This has all the right ingredients to appeal to me in the sense that they were compared, in their day, to bands such as ACR and Talking Heads.
And yet, when I listen to this 21 track career retrospective I feel like something is missing and I can't put my finger on it? Are there just too many tracks for my tiny mind to input and output in review form? Are there not enough tracks that catch my attention? Is there something not quite right about the tracks?
The first piece of vinyl constitutes the seven track 'The Glitterhouse' album, originally released on Cherry Red in 1981. It kicks off with the single 'Hungry, So Angry' and you think to yourself, I'll have some of that but then the law of diminishing returns kicks in. A number of the remaining tracks seem over long in the sense that they seem to create a nice tension but there is no payoff?
It is a bit like a long sentence with no full stop and no new sentence to follow it. 'That Haiku' being a case in point as it seems to lack the distilled essence of its poetic counterpart. The second vinyl would appear to be made up of tracks cherry picked from Cherry Red's 2001 retrospective and some other b-side sundries. There are actually stronger tracks here. 'Nasdat Dream', 'Them Or Me', in fact the whole of side C. They are concise pop songs and this may help.
|
The Adrian Sherwood mix of 'So Hungry, So Angry' that begins side D does little more than add four seconds to the original. The rest of the tracks on this side aren't too bad but again they seem to drag a bit and are longer on the whole. The final vinyl is a 12" with three tracks culled from a previously unreleased 2008 recording session. They make for an interesting comparison, particularly as the vocals sound completely different but it could well be a different singer altogether?
On the whole I would say this release is a mixed bag and perhaps the best material is already available on the Cherry Red retrospective but it certainly covers all the major career points of this intriguing cult band.
|
