Sweet Exorcist

Sweet Exorcist were a British music duo consisting of Richard Barratt, also known as DJ Parrot, and Richard H. Kirk. They were among the flagship bleep techno acts on Warp Records in the late 1980s. Sweet Exorcist, which was named after a Curtis Mayfield track, was the project of Sheffield-based musicians Richard H. Kirk (Cabaret Voltaire) and Richard ‘DJ Parrot’ Barratt (later a member of All Seeing I). Kirk and Barratt knew each other since the mid-1980s. Barratt had already supported a Cabaret Voltaire tour of the UK in 1986. By 1989, Cabaret Voltaire had wrapped up a contract with EMI and had effectively stopped working together. Kirk passed the time by going to clubs and working in the studio with Barratt, who at the time was running Sheffield's main club night, Jive Turkey. After both worked on several tracks together, Barratt suggested making a club track with studio test tones. In January 1990, the tracks were released as "Testone" on Warp. It defined the bleep techno sound, by making playful use of sampled sounds from Yellow Magic Orchestra's Computer Game (1978) and the film Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977). The next release was "Clonk", also on Warp. For both singles, remix versions were released. In 1991, the duo released an album, entitled C.C.E.P on vinyl and C.C.C.D on CD, it was the first album released by Warp Records. The band followed this up with the album Spirit Guide to Low Tech on Touch Records, released in 1994. 2011 saw the release of the compilation album RetroActivity on Warp containing remixes for both singles as well as the tracks such as "Clonk" and "Clonks Coming." 1991: C.C.C.D. (Warp) 1994: Spirit Guide to Low Tech (Touch Records) 2011: RetroActivity (compilation album; Warp). 1990: "Testone" (Warp) 1990: "Testone Remixes" (Warp) 1990: "Clonk" (Warp) 1990: "Per Clonk (Remix)" (Warp) 1991: "Popcone" (Plastex) Interview Sweet Exorcist/Richard H. Kirk: This Used To Be The Future, themilkfactory.co.uk, 2011, retrieved 23 February 2014 Savage, Jon (20 July 1993). "Machine Soul: A History of Techno". Rock & Roll Quarterly. 38 (29). New York, NY: The Village Voice: 20. ISSN 0042-6180. Dan Sicko, Bill Brewster: Techno Rebels: The Renegades of Electronic Funk. Wayne State University, 2010, ISBN 978-0814334386 Stubbs, David (5 November 2011). "Warp Records: Richard H Kirk looks back on a futuristic life". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 23 May 2026. Sweet Exorcist: RetroActivity (Warp Records), themilkfactory.co.uk, 2011, retrieved 23 February 2014 Sweet Exorcist discography at Discogs Sweet Exorcist at AllMusic Sweet Exorcist discography at MusicBrainz