Confrontation

Album: It's A Condition (1981)
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Songfacts®:

  • One of the more unusual bands on the early '80s New Wave scene was Romeo Void, formed by lead singer Debora Iyall and bass player Frank Zincavage when they were students at the San Francisco Art Institute. Their guitarist, Peter Woods, became a main songwriter, and their sax player, Benjamin Bossi, added an extra layer that helped set them apart.

    "Confrontation" is one of their earliest songs, with a Iyall getting a bit avant-garde in the lyric, opening with the lines:

    The mold on the pie
    Begins on a single piece


    Zincavage talked about the track in a Songfacts interview. "I believe I started this one with Debora, then brought it to Peter to finish. There is a definite XTC influence on my part.

    But that was the fun thing about us, there was no single person whose influences took over. Debora has a sort of cut up/found lyric quality to part of it - 'the mold on the pie'??? Her lyrics often had an element of personal disclosure and that comes up here. Benjamin gets a chance to let loose a bit on sax."
  • "Confrontation" is part of Romeo Void's debut album, It's A Condition, released on the 415 Records, a San Francisco label that specialized in punk and new wave. 415 had David Kahne on their payroll, and he produced the album - Kahne went on to produced Sublime, the Bangles, Sugar Ray, Paul McCartney and many others.

    The album got great reviews and some local airplay; their next one, Benefactor, included "Never Say Never," which got national attention when MTV started playing the video. The group nearly broke big with their 1984 song "A Girl In Trouble (Is A Temporary Thing)," but by then they were signed to Columbia Records, which abandoned them. Romeo Void broke up in 1985 leaving a legacy of three intriguing and musically progressive albums and a handful of memorable videos.

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