SIOUXSIE &

THE BANSHEES
SISTERS
OF MERCY
& THE GORY YEARS OF GOTHIC ROCK 1976-1992 RIP

Bauhaus

All About Eve

Southern Death Cult

Cocteau Twins

Joy Division

The Mission

Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds

THE CURE
VOLUME 1 ISSUE 17 us $10.95 uk 5.99 PRINTED IN THE UK

07

70992 30039

Fields Of The Nephilim

The Creatures

The Birthday Party

The Best Of

OUT NOW
19 songs including Tainted Love, Disposable Teens, mOBSCENE,
The Beautiful People, Personal Jesus & two bonus tracks
Special CD/DVD set available featuring
20 videos including the (s)AINT exclusive

www.marilynmanson.com

Contents
Chapter 1 1976-79
9-20

Chapter 2 1980
21-32

Chapter 3 1981
33-40

Chapter 4 1982
41-54

Chapter 5 1983
55-68

Chapter 6 1984
69-76

Chapter 7 1985
77-90

Chapter 8 1986
91-98

Chapter 9 1987
99-114

Chapter 10 1988
Chapter 11 1989
125-134

Chapter 12 1990-92
135-145

COVER SHOT: STEVE DOUBLE. THIS PAGE: DEREK RIDGERS

115-124

Editors Letter

The children of the

night, what sweet
music they make

Count Dracula

hile research was underway

on this edition of NME
Originals, the estimable
DJ and cool music
connoisseur Mr Sean
Rowley was busy compiling an album
called Guilty Pleasures full of songs
generally considered naff. The phenomenal
response to Mr Rowleys project
celebrities and fans alike swamping
his radio shows with calls confessing
previously hidden affections for the likes of
Barry Manilow and Boston begged only
one question: where was all the Goth?!
If the experience of creating NME
Originals: Goth has taught me anything its
that, although we seldom dare mention its
name, theres a little bit of Goth in all of us.
Cranking up the soundtrack to the months
of research the Sisters This Corrosion,
Siouxsies Happy House and, of course,
the Bauhaus classic Bela Lugosis Dead
booming off the CD in our tiny ofce
caused many a passer-by to stop at the
doorway and sheepishly grin, Fuck me,
I havent heard that in ages. You aint got
a copy of Dawnrazor have you?
Why, of all musical genres, Goth should
be among the last to be rehabilitated by
history probably has something to do with
the fact that it is a determinedly adolescent
pleasure. Goth makes all the sense its
ever going to make almost exclusively in
those teenage years when you suddenly
realise that everything youre being taught,
everything youre being groomed for,
everything about everything, in fact, is
an utter waste of time and effort because

NME ORIGINALS

were all going to die. Goth wallows in this

eternally darkest of jokes and provides
a suitably doom-laden soundtrack to
this monumental morbidity. As we grow
older and closer to the inevitable, we
understandably tend to ll our time with
stuff to avoid such thoughts and slough
off Goth as a ridiculous phase we grew
through. Well, that and the fact that if
youre still wearing the widows weeds and
bogbrush hair as you exit your thirties,
youre either a treasured rich eccentric like
Robert Smith or you tend to look like some
sad kind of escapee from the nuthouse.
That said, like most things rooted in our
adolescence, we are ercely protective of its
memory. Hence the incredible arguments
that ensued over the compilation of the
volume youre now reading. There was
no dissent over the roots of Goth. The
rst usage of the term referred to a tribe
of ancient Germans that the civilised
Romans regarded as barbaric. Later the
term was applied to a particularly brutish
form of medieval architecture. And then,
in the early 1980s, it was used by music
critics to describe the emerging black-clad
movement of bands and their fans who,
out of the ashes of punk, were determined
to revel in the misery of human mortality.
So far so good. But when it came to
actually deciding who was Goth enough
to feature in this magazine and who was
merely Peripheral Goth, all hell broke
loose. Numerous phone calls ended with
colleagues or acquaintances (ex-Goths
all) vowing not to buy the issue if Echo &
The Bunnymen were in it or if Sex Gang

Children werent. Killing Joke? Some

said yea and some nay. Psychedelic Furs?
Mostly nay. And so on it raged until it was
decided, for sanity and spaces sake, to deal
with the species that I guess we might term
Stadium Goth. In other words, the big,
inuential bands that, for better or worse,
have inuence on and can claim some
responsibility for all of todays dark stuff,
from Marilyn Manson through Mortis to
Dashboard Confessional.
So, a quick apology to those faithful few
who hung around the Batcave and to those
wholl throw a hissy t because Virgin
Prunes, Danse Society or Red Lorry Yellow
Lorry just didnt make the cut. And a big
welcome to the rest of you. Goth, it seems
to me, is in the ascendancy just now. The
Cure are being honoured by MTV and
name-dropped by The Strokes et al, while
Interpol are reinventing Joy Division for
a new generation. Gloom is back big time.
So time to climb out of the closet. Buy this
issue go on, you know you want to! wrap
it inside your copy of NME if you must,
hurry it home, dim the lights, spark up the
candles and, as the great Nick Cave once so
gruesomely hollered, release the bats!

Steve Sutherland
Editor

MIKE MORTON

NME ORIGINALS

NME ORIGINALS

NME ORIGINALS

three imaginary boys

THE LEGENDARY 1979 DEBUT ALBUM

2 CD DELUXE EDITION

2 CD SET COMPILED BY ROBERT SMITH

Digitally Remastered from the Original Master Tapes
Features 6 previously unreleased songs and 17 tracks on CD for the very first time
Deluxe package contains a 16 page booklet including sleevenotes with rare and
previously unseen photographs
982 182-8

Chapter 1

DEREK RIDGERS

1976-79

Bromley Contingent

Siouxsie &
The Banshees
100 Club, London

ts never the same at a Pistols

gig nowadays (in London,
anyway) if what is known as
the Bromley Contingent isnt there.
This inseparable unit is Steve (21),
Bill (22) and Simon (19) he sells hot
dogs off a mobile stand during the
day raspberry-haired Debbie and
Suzi [sic], of Suzi & The Banshees.
They rst heard the Pistols at their
local tech in January and theyve
been faithful followers ever since.
They made the trip to Paris, in a
ropey old car, to see their heroes rst
overseas performance, and Siouxsie,
shocking in her semi-nudity, got
punched on the nose.
She is nothing if not m agnicent.
Her short hair, which she sweeps in
great waves over her head, is streaked
with red, like ames. Shell wear
black plastic non-existent bras, one
mesh and one rubber stocking, and
suspender belts (various colours),
all covered by a polka-dotted,
transparent plastic mac.
Over the weeks the Bromley
Contingents parade of inventive
dress (its rarely the same two weeks
running) has set the fashion pace of
the scene. It was only a matter of time
before they took their street theatre
to the stage.

Apart from Suzi, it wasnt

decided who would actually end
up doing the 100 Club festival until
the day. Everyone thought though
that theyd carry out their muchadvertised plan to sing Goldnger.
It was not to be. At the last
moment, in an orgy of rock
iconoclasm, they decided on The
Lords Prayer spiced with the most
ridiculous rock songs ever written.
Two-tone Steve (his hair is black
on top, white at the sides) was on the
bass he picked up for the rst time

Deliver us from
evil: Siouxsie, Steve
Havoc, Marco Pirroni
and Sid Vicious at
the 100 Club

had one rehearsal. And a mature gent

called Marco was the lead guitarist.
The prayer begins. Its a wild
improvisation, a bizarre stage fantasy
acted out for real. The sound is what
youd expect from, er, novices.
But Sid, with miraculous
command, starts his minimal thud
and the beat doesnt uctuate from

The Lords Prayer begins. Its wild

a bizarre stage fantasy acted out for real
the night before. Sid Vicious, Johnny
Rottens friend and inventor of the
pogo dance, was on drums. He has

Too many Jews for

my liking, sang
Sioux. Ironically,
of course

the start to the nish of the, er, set.

Against this knobbly sound, Siouxsie,
with the grace of a redeemed ghoul,
ries the senses with an unnerving,
screeching recital of Twist And
Shout and Knocking On Heavens
Door. Sids smile ickers. Marco,
his guitar feeding back, rolls up his
sleeves, and two-tone Steve twotones.
The audience, enjoying the bands
nerve and audacity, eggs them on,
gets bored, has a laugh, and then

wonders how much more it can take.

Twenty minutes later, on the nod
from Marco, Sid just stops.
The enthusiastic cheering is
just recognition of their success.
If the punk rock scene has anything
to offer then its the opportunity
for anyone who wants to get up
and experience the reality of their
wildest, stage-struck dreams. The
bar-ies are horried.
God, it was awful, says Howard
Thompson, an A&R man from Island.
But Suzi is not interested in contracts.
The ending was a mistake, she
says. I thought wed go on until they
pulled us off.

NME, 29 October 1977, p3

RAY STEVENSON/RETNA/REX FEATURES

MM, 29 October 1977, p17

MM, 2 October 1976, p26

10

NME ORIGINALS

This is Siouxsie
& The Banshees.
They are
patient.
They will win.
In the end.
A World Domination By 1984 Special
by Paul Morley
NME, 14 January 1978, p7

DEREK RIDGERS, ADRIAN BOOT/URBANIMAGE.TV

iouxsie is the frail-faced, tough-minded,

strange-light-in-her-eyes voice/
performer of Siouxsie & The Banshees.
When she was a little girl I was
very lonely. The few friends I had were gypsies.
When I was eight I tried to commit suicide to get
noticed by my parents. I used to do things like
fall on the oor upstairs so that theyd think Id
fallen downstairs, and Id have bottles of pills in
my hands. Ive always felt on the outside, really.
She, like the rest of the group, admits to being
a loner. They dont really like people. Their
reason for existing is to perform noise with
meaning for people to share and benet from.
They could be the last rock group. The only
rock group. They are not a rock group.
They are twentieth century performers.
Friday night at The Nashville. An
incongruously traditional venue, it would
seem, for the Banshees. Isnt anywhere? It
is an occasion. Names/faces are scattered,
perhaps admiring the path of individualism.
Wayne County, Billy Idol, Marianne Faithfull,
Jordan and on. It is a sell-out. People straggle
outside, hoping for admission. Some, absurdly,
produce ve pound notes in vain attempts at
bribing the doorman. What is this?

