Chris Wirsig & Audio Terrorist “Tainted Love”
It was Ed Cobb who wrote “Tainted Love,” and Gloria Jones who performed it originally. However, the song wasn’t popularized until Soft Cell and many others gave it a spin. Today, Chris Wirsig & Audio Terrorist rages back with their hyperpop-infused electro banger, channeling the dark and demons living in the unknown corners of “Tainted Love.”
The latest “Tainted Love” opens with a dazed, mind swirl. Like losing the grip of reality accompanied by a burning sensation, Chris Wirsig & Audio Terrorist takes your whole perception away with a powerful, mind-bending storm spiral, completely dominating your ears and heart. They are definitely not gentle or has any intention to sugarcoat. This is the dark and unheard story of “Tainted Love.”
A sort of chaos and flames fluttering through the soundscape veins, creating a strong, almost palpable visual imagery, and that’s Chris Wirsig, the award-winning producer and composer, who is known to manipulate your emotions and perceptions with a storm of sounds. Audio Terrorist’s dark and gritty vocal only intensifies the already deeply evocative daze. Like a great disturbance that stirs in your heart and head, his vocal draws you to the depth of abyss with a hint of wicked allure—the almost unnoticeable rock n roll phantom is lurking in the dark, gazing you deep in the eyes. And the world keeps tumbling, head over toes.
Their version of “Tainted Love” leaves a strong enough impression to make you forget about all other version. Their hyperpop, electro, psychedelic complex is many steps palpable and impulsive than Ed Cobb and less personal than Marilyn Manson. They create a character and a deeper story within these fixed melodies and lines. Essentially, through their music, your heart is beating along the music’s rhythm, and you’re inside its emotive and intellectual perception. That’s a very powerful thing. Even though you have heard of “Tainted Love” a thousand times, they give you a brilliant one more time, for you to sink in and ponder, and discover something you don’t already known about this classic tune.
Read our interview with Wirsig and DuArte and learn more about their collaboration.
Punk Head: I love how inventive the soundscapes are in "Tainted Love." Tell us more about this collaboration.
Chris Wirsig: Thanks very much. Kalib and I have played the song live when I was touring California with my band no:carrier, and we always said we need to make it into a polished studio version. Somehow the song fell to the wayside, but recently we resurrected it, and I thought it’s a great time to do it in an updated, Hyperpop-infused version.
Kalib DuArte: We did one of those “one band morphs into another gigs,” and so our cover of “Boys of Summer” (great video by the way) became a transition track between Audio Terrorist and no:carrier. Chris was like “hey, we need more than one track with you on it” and so he did an arrangement of “Tainted Love.” My producer said, “what if we sing it more as a harmony and strip away the melody?” It seemed weird at the time, but now it seems very current. Just how it goes sometimes.
PH: Can you describe the emotions or feelings you hope this single evokes in listeners?
DuArte: The song has a classic 60’s melody seducing you into feeling good about a bad situation. To get stuck in it. It’s a real tension in it. I want our version to not do that, and it to make you feel “hey, this isn’t right” because it is not. If it feels bad, get the f@
PH: What did you enjoy most about making the track?
Wirsig: I loved playing with that classic and making it a little darker, maybe a bit more sarcastic than even the famous Soft Cell version. With Kalib’s vocal style on this song, it was easy for me to go very “electro” on it, and really dive into the sound design to make it edgy yet danceable.
DuArte: Showing that even a classic can be approached in a new way which isn’t imitated by the original from the 60’s, the famous version from the 80’s, or anyone else’s other covers. Us taking risks and thinking “have we gone too far?” and shelving it. Then listening to it later and saying, “it wasn’t the wrong idea, but it was the wrong time for the idea. “
PH: What has been, so far, your favorite song to perform and why?
DuArte: An original Audio Terrorist song or a cover tune? Original: “Caravan of the Soul” cuz at heart I’m a bit of a crooner. Chris played a great version at a gig. Covers: “I’ll Melt with You” by Modern English. You know when you cover a song and the guys in the audience get so jealous of how their gals are responding to it that they look like they will take you out back and beat the shit out of you, you are on to something… ;)
Wirsig: That’s hard to answer. I definitely enjoyed performing “Tainted Love” with Kalib back then. But at the moment my favorites are the songs by Angels On The Battlefield, an Epic Metal band I’m playing keyboards and some other more exotic instruments for. We’re about to release a first, kick-ass single soon.
PH: What would you like to say to your fans out there?
Wirsig: Thanks for listening to the music – stay curious.
DuArte: Thank you for all the support over the years! One random positive engagement helps keep me going down an experimental collaborative path, and not turn Audio Terrorist into a dance floor pop cliché. Even if it is a cover, it should be an original take on it.
