Geff Rushton

^{May 1982}
CA's godfather I suppose. Our manager perhaps? He arranged all the contacts that allowed for our albums to get produced. At the time Geff was a member of the local band A House, and also had his own solo project - Murderwerkers

Later known as John Balance. Along with Tom Craig he edited the fanzine Stabmental, which featured a couple of articles on Cultural Amnesia.

Geff is the one at the back of the photo, Tom in front.

Jhonn Balance (Geoffrey Rushton)
16 February 62 - 13 November 04

Jhonn/Geoff has died after a fall at home. We reproduce our submission to the book of condolence...

We are very saddened to hear the news about Geoff. We knew him first when he was 17 or 18 and editing the magazine Stabmental, one of the most notable zines covering early industrial and post-punk at the height of the cassette scene and of a now rather distant material culture of tape, vinyl, mailart, typewriters and photocopying. It was he who first introduced us to this exciting new world.

When, with his encouragement, we started making music, Geoff was enormously generous and supportive of us, providing contacts for cassette companies, telling us who was looking out for material for compilations, donating a number of songs and recording with us on one or two occasions. He released and designed the packaging for one of our tapes himself, wrote blurbs for us, featured us heavily on his Endzeit compilation and generally spurred us on in our mini-career. Perhaps we ill-repaid his efforts by fizzling out as we did.

We had little contact with him after the early 80s, but our experience is one small example from early on of the generosity and support for others, and eagerness for collaboration with those he felt were doing, or could do, something worthwhile, that marked his life throughout. It is inseparable from the body of music that he leaves behind, and together they have made him a very significant person in experimental music since the late 1970s.

* * *

SeaSong, from 2004, is dedicated to Geff.