Calm down and reect on a

bewildering reputation. Its now
15 months since the Banshees,
in a spirited, impulsive shot of
audience participation, went
on stage at the 100 Club and
set their unique, shocking,
honest precedent. Thats a dark,
distant past, perhaps the only
period that the Banshees have
actually felt that they belonged
to something. A movement
that pressed self-destruct
early on, a movement whose
successful ones were, with odd

looking different, dancing

around, on drums, PP
Barnum on guitar. They were
unformulated, but intense.
From there, the growth has
been subdued and careful,
PP Barnum left (hes now
formed Heroes); Martin
was brought in. The group,
as would be expected, have
touched controversy. Theres
been a farcical fracas with the
police, resulting in a 20 ne
for Siouxsie, and the infamous
spraying incident, Sign
Siouxsie & The Banshees.
No record deal, except the
occasional futile one-off, and its only in
the last few months that they gelled as a
considered, permanent group. And now?
Their development has happened away
from the subcultural acceleration. There is no
rush. They are patient.
Now were starting to do interviews, weve
just begun to understand what were doing,
whereas before without doing interviews we
never really thought about motives.

When I was eight I tried to commit

suicide to get noticed by my parents
exceptions, the shrewdest, the most adaptable
to the business, as opposed to the most creative,
challenging and committed.
In March/April of 77 a new Banshees
appeared, playing their rst real gig at the Roxy,
with Siouxsie singing, Steve on bass, Kenny

NME ORIGINALS

11

Southern
The
New Trend
DeAth Cult

And yet, despite all this, Siouxsie & The Banshees

nd themselves in an almost enviable position.
Siouxsie is, according to the NME poll, the
fourteenth most popular female singer in the
world. They hold the house record at the Vortex.
They sold out The Nashville two nights running.
They have made no commitment sacrices, no
compromises, and they feel comfortable that
what theyre saying is necessary.
Things have to go on. Were trying to show
that it does not have to be pop-punk next, it
doesnt have to be the same old rocknroll riffs.
We dont like trends. We formed initially because
we felt we had something of our own to say.
Is it this different way of doing things/saying
things/playing things that has attracted this
curious following? Or is it just hip to like them?
Are they the new trend?
Well, theres the girl thing theres a lot of
people whove latched on to us because of the
because theyve understood things that arent
there like being labelled Nazis many of the
audience dont understand we probably dont
understand ourselves completely.
(Right) Put your
left leg in, your left
leg out: Sioux
invents the punk
hokey-cokey

12

NME ORIGINALS

Whatever the reasons for their popularity, it

exists, and their audience intuitively grasps the
fact that theyre not absorbing run-of-the-mill
music/noise. It is unconventional in form, but no
way inaccessible. Structured noise. Do they view
themselves as musicians?
As non-musicians. Sound innovators. A
comprehensible term? Its making different
sounds with what youve got. We go out of our
way not to be musicians we dont rehearse
till our ngers bleed. We can play rocknroll,
but we ignore it, shove it in a corner. We dont
see ourselves in the same context as rocknroll
groups. Were out on a limb. It is dangerous, but
it excites us, makes it worthwhile.
Visually, Siouxsie is harsh, asexual. She wears
shorts/short skirts for freedom of movement.
She is nicknamed Android by the group.

emotion that comes up, youre not realising it.

Emotion? Passion its just emotion full stop.
Theres no other words. Its just one thing.

If the

emotions of the group have toughened/

owered over the last few months, then so has
their intensity as performers.
Now, we seem to have some sense of
direction. We havent just gone out and done
every gig that weve been offered. The best things
are those when you go down really badly but
you know youve done a good set we dont
really need audience approval were putting
on a show for ourselves and if anyone wants to
take something from it its up to them. Were
not going to impose anything on anyone. Its
entertainment for some people but its not
mainstream entertainment.

Siouxsie is harsh, asexual. She wears short skirts for

freedom of movement. She is nicknamed Android
Her make-up, which eerily transforms her
nervous, wistful, pale face into the hard-lined
clown-tragedian, is the one concession to the
audience. Her voice is staggered. No orthodox
uid melodies, but clipped, forced lines, sharply
falling and rising.
She displays no exhaustion,
exhilaration, amusement,
frustration or any of those
other colourful sideshows
that performers often nd in
themselves. In the early days there
was little nervousness when she
got on stage. Now, she gets
very nervous.
Maybe its because
theres a lot more emotion
put into what were doing
now when you just get
up there like we used to, the

The Banshees words are of a strange

language, derived from experience and
observation, chilling vignettes of minor
atrocities and gruesome indulgences, of
frustration, of unrequited love. From the dark
side of life, grinning, perverted, subversive;
euphoria and depression, vision and
pessimism mysteriously co-exist. The truth
in ugliness. Striving to manufacture
some semblance of order, or
purposefulness, set against the
absurdity and pointlessness of life.
Their realism is vital, snatches of
everyday life exaggerated for effect:
People live in a dreamworld.

Their abrasive

, uncompromising
language, and the way that its
presented, is not of the type that is
liable to entice record companies to
propose lucrative deals. The group
realises this is important.
We want to become successful because
it would mean that people are confronting
what were putting down on vinyl and
paper but if we are, wed probably be
successful for the wrong reasons.
Every day theres a problem about
having to compromise everyday theres
a reporter wanting to interview just
Siouxsie, getting across that its a backing
band for Siouxsie. Its not that at all. Its
a four-piece band. In the end you have to
explain yourself in the most basic, moronic
way and that takes something away. Record
companies arent there to help a band
progress, thats bullshit. That theyre to make
money for themselves. They dont care if a
band falls by the wayside as long as theyve
made enough money out of them. We want
commitments from a record company so
that we can do what we want to do.
Well win in the end. If we dont let
people get the better of us, inuence us,
like the establishment.
As long as we can resist I think
well win in the end.

ADRIAN BOOT/DAVID MUSCROFT

For a group who leave such a huge question

mark after their work, it is hard for the Banshees
to take being so readily wrapped and dismissed
in the rock press, often as either oh-a-girl, thefuture-is-female. Great. Next or ooh-Nazismnasty-destroy. Next.
They had indeed been misinterpreted, though
admittedly, as regards Nazism, as a result of
their lack of forethought. They wore swastikas.
There were stiff-armed salutes. Their lushly
subversive, brutally sensual words and the
rhythmic/anthemic noise they create to form an
undoubted Teutonic heaviness didnt help.
But always with any sort of politics, which is
why we havent got any, you get extremists, and
once you get extremists you get people doing
great things and terrible things for every
following of some sort you get followers who
distort things.

(L to r) Siouxsie,
John McKay,
Kenny Morris and
Steve Severin

NME, 18 November 1978, p45

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
The Scream

RETNA

(Polydor)

Good-day, second-class of 78!

And now, for the last goddam
time in my life I ask you, who
wants to be David Bowie when they
graduate? Hands up! Siouxsie ah,
Siouxsie, come up the front here
and show the boys and girls how it
should be done.
One: must be
skinny, wear a mass
of make-up and look
asexual enough to
accommodate every
closets ambivalent
fantasies. Two: blind
the critics with words
and silence and all but
a few ungrateful hack swine
will lick your soles for the privilege
of an interview from you. Three:
irt with the all-time contraband
coquette that is Fascism, and it will
still get that ridiculously uncool yet
controversial minority going. Four:
get out of your depth.
Things I like about Siouxsie:
Hong Kong Garden; the way she
treats her audience like muck,
knowing why the gross majority of
them come to gape at her; I even
kind of liked the way she danced on
Top Of The Pops.
Fact: until recently, Siouxsie & The
Banshees included in their stage set

a song called Love In A Void. This

song featured the line Too many
Jews for my liking.
This, says Siouxsie,
was a metaphor
for too many fat
businessmen waiting
to pounce, suck the
youth from and cast
aside new talent.
I do not see the
connection. I consider
this to be the most
disgusting and unforgivable lyric
ever written. Siouxsie is well into
her twenties, so ignorant youth is
no excuse. Therefore she must be
either evil or retarded.
I am disgusted by the way
Jewish writers (Viv Goldman) and
otherwise extremely moral writers
(Chris Brazier) have drooled over the
silly cow, letting her get away with
that line. Well, take your shocking
song and stick it up your rude white
ass, Sioux, because heres a review
that dont believe in running with
the pack.
Oh daddy please, pretty please,

wont you beat up that nasty girl

and make her fade away? She hurts
my ears and she bores me and the
only reason she hasnt been written
off yet as a corny art-rock act is
that she once used to hang around
some, ah, punk band.
Standing alone, the Banshee
sound is a self-important threshing
machine thrashing all stringed
instruments down onto the same

jigsaw pieces tra la la) with

unpleasant but truthful sociology
topics (going mental, selfmutilation, Fascism, cancer):
subjects which have only been
dealt with in any number by punk.
I quite enjoyed singing along
to Helter Skelter (the least awful
effort here, and even that was
written elsewhere), and Carcass
got me a bit jittery until I saw the
joke, giggled and yawned. The rest
(barely) struck me as endless plain
noise totally bereft of melody.
Her words for Switch and
Nicotine Stain (she should write
more lyrics alone) contain a certain
germ, which is rendered totally
ineffectual via drone, pretension
and conceit. Her words for the
stunning Suburban Relapse are
awed only in the tune that John
McKay sets it to and, naturally, by

She must be either evil or retarded. Stick

your shocking song up your ass, Siouxsie
low level alongside that draggy
sub-voice as it attempts futile
swoops around the mono-beat.
Their sound is certainly different
from the normal guitar-bassdrums-voice set-up. But its radically
stodgy, as opposed to that lightfantastic Public Image trip. Its loud,
heavy and levelling, the sound of
suet pudding.
The Banshees unite sub-glam
owering poesie (Amorphous

the singularly awful Banshee sound.

Ah well, kid, hear it for yourself
and examine your subconscious.
Maybe youll love it. Me, I keep
seeing Siouxsie up there in her
swastika armband making nothing
but a fashion accessory out of the
death of millions of people.
And I honestly dont think that a
rilly sensitive person like myself can
ever see beyond that.
Julie Burchill
NME ORIGINALS

13

Where Will It End?

