The Utah Saints are Tim Garbutt and Jez Willis, a
techno duo from the
UK (specifically,
Leeds) that achieved a bit of success in the early 1990's with the single "What Can You Do For Me?" which sampled
The Eurythmics' "There Must Be An Angel Playing With My Heart". They experienced similar success with the track "Something Good", which included a potent
Kate Bush sample from her song, "Cloudbusting". They released a self-titled debut album that bound high energy dance music to rock and roll sensibilities. They produced a varied and interesting freshman release that evoked
Motorhead on the one hand, and
Philip Glass on the other. Interestingly enough, the whole of the album was produced digitally, using no tape whatsoever. This seems like little great achievement today, but keep in mind that Utah Saints was produced in 1991. The Utah Saints had a major role in the early development of techno and rave music, standing apart from bands like
Bizarre, Inc. and
N-Joi, and producing new, innovative music. They can count
the KLF,
Moby,
Fluke and
The Shamen as their contemporaries.
The Utah Saints didn't intentionally name themselves to evoke feelings of the
Mormons, rather, they were fond of a quote from the
Coen Brothers movie
Raising Arizona:
"maybe it was Utah"
Not quite sure as to where the Saints bit came from.
BTW,
Michael Stipe of
REM is a known and professed fan of the band.
They have since released the Something Good EP, and the full-length album
Two was released in October, 2000.
Two features tracks co-written by Michael Stipe, and contains samples from
The Pretenders and
Iggy Pop.
Paul Oakenfold has raved about this album and the group's performance.
And yes, they remixed the
Mortal Kombat theme, and are having been working as DJ's, musicians, and remixers ever since.