Written by:

Mark E. Smith, Craig Scanlon

Initial release:

Shiftwork, Cog Sinister/Fontana 848.594-1 LP; 848.594-4 Cassette; 848.594-2 CD

Date:

15 April 1991

Subsequent releases:

Shiftwork, Cog Sinister/Voiceprint COGVP134 CD; 23 September 2002
Shiftwork (coupled with Code Selfish), Cog Sinister/Voiceprint VP241005CD; 22 September 2003
The War Against Intelligence – The Fontana Years, Universal Music 0770002;
20 October 2003
Shiftwork, Fontana/Mercury 9847464 CD; 7 May 2007
The Fontana Years, Fontana CD574265/; August 2017; box set contains Shift-Work extended CD)

Officially released live versions:

Nottingham 92, Cog Sinister/Voiceprint COGVP110CD; November 1998 (recorded at Trent Polytechnic, Nottingham, 15 March 1992)

Radio Sessions:

The Complete Peel Sessions 1978 – 2004, Castle/Sanctuary CMXBX982; 25 April 2005 (recorded 5 March 1991,broadcast 23 March 1991)
The Fontana Years, Fontana CD574265/; August 2017; details as above)

Group on initial release:

Mark E Smith – vocals; Craig Scanlon – guitar; Steve Hanley – bass; Simon Wolstencroft – drums, keyboards; Kenny Brady – fiddle (plus Cassell Webb on backing vocals)

Commentary:

Simon Ford wrote in Hip Priest: “The main theme of the album [Shift-Work] was captured in ‘The War Against Intelligence’ (the original title for the album until the Gulf War started and Smith decided to change the title to something less controversial).”

‘There is a war of intelligence going on at the moment…intelligence is actively discouraged in all walks of life, the media and all of it.” (MES in an interview with Roger Morton: “Time and a Half, Gentlemen, Please”, NME; 20 April 1991)

As pointed out by Daryl Easlea in the booklet accompanying the Peel sessions box set, Kenny Brady’s fiddle is more prominent in the mix than on the album version.

MES says “plagiarists” with a hard and not a soft g as the word is normally pronounced. Performances of the song differered little, either musically or lyrically, from the studio version.

The track reached no.35 in John Peel’s Festive Fifty in 1991.