NME, 12 May 1979, p43

THE CURE
Three Imaginary Boys
(Fiction)

14

NME ORIGINALS

NME, 16 December 1978, p16

Aint No Blues For

The Summertime Cure
R

obert Smith, teenage lynchpin of The

Cure, plays a Woolworths Top Twenty
guitar that set the lad back precisely 20.
Hands up those of you who still reckon you
need expensive instruments to play rocknroll?
An abrasive Light Metal trio hailing from
Crawley, a far-ung southern outpost of
Londons commuter hinterland, The Cure are
like a breath of fresh suburban air on the capitals
smog-ridden pub and club circuit.
Compact and self-sufcient guitarist
Smith balances the groups sound live himself
aided by a portable mixing desk at the side of
the stage The Cure are a triumph of impulse
and spontaneity. As Smith explains, We see so
many of the people we went to school with doing
absolutely nothing. A lot of them are talented
enough to, but they just dont bother themselves.
There are so many people playing music that
is absolute rubbish and getting somewhere doing
it. You just think, if theyre doing it, why dont
you, when you know youre so much better?
Smith formed the band at school with
drummer Lol Tolhurst and bassist Mike
Dempsey as long ago as 1976. They spent most of
last year in limbo,
unhappily signed to
German disco label
Ariola-Hansa and
recording demos
with unsympathetic
producers, but never
actually getting that elusive rst single release.
We thought wed be able to do all these
outrageous songs wed written, but all they
wanted were really banal old rocknroll songs.
Then they gave us the money to do our own
demos. And of course they didnt like them. So
they tried putting us in the studio with one of
their soul producers, and that didnt work out

The Cure: (l to r)
Robert Smith, Lol
Tolhurst and
Mike Dempsey

either. It got to the stage where we would have

become the Barron Knights of punk
With their ve-year Ariola-Hansa contract
terminated, The Cure, master tapes tucked
rmly under their armpits, went back to gigging
at local venues until an old friend lent them the
cash to cut some last-ditch demos.
A dozen copies of the resultant tape were
mailed out to record companies. A week or so
later, young Rob received a call from former
Polydor A&R man and Jam producer Chris
Parry, with whom they have nally recorded a
single, Killing An Arab. The title comes from
The Stranger, a
book by Camus
about an Algerian
uprising.
Its not racist, if
you know what the
song is about, says
Rob. It just happened that the main character
in the book had killed an Arab, but it could have
been a Scandinavian or an English bloke.
With a John Peel session and more extensive
London gigging on their immediate agenda, it
remains to be seen whether or not The Cure can
retain their refreshing joie de vivre.
Adrian Thrills

We could have been the

Barron Knights of punk

JILL FURMANOVSKY/JUSTIN THOMAS/KEVIN CUMMINS/IDOLS

Aaah! More alert and

anguished young
men. Do not applaud
them. This glistening
long-player contains
variations upon the
smoothly quirky
theme that brought
the world the
pleasurable Killing
An Arab. Over a whole album that pretty
bending and doodling does a lot less than
please, and a lot more than grate.
But The Cure are not just making pop music.
They are trying to tell us something. They are
trying to tell us they do not exist. They are
trying to say that everything is empty. They
are represented on the ice-cream colour cover
by three bulky, ageing household gadgets. Lol
Tolhurst (drums) is a fridge. Michael Dempsey
(bass, voice) is an upright Hoover. Robert Smith
(guitar, voice) is a standard lamp. Each song is
represented on the back sleeve by a picture and
on the label by a symbol.
All this charming, childish ddling about
aims for the anti-image but naturally creates the
perfect malleable image: the tantalising enigma
of The Cure. They try to take everything away
from the purpose and idea of the rock performer
but try so hard they put more in than they take
out. They add to the falseness.
The Cure, really, are trying to sell us
something. Their product is more articial than
most. This is perhaps part of their master plan,
but it seems more like their naivety. The Cure
set themselves up as though they oat along
way outside the realms of anything we can
understand. They are scandalous, fullled aliens,
and they look down on us. What do they see?
Not much thatll shoot your being through
with vigour or sudden understanding, but they
never stop nagging. Willowy songs wallow in
the murk and marsh of tawdry images, inane
realisations, dull epigrams. Sometimes a song is
as pretty as Killing An Arab: Accuracy (a target
over a mans eye) or Fire In Cairo (palm tree in
the desert). But nowhere is there anything truly
adventurous. What The Cure have done here
is the equivalent of an album of Enid Blyton
readings packaged as readings from Angela
Carter. No, its maybe not that awful-good.
Its just that in 1979 people shouldnt be
allowed to get away with things like this.
There are too many who do. Fatigue music. So
transparent. So light and oh, how it nags.
Paul Morley

1978 - 1979
MM, 21 July 1979, p27

JOY DIVISION
Unknown Pleasures
(Factory)

To talk of life today is like talking of

rope in the house of a hanged man.
Where will it end?
The point is so obvious. Its been
made time and time again. At the
time of writing, our
very own mode of
(Western, advanced,
techno) capitalism
is slipping down the
slope to its terminal
phase: critical mass.
One particular and
vigorous product of
capitalisms excess
has been pop music,
not so much because of the forms
intrinsic merit (if any) but because,
for many, bar football, its the only
arena going, in this country at least.
Trying to nd a clue/Trying to
nd a way/ To get out! Unknown
Pleasures is a brave bulletin, a
danceable dream; brilliantly, a
record of place. Of one particular
city, Manchester. And in dening
reaction and adjustment to place
so accurately, it makes the specic
general, the particular a paradigm.
To the centre of the city in the
night/Waiting for you Joy
Divisions spatial, circular themes

and Martin Hannetts

shiny, waking-dream
production gloss are
one perfect reection
of Manchesters dark
spaces and empty
places, endless sodium
lights and hidden semis
seen from a speeding car,
vacant industrial sites the endless
detritus of the 19th century seen
gaping like rotten teeth from an
orange bus, Hulme seen from the
fth oor on a threatening, rainy
day This is not specically to
glamorise: it could be anywhere.
The song titles read as an opaque
manifesto: Disorder, Day Of The
Lords, Candidate, Insight, New
Dawn Fades. Loosely, they restate

and with lightning speed;

unwinding and winding as the rigid
metal music folds and unfolds over
him. Recording demands a different
context: Hannett imposes a colder,
more controlled hysteria songs
merge in and out of one another in a
brittle, metallic atmosphere.
Opener Disorder races briskly,
with ominous organ swirls at the
end, Curtis intones Feeling feeling
feeling in the tones of someone
whos not sure he has any left. Two
slower songs follow, both based on
massively accented drumming and
rumbling bass. Day Of The Lords is
built around a wrenching chorus of
Where will it end? while the even
sparser Candidate eshes out the
bare rhythm section with chance

The albums two aces are Insight and

Shes Lost Control here, finally, Gary
Glitter meets The Velvet Underground
outsider themes: individuals caught
in a trap they dimly perceive anger,
paranoia, alienation, feelings of
thwarted power, and so on. Hardly
pretty, but compulsive.
What gives Joy Division their
edge is the taut danceability
of their faster songs, and the
dreamlike spell of their slower
explorations. Both rely on the
tense, careful counterpoint of
bass (Peter Hook), drums (Stephen
Morris) and guitar (Bernard Dickin);
Ian Curtis expressive, confused
vocals croon deeply over recurring
musical patterns which themselves
mock any idea of escape.
Live, he appears possessed
by demons, dancing spastically

guitar ambience.
The albums two aces are Insight
and Shes Lost Control; here,
nally, Gary Glitter meets the Velvet
Underground. Both rely on rockhard echoed drumming and bass
recorded well up to take the melody
the guitar provides textural icing
and thrust over the top. The formers
attractive, bouncing melody belies
the lyrics: But I dont care any more/
Ive lost the will to want more.
Shes Lost Control, remixed to
emphasise guitar and percussion,

is a possible hit single: its certainly

the obvious track for radio to play.
Deep and dark vocals ride over
an irresistible, circular backing
that threatens to break loose but
never does; the tension ends in a
crescendo of synthesized noise.
Three faster tracks follow
mutated heavy pop, all built
around punishing rhythms and riffs
itd be tempting to call metal, except
control is everywhere. Shadowplay
is a metallic travelogue, with
Curtis eeing internal demons;
Wilderness externalises things
into Lovecraftian fantasy, all
echoed drumming and sickening
guitar slides, while Interzone
moves through a clipped, perfect
introduction to guitar shrills and
murder-mystery mumbles.
Both sides end with tracks New
Dawn Fades and I Remember
Nothing so slow and atmospheric
that alienation becomes a waking
dream upon which nothing
impinges: Me in my own world
Leaving the 20th century is
difcult; most people prefer to go
back and nostalgise. Joy Division at
least set a course in the present with
contrails for the future perhaps
you cant ask for much more.
Indeed, Unknown Pleasures may
very well be one of the best white,
English, debut LPs of the year.
Problems remain: in recording
place so accurately, Joy Division
are vulnerable to any success the
album may bring once the delicate
relationship with environment is
altered, they may never produce
anything as good again.
Perhaps its time we all started
facing the future. Where will it end?
Jon Savage

Facing the future:

Stephen Morris, Ian
Curtis, Bernard Dickin
and Peter Hook

NME ORIGINALS

15

Me In My Own World

et me draw back the curtains on a

winter night last year. A midweek night
of no special signicance, save that Joy
Division had come marching into town.
It wasnt much of a welcome. It wasnt one of
those jam-packed little-league sell-outs where
you cant get in for the length of the guest list
and where breath is bated in anticipation of
something about to turn big. Nothing of the sort.
Down in the basement connes of a celebrated
Islington watering hole it was relaxed and cool.
In front of the stage, though, a gaggle of
a dozen or so modern boys staked out their
territory like there was some sort of conspiracy
afoot. Minions were dispatched to fetch the
pints. The space in front of the stage was
jealously guarded. Their muted green tribal
colours set them apart from the dowdy crowd.
They had come, heaven knows where from,
for Joy Division. Another Manchester Band. The
band that looks dead set to follow Buzzcocks out
of merely local and underground acclaim and
into the wider limelight at least judging by the

Take No
rapturous critical reaction to their rst album,
Unknown Pleasures.

