Age of Chance

They were contemporaries of Pop Will Eat Itself, whose music also featured rock guitar, dance beats and copious samples, and other early UK samplist groups such as Coldcut and The JAMMs.

Age of Chance first came to national attention in 1985, when their debut single, "Motorcity/ Everlasting Yeah" released on their own label, Riot Bible, was picked up and championed by BBC Radio 1 DJ, John Peel.

They released their second self-funded single, "Bible of the Beats" / "Liquid Jungle" in January 1986, which led to an invitation to contribute a track, "From Now On, This Will Be Your God" on the NME C86 compilation tape.

A second Peel session was recorded in June 1986, with "Be Fast, Be Clean, Be Cheap", "From Now On, This Will be Your God", "Kiss" and "How the West was Won".

The band then signed to the Sheffield independent record label, Fon, for "Kiss" and its remix 12"s and six track mini-LP Crush Collision.

They recorded a Janice Long session comprising "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Noise", "Hold On" and "Bible of the Motorcity Beats."

A strong visual identity was developed by the band, from their clothes (notably featuring cycling tops, the idea for which came after seeing a cyclist standing at the bar in The Faversham public house in Leeds) to their cover art.

The sleeve of Don't Get Mad ... Get Even was one of Q Magazine's 100 Best Record Covers of All Time (2001), with the citation describing the collaborations as "Too intricate to rightfully exist in the pre-desktop publishing age, the sleeves were edgy, loaded, with menacing visual manifestos adorned with slogans ... alongside bar codes, cruise missiles and (first woman in space)Valentina Tereshkova's face.

"[9] Designer Ian Anderson recalled that "The way they were presented was very much as a philosophy; it was a punk attitude crossed with disco styling, that asked questions to get a reaction.