were notorious for sparking civil disobedience (including the occasional riot) and causing serious damage to venues at which they performed, and they were in fact banned from some cities entirely. The group was also infamous for their "The Party's Over" graffito of an upside-down martini glass, and was heavily involved in the Tompkins Square Park Riot in August 1988. While the band disbanded in the early 1990s, a small anarchist social movement continued to exist under the same name for several years thereafter.[1]

History

A drawing of Peter Missing's upside-down glass logo.
Party's over logo

The earliest incarnation of the group, which was founded in Hamburg in 1984 by Peter Missing, included Sascha Konietzko and En Esch of industrial act KMFDM, who were only with Missing Foundation briefly before going their own way.[2]

After Missing moved back to New York City in 1985, he started a new version of the group, and the line-up became more stable, with a core group of Missing, Florian Langmaack, Chris Egan, and Mark Ashwill.[3] The band's second album, 1933, was released in 1988,[3] when the band's social unrest fomenting activities began to increase dramatically. The group's upside-down martini logo had been spray painted all over the East Village that year.[4] At a show in mid-1988 in New York, the group doused oil barrels in kerosene and set them on fire, then rolled them into the audience, causing major damage to C.B.G.B.'s, the club where they were performing.[4] In a July 31 protest, one of the band members was arrested.[5] A week later, Missing helped organize another initially peaceful protest at Tompkins Square Park, which grew violent after the band performed a concert.[3][6] Some cities began banning the group from performing for fear of similar destruction to their venues.[3]

The group's biggest cultural impact, other than their disruptive live performances, was the creation of their infamous "The Party's Over" image of an upside-down martini glass, which became a symbol for political and social dissent.[7] The logo was part of a major graffiti campaign in New York's Lower East Side during the band's existence.[3] An accompanying phrase, 1933-1988, was added as a way to draw comparisons between contemporary New York and the Weimar Republic.[4] The group was accused of Satanism by a WCBS-TV news[8] during the height of their influence.[3]

After releasing a total of five albums, the group disbanded in 1992, and Missing initially moved to Berlin, then relocated to Copenhagen.[3]

In 2013, Dais Records reissued the first two Missing Foundation albums, Missing Foundation and 1933 Your House Is Mine in a limited edition vinyl format.

Musical style

Missing Foundation patterned itself after early industrial acts such as Throbbing Gristle and Einsturzende Neubauten.[3] The group used a variety of found metal objects to create its percussion, and only rarely used traditional instruments such as guitars.[3] Lead vocalist Missing often shouted through a bullhorn,[4] on many occasions because the club owners had turned off the in house speaker system.[3] Missing and his cohorts were once described as "a scattered collection of anarchists and antigentrification militants".[1]

Discography

All albums released on Restless Records.[3]

References

  1. 1 2 Schneider, Daniel B. (December 14, 1997). "F.Y.I.:Through a Glass, Darkly". New York Times. Retrieved July 22, 2012.
  2. ↑ Prato, Greg. "KMFDM Biography". Allmusic. Rovi Corporation. Retrieved July 21, 2012.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Huey, Steve. "Missing Foundation Biography". Allmusic. Rovi Corporation. Retrieved July 22, 2012.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Johnson, Kirk (August 13, 1988). "The Talk of the East Village; A Neighborhood of Vigorous Opinions". New York Times. Retrieved July 22, 2012.
  5. ↑ Wines, Michael (August 10, 1988). "Class Struggle Erupts Along Avenue B". New York Times. Retrieved July 24, 2012.
  6. ↑ Anderson, Lincoln (August 10–16, 2005). "Artist who was once the center is now on the fringe". The Villager. 75 (12). Retrieved July 24, 2012.
  7. ↑ Moynihan, Colin (April 29, 2002). "A Stirring Icon That Shook Things Up Turns 20". New York Times. Retrieved July 22, 2012.
  8. ↑ http://sensitiveskinmagazine.com/missing-foundation-and-mike-taibbis-cult-of-rage/
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