A single

Ian Curtis (left) and

Bernard Albrecht
anxiously await the
Joy Division backlash

16

NME ORIGINALS

overhead spot oods the centre-stage

microphone and spills out onto the heads of the
aforementioned gaggle of sartorial hot-shots.
Heads that start to bob furiously at the rst pulse
of streamlined rhythm, attached to bodies that
lurch back and forth, attached to legs that jerk up
and down at the knees and arms that swing in a
loose crawl or elbows that ap madly.
The spot picks out singer Ian Curtis. The rest
of Joy Division are shrouded in darkness as they
pour out their harsh metal thunder. The singers
body shakes, rocks and palpitates, a mad dervish
caught in that one spotlight.
Were you to shine a torch around this
subterranean scene you would see the young,
tidy faces of Joy Division and notice perhaps the
ordinary, neat cut of their clothes, with the barest
hint of the regimental overtones of their name
in their ap-pocket shirts. You might also notice
the excitement in the faces of the onlookers, all
locking into the irresistible motion of the music.
The strongest new music to emerge this year.
It owes nothing to the after-punk cult of the
amateur. If its pop, thats purely accidental. And
it plays with musical perimeters in ingenious,
never pretentious, ways by building carefully
on their standard rock basis and using sounds
as textures with which to construct a song. Its a
technique that anyone who listens to the radio
these days will be familiar with, from I Feel
Love to Public Image, to give but two examples.
The themes of Joy Divisions music are
sorrowful, painful and sometimes deeply sad.
Its music that gives often harrowing glimpses
of confusion and alienation. Joy Division walk
alone, with their heads bowed.

1979
noisy, unkempt beginnings in 77 to the superb
controlled heat they generate now.
But up until now Joy Division have been
dogged by business problems, stalled by
personal problems, and ignored. They mistrust
the glowing reviews they now get, and wait,
dispassionately, for the backlash.

Being on the outside has made them very insular

(L to r) Bernard
Albrecht, Ian Curtis,
Peter Hook and
Stephen Morris

and possessive about their music. It has also

given them their strength: not a resentful, wellshow-em sort of strength, but the satisfaction
they derive from their music.
All the business side that really fucks you
up, moans Peter. Once you get back in the
rehearsal room and theres just the four of us
with instruments were back where we started.
It still hangs over you like a cloud but once
you get your instrument youre free
Youre always working on the next song, says
Ian. No matter how many songs youve done,
youre always looking for the next one. Basically
we play what we want. Itd be very easy for us to

NME, 11 August 1979, p24

Prisoners, Leave No Clues

Not just another band from Manchester, Joy Divisions Unknown
Pleasures LP puts them at the top of the league. By Paul Rambali
At least, thats my interpretation. Joy Division

PENNIE SMITH

arent giving anybody any clues. They dont agree

with lyric sheets.
You get people who seem to think you should
put your lyrics on so you can get your message
across, says bearded bass player, Peter Hook,
with obvious disdain. Weve said to people,
Havent you ever been listening to a record
where youve been singing a certain line and
when you nd what it really is you feel let down?
But they just wont admit that at all. They still
wanted to know what our lyrics were about.
Dont you think its wrong to pin somebody
down like that? Our lyrics may mean something
completely different to every single individual.
Why not write gibberish then? On a variation
of the monkey-and-typewriter principle itll
mean something to someone sooner or later.
The songs mean something personal to us,
but thats not the point. Its like saying, What did
Max Escher mean when he did that painting?
He points to a giant print of one of Eschers
typical perspective puzzles that hangs on the
wall of Manchesters Central Sound Studio,
where we are now located. He might just say,
I was pissed. We dont want to say anything.
We dont want to inuence people. We dont
want people to know what we think.

Ian, who writes the lyrics, broadly speaking

shares these views. He is off stage the virtual
opposite of what he is on. His speaking voice is

high and faltering, not swarthy and assertive,

and his shyness you would not guess from his
onstage abandon.
Stephen Morris, the drummer who completed
the foursome a few months after Ian joined,
lives, like Ian, in Maccleseld, and owns a huge
record collection, partly inherited from his jazz
enthusiast father: He took me to see Count
Basie once So I took him to see Hawkwind. He
was getting all dressed up and I had to explain
that, no Dad, its not that sort of concert
He bought his rst drum kit by chopping up
the furniture in his house to sell as rewood.
Which leaves only Bernard Albrecht, who
plays guitar, and went to school with Hook. He
is astute and eager to explain himself.
I dont like a lot of music, he admits, but
the music I do like I get more out of than from

say, Well, all these people seem to like such and

such a song itd be easy to knock out another
one. But we dont.
We dont want to get diluted, really, and
by staying at Factory were free to do what we
want. Theres no one restricting us or the music
or even the artwork and promotion. You get
bands that are given huge advances loans
really but what do they spend it on? What is
all that money going to get? Is it going to make
the music any better?
Another good thing about it, says Stephen,
from the heart, is if youve got some sort of
frustration, something eating you, you can get it
out just by playing.
The thing is, if youve got a brain, explains
Peter, obviously you want to do something with
your life, or whatever. Im sure a lot of people feel
like that. Now that weve got this, we dont.
Ian: When I was about 15 or 16 at school, I
used to talk with me mates and wed say, Right.
As soon as we leave well be down in London,
doing something nobody else is doing. Then
I used to work in a factory, and I was happy

You get back to the rehearsal room, and theres just

the four of us. You get your instrument and youre free
anything else in life. I want to put the feeling that
I get out of music back into music as well.
When we started off none of us could play.
But each time we go one step forward and that
draws you on. Its just a really good feeling. I
think thats why a lot of people get disillusioned,
cos, like, the music dries up.
Its relatively easy to trace the stealthy progress
Joy Division have made from their aggressive,

because I could daydream all day. All I had to do

was push this wagon up and down. But I didnt
have to think. I could think about the weekend,
imagine what I was going to spend me money on,
which LP I was going to buy You can live in
your own little world.
Too true. But whichever world you choose to
live in the chances are itll soon coincide with
Joy Divisions. Theyre here to stay.
NME ORIGINALS

17

Trouble At The Top

MM, 1 September 1979, p23

SIOUXSIE & THE BANSHEES

Join Hands
(Polydor)

18

NME ORIGINALS

MM, 15 September 1979, p3

he Siouxsie & The Banshees tour ground

to a halt after only one gig last week when
guitarist John McKay and drummer Kenny
Morris left the group and disappeared after a row
in a record shop.
After the row, which followed a disagreement
over signing autographs and giving away
promotional LPs in the Aberdeen shop on
Friday, the pair went back to their hotel, packed,
arranged their
pillows in their beds
to look as if they
were occupied, and
xed their backstage
passes to the pillows.
Apart from a brief
encounter with their manager, Nils Stevenson,
as they drove away in a taxi, Morris and McKay
have not been seen since.
Their sudden departure means that Siouxsie
and Steve Severin had to pull out of their
Aberdeen show, but after explaining to fans that
the two art students have left, Siouxsie and
Severin joined support band The Cure for a
ten-minute version of The Lords Prayer.
Severin told MM on Monday that while he and

Siouxsie were aware of problems with McKay and

Morris they were given the option of leaving the
group before the tour started they anticipated
the make-or-break aspect of the tour would not
be decided until the dates had nished.
They have just run away, said Siouxsie.
Their actions were a complete cop-out. They
have showed complete apathy. If they wanted
to object to something, or felt they were being
pressured, they
should have shouted
back, or hit me, but
instead they did this.
I consider it is
the worst, the most
cowardly way they
could have behaved. It is the most disgusting
thing they could have done to a band, and worst
of all, their action feels so calculated it wasnt
as if they stormed out in a fury.
The band have cancelled dates this week,
although there is a chance they will have been
able to rehearse with two new members to open
again at Oxfords New Theatre on Friday. Venues
should be checked locally. Tonights Bradford
show has been postponed until 24 September.

They have just run away. Their

actions were a complete cop-out

PAUL SLATTERY

A year ago, the

Banshees had a hit
album, a Top 10 single
(Hong Kong Garden),
the crossover pop
audience and the
punk audience.
Credibility, critical
acclaim and pop
prowess. They even wore their
clothes nicely perfect. Blink and its gone!
There was a weak follow-up, Staircase.
The group doesnt play much; the audience
fragments, as the matrix moves to new areas.
In limbo, the Banshees plump for standbys:
art and mystery. It hurts. Shorn of the bounce
and verve that balanced the odd obscurity of
The Scream, Join Hands is a confusing, in parts
brilliant, in parts awful, faintly musty collection.
Conveniently, almost all the better pieces
are kept on the rst side. Poppy Day, is a short,
powerful evocation of the Great War graveyards
in Flanders. McKays phased guitar scythes out a
barrage of sound while the bass carries the tune.
Regal Zone opens with an urgent urry, muted
slightly by McKays sax: it shifts into an urgent,
insistent claustrophobia.
The two best tracks follow: Placebo Effect has
a stunning anged guitar intro, chasing clinical
lyrics covering some insertion or operation. It
winds down, spaciously, into the apocalyptic
Icon. Siouxsie begins awkwardly, and the band
slip into one of the oldest tricks in the book the
Bo Diddley rhythm and make it their own: the
brilliantly reverbed guitar is a perfect foil for
Siouxsies soaring and, for once, emotional vocal.
The second side begins with the single,
Playground Twist. Siouxsies fascination for the
macabre nds an expression that suits it in a swirl
of child-like disorientation and terror. A great
song. Mother then sets alarm bells ringing: a
short recital by Sioux, childlike, over a music box,
its mawkish rather than evocative.
With The Lords Prayer the alarm bells burst
into a cacophony of sirens. Over 13 minutes,
Siouxsie pulls the wings off the Lords Prayer over
a Banshee boogie which, when it shifts, provides
the only movements of interest. Its not art, not
proper noise: the Banshees arent, respectively,
good enough artists or incompetent enough
musicians. The 100 Club one-liner (and myth),
taken out of context, is made absurd.
At its worst, Join Hands is unforgivably
necrophiliac; at its best, it captures the power
of which the Banshees are capable. Translated
practically, all this means: listen before you buy.
Jon Savage

www.wychwood.co.uk

The legendary Hobgoblin beer is the per fect potion for celebrating All Hallows Eve. Available from
all good supermarkets and of f-licences, its enough to scare the taste buds of f any lagerboy.

