Bill Drummond
Currently active as a writer and artist, Bill Drummond is best known as co-founder of the KLF, the avant-garde 'pop group' of the late eighties, the K Foundation, its nineties 'avant-art' media-manipulating successor and of The Foundry, a thriving arts centre set within the aegis of a public house in Shoreditch, London, which is itself the former headquarters of a major bank.Originally an artist, Drummond's musical history began in 1977, and the Liverpool group Big in Japan whose membership also included future luminaries Holly Johnson (Frankie Goes To Hollywood) and Ian Broudie (The Lightning Seeds). After the band's demise, Drummond and another member of the band Dave Balfe started a record label and music publishing company, Zoo, acting as producers and label managers, and releasing the debut singles by Echo & The Bunnymen and The Teardrop Explodes, both of whom Drummond would later manage somewhat idiosyncratically.
He would later take a job in the mainstream music business as an A&R executive for the label WEA, working with Strawberry Switchblade, Zodiac Mindwarp and the Love Reaction, The Proclaimers and Brilliant before repenting his corporate involvement, resigning his job and issuing a solo album The Man, before teaming up with Jimi Cauty (whom he had signed to WEA as a member of "Brilliant") to form The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu, (aka The JAMs, The Timelords, The KLF and a host of other names), their idea of an "anti-band", a richly imaginative and ongoing cultural critique culled from their experiences in the music industry. Under such aegis, Drummond and Cauty enjoyed a long-running approval and reverence from the music press for their combination of wayward promotional tactics, depthful media critique, and humorous, innovative and influential dance music.
Their final act as The KLF, deleting the back-catalogue that had made them rich was only the first indication of their growing disgust with what they had themselves contributed to the popular culture. The ultimate act, that of burning a million pounds of the profits they had made, would come reputation as a writer of wide-ranging experience and talents.
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