The Three Johns

Formed in 1982 as a side project by Mekons co-founder Jon Langford, the Three Johns originally consisted of Langford together with John Hyatt, Phillip "John" Brennan, and a drum machine. The group specialized in abrasive, politically charged, danceable rock that bore almost no resemblance to Langford’s primary band. Instead, the Three Johns operated as a silly-serious collective of political and cultural provocateurs. Working at the peak of Margaret Thatcher’s ill-conceived Tory rebellion, the band openly opposed this fresh conservative image of Britain’s future. Their elliptical and epigrammatic lyrics avoided straightforward sloganeering, yet scattered clues throughout the songs made their left-leaning stance unmistakable. Rather than typical rock agit-prop, the Three Johns delivered an accessible strain of polemical post-punk anti-pop built around big, messy arena-rock-sounding guitars and hard, repetitive, quasi-hip-hop dance beats. What proved most subversive was that, even with Langford’s and Hyatt’s goofy vocals, the band functioned in its own peculiar manner as pure pop for now people, particularly those opposed to Thatcher. With tongues planted firmly in cheek, the Three Johns addressed British and American materialism, the diabolical Reagan-Thatcher lovefest, and the inner workings of the pop music industry, blending sharp humor with genuine fear and horror. Often difficult to categorize, the group took pleasure in remaining slippery while expressing both affection and contempt for pop music. In certain ways they recalled their friends and fellow Leeds, England residents the Gang of Four, yet where that band came across as dour and serious, bordering on academic, the Three Johns were loutish and boisterous—an ultimately effective mix when pairing politics with rock & roll. Following the 1990 release of Eat Your Sons, Jon Langford devoted himself entirely to the Mekons, placing the Three Johns on what has remained an indefinite sabbatical.