Enfants Terribles

MM, 24 June 1978, p23

JOY DIVISION
An Ideal For Living
(Enigma)

Yet more promising new music

from Manchester. Joy Division
were called Warsaw until they
recorded this EP last November,
and it was under that name that
I saw them at the Electric Circus
the month before (theyve made
it on to the new Virgin album
commemorating the Circus last
weekend). This has the familiar
rough-hewn nature of homeproduced records but theyre no
mere drone-vendors there are
a lot of good ideas here, and they
could be a very interesting band
by now, seven months on.
Chris Brazier

If you really think The Banshees

spent the past year in a contractless limbo because their music
was too near the edge, then you
must spend a lot of your time
going round walking into walls.
The Banshees have fans, lots of
them, and no record company
worth its salt would pass up the
chance to sell them records.
And what about releasing
a record themselves? Dont
they know the old mass access
argument hardly applies any
more? But here it is, a brash,
delirious two-chord triumph
that I would never have thought
them capable of, being not in the
least enamoured of their facile
attempts at creating radical music.
Hong Kong Garden, a longtime stage favourite, is a bright,
vivid narrative, something like
snapshots from the window of a
speeding Japanese train, powercharged by the most original,
intoxicating guitar playing Ive
heard in a long, long time.
Would you believe its going
to be played on the radio? Would
you believe Siouxsie on Top Of The
Pops? Would you believe not one
mention of Blondie oops.
Paul Rambali

sprog of some belly-dancer and a

poisonous reptile. Compact bass
guitar motif, descending alone.
Then those vocals taut, terse,
tense intonation, a voice like that
feeling you get watching the faces
on the workaday tube ride after
stepping out at dawn for the third
time without sleep.
Standing on the beach/With
a gun in my hand/Staring at the
sea/Staring at the sand/Staring
down the barrel at the Arab on
the ground/Can see his open
mouth/ But I hear no sound/Im
alive/Im dead/Im the stranger/
Killing an Arab.
And racism has got nothing to
do with it.
Tony Parsons

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Hong Kong Garden
(Polydor)

A lot of people have been waiting

for a long time for this disc, while
punks self-styled enfant terrible
played cat-and-mouse with a
music industry she openly regards
with contempt and disdain.
Siouxsies got a point. The
record companies who decide
what youre going to be able to
buy are often reactionary and
staid and can be accused of
manipulating the populace. But
then she isnt entirely blameless
on that last count herself.

20

NME ORIGINALS

NME, 27 January 1979, p20

THE CURE
Killing An Arab
(Small Wonder)

Apparently based on Alberts

The Outsider and, if so, quite
possibly the straw that broke
Camus back. Cymbals crash once,
twice, three times. A guitar, full of
eerie promises, slithering like the

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Playground Twist
(Polydor)

If Ingmar Bergman produced

records, they might sound like
this. The listener is immediately
engulfed in a maelstrom of
whirling sound punctuated by
the ominous tolling of church
bells, phased guitars, thundering
percussion, a surreal alto sax and
the wail of Siouxsies voice. It
demands to be played repeatedly
at threshold-of-pain volume to
elicit its full nightmarish quality.
Roy Carr

MM, 30 June 1979, p31

THE CURE
NME, 19 August 1978, p19

NME, 30 June 1979, p31

NME, 17 November 1979, p25

JOY DIVISION

Boys Dont Cry

Transmission

(Fiction)

(Factory)

Hum this is something of a

disappointment. On stage Boys
Dont Cry is invariably one of the
high points, but somehow, in its
translation onto vinyl, the goods
virtually gone. The agile interplay
between the three Cure members,
and the reverberating economy
that producer Chris Parry
spotlighted on the debut album,
have been edged out in favour of a
muddy mix and an old-fashioned
hierarchy of instruments. It just
sounds so ORDINARY now. The
ip, Plastic Passion, doesnt
redeem the situation either. A
feeling of disappointment makes
a slim song sound threadbare.
Such a shame.
Ian Birch

Dance, dance, dance to the radio!

A bass guitar slowly stirs and
quivers. A relentless, dipping riff
gathers momentum and sweeps
its way into a spiralling electric
guitar as a distant drummer
pumps out strict Can doublebeats.
This is an awesome disc, scaling
the heights fellow Mancunians
Magazine merely hinted at in
Shot By Both Sides.
Ian Curtis provides regular
Iggy-style grunted vocal
interjections while the simmering
production again the work of
Martin Zero Hannett is crisp
enough to push Transmission
into the chart. With the right
breaks, this could easily be a hit!
Adrian Thrills

Chapter 2

DEREK RIDGERS

1980

The New Pink Floyd?

Joy
Division
University Of London
NME, 16 February 1980, p55

oy Division at the University

of London was a sell-out.
The guest list was huge.
Their impact was substantial.
Seeing Joy Division, if you
are properly tuned, is a jarring
experience. The music keeps
coming, trenchant, serene,
steady, hard, almost an orgiastic
celebration of the fact that Joy
Division have arrived at a noise and
form that is distinctive, instinctive
and immeasurably dynamic. The
introversion and singularity of
the four musicians is tfully held
under control and private music
is forced out into the open. The
tension is startling.
The presentation is as grey and
bland as the noise is volatile and
deeply black singer Ian Curtis
comical trapped-buttery apping
the only real stage movement,
a visual representation of the
struggle inherent in Divisions

22

NME ORIGINALS

music. As Richard Jobson said,

Divisions music is genuinely
violent, and its the violence of
beauty rooted in beastly desire, the
violence of breakdown, inhibition,
failure, fatalism
It could be vanity, it could be
impatience, even nervousness,
but during a Joy Division set,

nightmares, clearly drawn, potent

and personal. But Joy Divisions
dreams are the inescapable places
where we live. Its all suggestion
rather than direction or dogma.
Joy Division sped through
their early songs with intensity
of feeling and concentration.
The group pointedly proved that

Their songs are desperate nightmares,

clearly drawn, potent and personal
outside of the songs, youll be
lucky to hear more than two or
three words. Hello and goodbye.
No introductions, no promotion.
Good or bad? Inside the songs,
careful words settings, situations,
dilemmas, images that are
primitive and anxious. Joy Division
are a powerful act of make-believe,
their songs like desperate bits of

they still work well away from

the mainstream, forging ahead
down the slippery corridor of
experimentation. They played
more new songs than old (they
didnt play Shes Lost Control or
Transmission or Disorder or
name your favourite) and these
new songs give no suggestion of
Division stagnation.

These new songs show that

Divisions music is as natural as
PiLs, not held down by the grey
hands of limitation or expectation.
Joy Division are still coming up
with new ways to alter the shape,
emphasis and texture of their
music. The new songs are as
organised, hostile and spacious
as the last set, but theres allround intensication, further
emphasis on the lead bass and
the active drums, even an overall
simplication.
The songs have extreme, paramelodies, and some have no bass,
some no guitars. Synthesizers
and bass with the drums, or two
guitars. The new single Love Will
Tear Us Apart is one hell of a
classic bass, synth, drums, voice;
Curtis hugging a white guitar up
to his chest but rarely using it.
The songs mobility and uidity
shows how much potential there

KEVIN CUMMINS/IDOLS

Simply the First Division

1980

MM, 14 June 1980, p10

NME, 26 April 1980, p37

THE CURE
Seventeen Seconds
(Fiction)

is in the simple contrasting and

connecting of instruments that
Division use. Its a staggeringly
melodic and momentous piece.
For Isolation they have the
same instrumentation, but its
more withdrawn and estranged;
a song they wrote only days
before that reveals Numan and
Foxx as true fools. The full
introduction of synthesizer has
not damaged the coherence and
balance of the music in any way.
It simply increases the amount of
mood, atmosphere, ephemeral
terror Division are capable
of achieving. The encore is a
condent, compelling, utterly
withdrawn ballad, something

like a dislocated and depraved

improvement upon Bowies
Heroes. So impressive.
Part of Joy Divisions success
is the breadth and certainty of the
reactions they inspire. For this
performance there were three
obvious ones: love, penetration
and stimulation is one all in
itself, and if I wasnt tied down
by language and responsibility I
could attempt to explain. Simple
frustration; that the group didnt
lay out for selsh delectation
their eloquent standards. How
ironical! And old-fashioned
derision. A dissenter behind me,
with a spiteful snort, reckoned Joy
Division are the new Pink Floyd.

Joy Divisions music is

physical and lucid, music about
uncontrollable emotions,
impulses, prejudices, fears. The
group have turned inarticulacy
into concrete impressions of the
deepest, most degenerate desires.
Its simple music, but not
simple-minded; cryptic but not
impenetrable. As Danny Baker
said, Joy Division are due some
sort of backlash, but hes not the
one to do it. If the group had
shown the slightest indication of
slackening I would have attacked.
But they are now better than they
have ever been. Joy Division will
tear you apart. Still.
Paul Morley

For a group as
young as The Cure,
it seems amazing
that they have
covered so much
territory in such a
brief time.
Its impossible
to locate one
continuous
thread linking works as dramatically
opposed as their solemn debut 45 Killing
An Arab, the classic single Boys Dont Cry,
and now the oblique, stilted soundtracks
that populate Seventeen Seconds.
Only one factor remains constant:
Robert Smiths pleading whine of a
voice and (Boys Dont Cry excepted) his
dependence upon keeping up a shield of
often mischievous distance.
After Boys Dont Cry (and its
commercial failure), Smith regrouped with
a keyboard player, one Matthieu Hartley,
taking on many of the textural chores that
Smiths guitar had previously covered.
A brief, pensive keyboard exercise very
much in the mould of Brian Enos Through
Hollow Lands entitled A Reection
opens Seventeen Seconds, setting
the mood. Play For Today builds on its
predecessor: keyboard notes and sombre
electric guitar touches act as a prelude
for an odd, mysterious piece of music
that aims to haunt through extensive
use of a stock pulse-beat overladen with
brush-strokes of guitar, bass and synth,
while Smiths vocals hang limply in the
mix. You either nd yourself drawn into
the landscape created or else you sit there
waiting for a sudden jolt, an acceleration.
This mode of musical arrangement
nds its fullest realisation in the single A
Forest yet the scenario, once created,
soon sounds limp, devoid of any tension
or mystery. Again, one keeps waiting for a
sudden lift-off, yet the song just lies there
twitching occasionally. Its a symptom
throughout Seventeen Seconds.
The album occupies a midway land
where much is insinuated but nothing is
truly delivered. It seems caught in that
very sense of distance that Smith seems
so obsessive about keeping up.
To many, Seventeen Seconds may
seem a valid progression. I however nd
it depressingly regressive. Even so, I await
their next move with great interest.
Nick Kent
NME ORIGINALS

23

Southern DeAth
Something
so good
Cult

Dont Walk Away

In Silence

o why do we get so animated and

enthralled by Joy Division?
Their music is lled with the horror
of the times no cheap shocks, no rocky
horror, no tricks with mirrors, but catastrophic
images of compulsion, contradiction, wonder,
fear. The threatening nature of society hangs
heavy; each song is a mystery, a pursuit. The
music is brutally sensual and melancholically
tender. The songs never avoid loneliness, cruelty,
suffering; they defy these things.
All this isnt out of a love for deep, oppressive
seriousness; were not celebrating doom. Its
more a loathing for mediocrity and hypocrisy
and complacency, the deceptions rock often
seems proud to mould. There can be nothing
so silly as believing that rock is a saviour, and
nothing as outrageous as accepting it as an
articial, attractive network of trash and ash.
Joy Division pushed its possibilities to the limits.
The very best rock music is art, and that is
nothing to be ashamed of. Good rock music
is entertaining and amusing, legitimate and
intelligent, and from week to week, single to
single, upset to upset, it keeps us going. It is
rarely straightforward intelligence and wit that
produces the very best rock music. It is dreams,
naivety, aspirations, intuition, exuberance
there are dreams that shout for a better world
and a deeper understanding. These are the
dreams of the very best rock music.
Joy Division make art. The prejudice that
hangs around the word art puts people off,
makes them think of the untouchable and the
unrealistic. Joy Division put reality into rock.
Yet for all the intensity and violence of their
images, the music never relinquishes a classic
accessibility; rhythm, melody, atmosphere are
awesomely sophisticated.
Joy Division achieve something
unique. Joy Division are not
merely a hip new wave group on
a fashionable independent label.
Oh no!

The month before what were to have been their

rst American gigs, Joy Division completed an
impromptu set of British dates. In keeping with
their aversion to regulation and routine, the gigs
hardly qualied as a tour proper.
The dates took in London venues as diverse
as the Rainbow, where they supported The
Stranglers, to three nights at the Moonlight Club.
Out of town, they went largely unannounced
or were advertised only locally. Though a few
dates were cancelled as Ian Curtis fell ill, it was a
period of intense activity for the group.
The last of the gigs was in the University Of
Birminghams High Hall on Friday, 2 May. It
was also, fatefully, the last public appearance Ian
Curtis made as vocalist in Joy Division.
Four days before the Birmingham gig, a video
was lmed in Manchester for the forthcoming
Love Will Tear Us Apart single. The location
a disused, windswept, Dickensian warehouse
converted into a rehearsal studio seemed the
ideal place for a Joy Division video. But the
bands attitude to proceedings was withdrawn
and disinterested. Even on camera, they seemed
to have little time for such promotional niceties.
Such lethargy could hardly have been further
removed from the mood in the university
dressing room later that week as the band
prepared for the Birmingham gig Joy Division,
despite their reputation as sober individuals,
despite the myth of romanticised gloom, were
earthy and easy-going people.
As Tony Wilson says, To people they seemed
a very gloomy band, but as human beings they
were the absolute opposite. They indulged in
the customary dressing room horseplay and
practical joking, beer-swilling and football talk
Ian Curtis was a Manchester United supporter.

But the earthy offstage demeanours the

blunt, wary Peter Hook; the mischievous Bernie
Albrecht; the quiet, easy-going Stephen Morris
and the shy, fragile, polite Ian Curtis were
transformed the minute they stepped out into
the misty glare of the stage spotlights.
Though a reticent student audience were
sluggish in warming to them, Joy Divisions
power and purity of purpose was immediately
apparent in the undiluted vigour of their music.
Their ultimate live set, characteristically,
made few concessions to rockbiz tradition,
the opening number being an unfamiliar
instrumental built around a revolving drum
motif, one of two new songs already written and
rehearsed in the few weeks since the completion
of the new LP, Closer.
A ripple of cheers greets a feedback-ridden,
faster than usual Shadowplay. But Joy Division
never stooped to easy games, and follow the
familiar song with two choppy, strident ones
from the new album, Means To An End and
Passover. Indeed, it is only with the end of
the slow, mournful New Dawn Fades that Ian
Curtis acknowledged the audience verbally for
the rst time with a curt Hello.
But the crowd, surprisingly, stand transxed,
their feet taking all of ve numbers to warm to
the dark dance music as the swirling guitar and
drum patterns of the hypnotic Twenty-Four
Hours give way to the pulsebeat of the throbbing
bass introduction to Transmission. The song
suddenly seems to take on the aura of the hit it
should have been as the audience nally begin to
respond with real vigour, their reticence melting
in the face of the frightening intensity of Joy
Divisions performance.
The euphoria rises through Disorder, Curtiss
ailing robotic juggle dance taking
on almost violent proportions as
Morris and Hook hold down the
backbeat with precision and power
and Albrecht picks out the purest
improvised guitar solos.

They seemed a gloomy band, but

they were the absolute opposite

24

NME ORIGINALS

KEVIN CUMMINS/IDOLS

Ian Curtis, lead singer of Joy Division and one of the most talented performers
and writers in contemporary rock music, committed suicide on 18 May 1980.
Paul Morley and Adrian Thrills pay tribute to the man and the group

NME ORIGINALS

25

 Just Cant Function No More

It doesnt

really need saying, but Ian Curtis was

highly emotional, deeply romantic and acutely
sensitive. It was these qualities, plus an irrational
willingness to take the blame, combined with
a set of problems its not relevant to reveal,
that made him decide to leave us. A change of
scenery. For him, perhaps, freedom.
On Saturday 17 May, four days before Joy
Division were to y to America, he had visited
his old house in Maccleseld to watch the
televised lm Stroszek by his favourite director,
Herzog. Hours later, in the early hours of the
Sunday morning, he hung himself. He was 23.
That a myth will develop is inevitable, if only
because of the type of group Joy Division seemed
to be, the passions they arouse. Ian Curtis
words are vivid and dramatic. They omit links
and open up perspectives; they are set deep in
untamed, unfenced darkness. He confronted
himself with ultimate realities.
However its written, this piece contributes
to the myth. Things need to be said, things that
would have been said anyway, without perhaps

so much unconstrained emotion. Ians leaving

gives his words and his images a nal desperate,
sad edge of clarity. Its a perverse way for Joy
Division to get their deserved attention.
Our memories add to the myth. Ian Curtis
own myths, the myths he dragged up from the
deep and tuned to our reality, inspire it.
The myth gets stronger we might as well get
on with it. Ian would love this myth. Ian Curtis
was young, but he had already seen the depths.
His death is a waste, but he had already given us
more than we dare hope from anyone.
We were looking towards him.
And he was no longer there.

Joy Division

played their rst gig at the Electric

Circus supporting Buzzcocks and Penetration in
May 1977. Their name was then Warsaw, having
rejected the Pete Shelley suggestion of Stiff
Kittens. The name Warsaw was derived from
Warszawa, a song on Bowies Low.
Warsaw were undistinguished, but there was
a great belief and romance guiding them. Slowly,
the noises formed. They recorded a four-track
single, An Ideal For Living, and planned to
release the EP using their new name Joy Division
Joy Division being the prostitutes wing of
a concentration camp. Poor sound quality
postponed the release and even when it was put
out, it created no stir, although something was
obviously forming.

Ian Curtis was young, but he had seen the

depths. He gave us more than we dared hope

Ian Curtis: the

myth grows
stronger

26 NNMMEE OORRIIGGIINNAALLSS
??

and recorded a thrilling single for Factory called

Transmission.
They quietly established their independence;
prolically and ambitiously expanded upon their
already considerable originality; unpretentiously
discovered the capacity there is in rock for truly
traumatic and radical developments. They played
scores of gigs, but never made it seem like they
were merely promoting product. They created
their own pace. They made it look so easy. It
being something like a total lack of compromise.
Only the cruellest blow could shatter Joy
Divisions brilliant development. Really, they
show what is possible. They never dared wonder
aloud what effect they were having. They never
asked for special treatment. They never shouted
for attention, they just got on with the job.
Joy Divisions powerful work will naturally
live on. The name Joy Division will not be used
by Hook, Albrecht and Morris. The group
had decided a long while back that if any one
of the quartet should, for whatever reason, in
whatever way, depart, the rest would, in cautious
recognition of the fact they were making
something special, change the name of the group.
There are no set plans for the future, but it
must be said that Ian Curtis was not the major
force in the group. He wrote the words and
offered contributions to the musical make-up.
Hook and Albrecht wrote the melodies, Morris
composed the rhythms. Curtis was a dazzling

In 1978 Joy Division met their

manager Rob Gretton. Producer
Martin Zero Hannett took an
active interest in the group, and
he and Gretton became fth and
sixth members.
Joy Division had a quarter of
the Factory Sampler, contributing
two songs, the rst indication
that Joy Division had a special
understanding. But still, the
completeness and strength of their
rst LP, Unknown Pleasures,
was unnerving. The group had
discovered their own potential.
They had quietly, effectively
travelled from one extreme to the
other. Every word counted, every
line had a chilling penetration.
Somewhere between An Ideal For
Living and the few months later
when Unknown Pleasures was
recorded, a radical transformation
had taken place. Everything had
fallen into place.
An audience began to look
their way, but Joy Division never
let go. They relished Factorys
uncomplicated exibility,
contributing two extra songs from the
Unknown Pleasures session to Fasts
Earcom 2, recording two new songs
for French label Sordide Sentimentale

focus, but the music is unique in itself. Each

contribution was equal.

The impact

of Joy Division can only grow

stronger. Joy Division can not clean away the
trivia and delusion of mass-based rock music,
but they throw a shadow over it all.
They emphasise the vanity and vulgarity
of the rock music so recklessly publicised and
gloried by industry and media, the plain
mundanity of the majority of pop, and their
own complete lack of conceit or ego indicates
the uselessness of pretending rock is some sort of
weapon of change. The very best rock is part of
a ght, a widespread perception, something that
actively removes prejudice and restriction.
Rocks greatness is its emotional effect on
the individual. Joy Divisions worth is immense
to every individual who does not resent their
strange awareness. The struggle and the
conict never ceases. There is no real safety, no
consolation, and often the evil, futile boundaries
of existence become too claustrophobic.
Ian Curtis decided to leave us, and yet he
leaves words of such strength they urge us to
ght, seek and reconcile. Joy Division will not
change the world. But there is value; there has
to be. The effect of Joy Division, the unknown
pleasures each individual fully tuned into Joy
Division discovers, can only be guessed at. But
the moods and the insight must inspire us, excite
us, challenge us
The value of Joy Division is the value of love.

KEVIN CUMMINS/IDOLS

The guitarist takes over on synthesizer for

the two closers, the translucent Isolation and
the serene Decades, a track, like the awesome
Atmosphere, that provides a sharp counterpoint
to the more physical hard rock that comprises
most of their set.
Curtis, however, stumbles from the stage
before the end of the song, totally exhausted and
obviously showing signs of strain. The band,
despite demands for more, return for only a
sharp one-song encore, a revamped version of
the 1978 Factory Sampler track Digital

NME ORIGINALS

27

Play For Today

The Cure Mk II: (l to r)

Lol Tolhurst, Mathieu
Hartley, Simon Gallup
and Robert Smith

28

NME ORIGINALS

PAUL COX/LFI

ere we go again.
I walk into The Cures
dressing room for the
night. I always hate
these sort of entrances. The four
members of The Cure, stood
among empty guitar cases,
practice amps, lager cans, dead
chairs, look limp and vacant. I slip
on my best brave face. Someone
rushes off to get me a Cure T-shirt,
something Ill be happy to wear.
Somebody else hands me a can of
lager, something I force myself to
swallow. Robert Smith is nearest to
me as I hover by the open door.
Hello, he says amiably, are
you nervous? Yes, I say through
a narrow throat, I always am. He
grins gooshly. I grin gooshly.
Last year, on the night of the
General Election, I revieweddestroyed The Cures rst LP
Three Imaginary Boys, at rst
spluttering at what I saw as a
queasy blend of arrogance and
austerity, then growing steadily
annoyed at what I fantasised as a
grand conspiracy of pompous pop
people and relentlessly hateful
politicians. I saw Three Imaginary
Boys as a conceited scrapbook
with a bitter lack of internal
coherence. Wrapped up in dinky
pinkness, with symbols instead
of titles, it was too self-conscious,
and tted in a place where talk of
innovation and stimulation was
all pose, no action, and where the
next mask was more important
than the next song. I thought The
Cure were horrible.
I listened to that LP three
times, says Robert Smith, and
murmurs in assent when I mention
that the second LP Seventeen
Seconds is much more soulful and
direct. The rst LP in a lot of ways
was like a compilation, it didnt
have a lot to do with what we were
doing even at the time.
At that time Robert Smith
felt hurt by my antagonism. He
immediately wrote me a note,
sternly and hilariously parodying
my own indulgent word-play,
pissing all over it. The Cure sang
a song about the review during a
Peel session. The incident got silly.
Then quickly forgotten. When we
meet, I turn up deeply in love with
Seventeen Seconds and Robert
Smith doesnt hate me at all.
Smith is soft where I imagined
he would be hard. Hes not a big
softie. Hes always on a ne line
between agitation and boredom,
and such a balance turns out
faintly, deviously charming. Hes
no pretentious mock recluse,
perpetually feigning intensity

1980

DAYS OF WINE
AND

POSES

Ysee it wasnt that The Cure ever had a non-image, they just didnt have
an image, right? Nothing terribly wrong about that, is there? Well...
Paul Morley shares a bottle and begins to understand
of vision. Hes never quite sure
what to say. Does he take himself
seriously?
I do take myself seriously but
theres a point beyond which you
become a comic gure.
Robert Smith is a songwriter
who wrote songs of enough
individuality and attraction to
warrant interest, who got hooked
into the record business and then
had to start wondering about
justication, morals, compromise.
Robert Smith cannot believe The
Fuss: I still dont feel comfortable
holding a guitar. Smith has the
look of the perpetually puzzled. He
stutters, he blunders he wonders
what the hell its all about, this
rock thing. I sometimes think I
might be in someone elses idea of
heaven, he says with grisly irony.

In the early hours. Were soul-deep

into bottles of red wine, muttering
about the state of the art, the
idleness and extravagance of the
shady rock heroes.
A Cure live set of the moment is
nothing like the sort of putreed
and obsolete rocknroll gig a lot of
people think is the only way. Their
new songs sound faded and lonely,
rely on touch and quietness. They
dont nag at you or remove your
independence. They rouse your
curiosity rather than remove it.
These songs are a slight chill, not a
right charge. A build-up of gloom,
shadows, broken bits of dreams
and expectations, not guaranteed
to supply the good night out.

Smith realises that The Cure

dont t into the rude rock gig, but
he likes to play.
Its very selsh when I go on
stage. It matters what the audience
thinks, but I write songs for myself.
Its very narrow-minded. And we
dont present shows. We dont leap
about on stage. We could make it
visual and everything but were
not like that naturally so why
should we? Id prefer it if we really
impressed a lot of people wholl like
us for a long time rather than give
someone a good night out wholl
forget it next week.
What does he mean by impress?
Just to show I dunno that
weve got something to offer.
He chuckles. Hell want to
change that later.

expect respect, they want their

privacy. Seventeen Seconds is a
record of exceptional quality. Brief
and wistful. The Cure leave it there
as much as they are able.
I dont think that we have any
right to an audience. I dont think
that just because we make records
people should listen, or if we play
they should come. If we werent
selling records Id still be playing
in a pub or something, which I was
a year before we got a recording
contract. Just because I enjoy it. Its
as simple as that. Id rather be on
stage than doing anything else.

The Cure story is a blur. It started

in pubs, now its reached clubs and
telly, and it will end quietly. They
started as a three-piece in 1977:

I still dont feel comfortable holding a

guitar. Sometimes I think I might be in
someone elses idea of heaven
The Cure form part of a new
realism in a part of rock that wont
take over but wont disappear.
Rock that isnt trapped in a maze
of mirrors, that isnt lost and
ignoble in a wasteland of dead
pride and rigid beliefs. The Cure
dont demand everyone be like
them, and their expectations are
moderate. The space to breathe,
decent access to recording and
releasing, a modest listening
level. The Cure want to exist, they

Smith, drummer Lol Tolhurst and

bassist Michael Dempsey. They
played other peoples songs, it was
all for fun and fun was all it was.
Robert Smith was part of a very
musical family. He recalls that
there was always an instrument in
the house, always people playing
music. At ve he walking around
hitting guitars. Just making noises.
I dont know if I believe that
thing about some people being
born musicians and some not.

Thats elevating musicians to

an unfair status.
This background and his
hardening pubby experience
developed and disciplined
Smiths beautifully polished and
adventurous guitar a personal
and delicious post-Hendrix
technique wasted on the rst
LP but exquisitely exploited for
Seventeen Seconds. (Similarly his
obsessive, compelling vocals.)
It was automatic for Smith to
play on a stage with friends, for
himself, with the audience only
half-welcome. It was difcult for
Smith to express himself. There
was so much he wanted to say, but
it was almost as if he didnt want
anyone to hear his words.
I dont know. Ive always
written things down ever since I
could remember. Mainly because
sometimes I get really angry. Ive
got a really violent temper but its
not physical because I dont think
I should vent my frustrations and
depressions on anybody else. I
dont throw tantrums or anything
like that, so rather than smash the
room up I write things down. Its a
release. But I havent got over the
idea of separating communicating
from preaching. My words are
mainly about me, how I feel,
theyre not about world situations
and alternatives.
The Cure dispensed with most
of their versions. They developed
originals. A debut single, Killing
An Arab, caused a bit of alarm;
Robert Smith was pulled into
the ow before hed even tested it
out. Fiction signed them. Three
Imaginary Boys was pinned
together. But the three-piece Cure
was destined not to last long. The
Siouxsie & The Banshees bust-up
accelerated fate. The Cure were
supporting them.
Kenny and John left the
Banshees. Budgie played for
Kenny. Robert played for
John, using his superior guitar
temperament to adapt perfectly to
the Banshee shapes. For that tour
he played two shows a night. The
Cure barely survived.
It just became like a job. Id
known Lol since I was six, but not
Michael, and the differences were
between him and me. I found
on the Banshees tour that I was
enjoying it more playing with the
Banshees than The Cure. Thats
what really made the decision. Lol
felt the same way, Michael wasnt
criticising or joining in on any
sort of level. We were sticking to
the same set night after night and
the whole thing was getting like
NME ORIGINALS

29

Art And Artifice

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Kaleidoscope
(Polydor)

Kaleidoscope
follows hard on
the heels of the
morale-boosting
chart successes
of Christine and
Happy House,
both of which
are featured
here. Christine,
the story of the schizophrenic with 22
clashing personalities, was breathtaking:
strong, steady drumming, a running bass,
a skilful acoustic guitar and Siouxsies
compassionate vocals all evoke perfectly
the songs stark atmosphere.
Happy House was great pop as well,
everything moving together to form
its own distinctive sound. And now
Kaleidoscope a series of sketches each
evoking its own atmosphere and place.
Happy House kicks off Side One
before Tenant is ushered in with a slow,
almost Public Image feel, with Severin
contributing electric sitar, among other
things. Trophy is a McGeogh number
with a recurring guitar motif and an
exploration by Siouxsie of the futility of
remembering past triumphs.
Hybrid, though meticulously
constructed, tends to outstay its
welcome, while Clockface seems trite,
save for Siouxsies chanting. The side
ends with Lunar Camel: slow, a trie
draggy, it lacks characteristic Banshee
purpose or direction.
Side Two: Desert Kisses boasts a
great swirling feel of power and intent
with Siouxsies voice reminding us of
its unique quality. Red Frame is almost
Human League but with more depth
and darkness, while Paradise Place and
Skin are just classic Banshee pieces.
Hypnotic, relentless, and incisive, both
feature Steve Jones on guitar, revealing a
hitherto unknown side of the (S)ex Pistol.
As the title implies, Kaleidoscope
aims to give the listener exactly that.
A kaleidoscope of sound and imagery,
new forms, and content, ashing before
our eyes. Undoubtedly a lot of the album
is a success on those terms, but even after
about ten plays its still hard to fully grasp
Kaleidoscope as a concrete whole. Or
maybe thats the beauty.
Paulo Hewitt

30

NME ORIGINALS

The Cure model for

the Littlewoods
catalogue postpunk collection

I stay away from. Im not a seller. In fact I sometimes

go the opposite way. Which is a bit stupid.
Sometimes it seems as though Robert Smith is
embarrassed by living. He is unsettled by the extent
and demands of his ego, necessarily oblique about
his work, nally ashamed by the vulgar way it tends
to be sold. But slowly he is beginning to realise that
he cannot exist in a vacuum. He is consolidating
his position within this Fuss, striking a ne balance
between playing the game and reconciling his own
inner conicts. And Seventeen Seconds is a victory
of aspiration over circumstances: one of the most
calm, liberating and progressive rock LPs of recent
years. Its easy (so calm! So uncluttered!) to miss. It
should be heard again and again and again (fade).

Deep into

the deep red wine, deep into the deep

conversation, Robert and I are talking about image.
Around the time of Three Imaginary Boys they
seemed to be elaborately disguising their plainness.
My mistake: I called it the anti-image. Robert Smith

One day Id wake up wanting to kill

somebody, the next day I wouldnt even
bother getting up. I was shutting down
was utterly fed up by that. We had to get away from
that anti-image thing, which we didnt even create
in the rst place. And it seemed like we were trying
to be more obscure. We just didnt like the standard
rock thing. The whole thing got really out of hand.
I was trying really hard to be normal, at home I
was being all nice, and my mum kept saying to me,
Whats an anti-image?
I tell Robert he can often be infuriatingly vague,
because he can.
I am very vague. I dont know why. Ha! Ha!
Does obscurity mean anything to Smith?
Im not doing this to make my name go down
in history. I really couldnt care less. Im not saying
that to look good in the interview, I honestly dont
think like that. There are so many people trying to
do that, its like another facet of the treadmill, and
its pointless because I could never win it anyway.
Ive got faith in what Im doing from a personal
point of view, but as to whether I go down in history,
Im very doubtful about that so I dont let it worry
me. If I let that worry me along with everything else
Id crack up before Im going to anyway.

PAUL COX/LFI

MM, 26 July 1980, p17

a joke. There wasnt

much point carrying on.
Late 79, Dempsey left.
Two new members were
drafted keyboardist
Matthieu Hartley and
bassist Simon Gallup
who oddly made the
music more sparse and
withdrawn.
Theyve added a new
dimension to the group
pissheads.
Resisting the
compromising
temptation to become
a full-time Banshee,
Smith and The Cure
emerged more in
control than theyd ever been. Out of bad times
and sad times was blended the tender Seventeen
Seconds a collection of songs restlessly remaking
and reworking one particular incident from inside a
love trap. Smith reects on a moment from different
points of view: resentful on Play For Today;
morbid on In Your House; near-extinguished on
Seventeen Seconds.
It was a really condensed incident, a rush of
feelings that Id found in myself had been watered
down mainly by playing in a group. Its a really
strange situation, but I nd touring and things like
that shut me down. I harden and get very reclusive,
sort of shun people. All the things that Id been
shutting down just came out in a big rush and
for the following two weeks every day Id just be
thinking about that one particular incident. One
day Id wake up wanting to kill somebody, the next
day I wouldnt even bother getting up. It was awful.
I wasnt ghting it, whereas in everyday life
youd have to control those feelings. But its good
that it happened. At the time I
was shutting down and didnt feel
like writing any more songs, I just
couldnt be bothered, and it was
through actually being in a group,
through playing songs, that
caused me to stop writing songs!
Out of such a strained
experience came an extraordinary LP: the
atmospheres are consistently melancholic,
the textures relaxed and subtle. No hurrying
or harrying. The Cure use genuine technical
originality the sound is light and misty, paler and
thinner than Another Green World, as convincing
as rock music can be in conveying the way the mind
runs, slows, repeats itself. It is denitive soft rock:
a crumbling world and its pervasive persistence in
memory is beautifully evoked, there is the quiet
agony of love and loss, a constant sense of distance
between people, places, past and present. Seventeen
Seconds is an LP of romantic melancholy, of
anguish and nally of horror.
There is genuine emotion on there and again
whether people want to take it that way is up to
them. Im not going to say youve got to believe me,
this genuine emotion, because now Ive done it I
dont really care. Its there if people like to listen to
it. Its not the type of LP youre going to put on if you
want a party. Nor a record to put on if youre having
a t of depression. The whole thing of doing Top Of
The Pops, of selling it, the whole shop window thing,

1980
MM, 30 August 1980, p27

Bauhaus Scamps, Oxford

bass notes, Double
Dare was a killer, with
Kevin Haskins beating
the living daylights out
of his drum kit and
Danny Ash torturing
his guitar yet they all
looked so restrained!
In The Flat Field
was the rst of two
new numbers and
came over very well,
while Boys had Peter
Murphy dragging
Danny Ash across the
stage by his hair and
going down on his
guitar la Bowie and
Ronson.
Theres more than
a touch of truth in
talk of their afliation
with glam rock. Their
version of Telegram
Sam did justice to
Marc Bolan, and
both that and Terror
Couple Kill Colonel
had the previously
unresponsive crowd
up and twitching.
One of the
highlights of their
very varied set was
Stigmata Martyr,
which had the
band emulating the
crucixion while
chanting the blessing.
They closed with
St Vitus Dance,
though the audience
was still quiet.
Bauhaus never
fail to alienate
certain sections
of their audience,
but such is the lot
of a band who are consistently
challenging, perplexing and
elating. Enigmas indeed!
Gill Smith

Oh bondage, up
yours: Peter Murphy
of Bauhaus

PHILIPPE CARLY - WWW.NEWWAVEPHOTOS.COM

trendy disco in
the centre of an
Oxford shopping
precinct seemed an
incongruous place for
a band like Bauhaus to
play on the opening night of their
British tour. But with this lot
nothing is predictable.
An extremely bizarre but
intricate lm served as a support,
and after much shufing around
with screens, the band emerged
from the crowd and walked
on stage. Talk about lack of
mystery! It gave everyone in
the audience a chance to gawp
at close quarters at them and
completely destroyed, for me,
their glamorous untouchability.
But in a moment, with the
stark white light bleaching
out Peter Murphys elegantly

Bauhaus are consistently

challenging, perplexing and elating
arrogant features and with the
rest of the band hovering in the
half-light, all was forgiven.
From the buzzing opening

NME, 8 November 1980, p32

BAUHAUS
In The Flat Field
(4AD)

Crossovers are
interesting to
observe, but
generally not
a lot of fun to
listen to.
Were now
in the throes
of a hard
punk/moderne
monochrome crossover, with
bands like Killing Joke and Bauhaus
on the verge of tapping a potentially
massive market opened up by Siouxsie
& The Banshees, Adam & The Ants and
even Joy Division. To these ears, theres
as palpable a difference between these
two groups of groups as there is between
the Sex Pistols and Cockney Rejects
something like the difference between
art and artice, but not quite.
In The Flat Field is the rst Bauhaus
album, and I wouldnt be at all surprised
to see it storming up the alternative
charts, at the very least. It oughtnt to.
I must admit to a passing liking for
their three singles. I was even prepared
to overlook their taking their name in
vain (what the hell has their GothickRomantick schtick got to do with the
stripped, no-nonsense principles of
the Bauhaus?), but over the length of
an album, their limitations and endless
pretence are just too much to take.
In The Flat Field is nine meaningless
moans and ails bereft of even the
most cursory contour of interest, a
record which deserves all the damning
adjectives usually levelled at grim-faced
modernists. Its doom for dooms sake.
If nothing else, this sheds some
light on the punk/moderne crossover
audience, who, in their taste for excessive
tribal plumage and dismal, doom-laden
music, are more closely related to the
heavy metal hordes than theyd like to
believe. And Bauhaus are nothing more
than a hip Black Sabbath. Really.
Personally, I couldnt give a toss, not
feeling much afnity with many other
human beings in general, and certainly
not with any tribal group. I just wish this
record had been more interesting, more
original, and less reliant on the obvious.
Ah well. Their singles showed Bauhaus
werent devoid of an idea or two; this
album shows theyve used them both up.
Andy Gill
NME ORIGINALS

31

The Bye
Bye
CureBlackheads

an unsettled individual listening

out for a strange guiding voice,
while the band play an attractively
doomy tune, enhanced by reticent
drums and carefully folded-in
keyboard lines. Nice, vaguely
psychedelic, production too.
Chris Bohn

NME, 8 March 1980, p23

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Happy House/
Drop Dead Celebration
(Polydor)

NME, 5 April 1980, p4

THE CURE
A Forest
(Fiction)

Unfortunately tagged as
naively witty suburbanites by
admirers, precocious darlings
by detractors, The Cures severe
growth problems were largely
caused by unwarranted heavy
attention early on. Consequently,
writer Robert Smiths ability to
construct eetingly mysterious
and highly evocative scenarios
went uncredited, as critics tried
instead to pinpoint the band
sociologically. A Forest is a good
example, which gets better with
age: Smiths dry, lost vocal tells of

MM, 28 June 1980, p16

JOY DIVISION
Love Will Tear Us Apart
(Factory)

This single, a follow-up to the free

exi-disc which some baddies in
record shops have been selling,
has been invested with sad
signicance after singer Ian Curtis
tragic suicide.
Joy Division were (and may
remain) an innovative and
courageous band. Divorced from
Curtis fate, this record offers a
taster for their forthcoming album
Closer. Evocative, interesting a
powerfully original piece of music.
Martyn Sutton
MM, 13 September 1980, p17

JOY DIVISION
Shes Lost Control /
Atmosphere
(Factory)

Severin and
Sioux: hell
hath no fury

32

NME ORIGINALS

A record that puts nearly

everything else to shame.
Atmosphere was only available
previously as a collectors item
French import and thank God
Factory Records have decided to
put it out as an ofcial release.
It features a plaintive bassline
and sparse drumbeats as Ian

NME, 22 November 1980, p18

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Israel
(Polydor)

Siouxsie Schmiouxsie what

does it matter as long she makes
good singles? Christine was
one and Israel isnt. At rst
impressive, grandiose, the song
meanders into tedium and clutter
and not even the wholesale
homage to Herzogs soundtrack
can offset that.
As for the ip, Red Over White,
God spare us from all this pseudoreligious Catholic guilt hogwash
with feebly disguised drum solos
and stream-of-consciousness
hippy lyrics.
You see how prejudice will
beget prejudice? Im quite happy
humming the odd Banshees tune
but faced with the attendant
iconography that surrounds them
these days all I can see in their
image is a twee pose.
Max Bell

JANETTE BECKHAM

Seemingly, hell hath no fury

like a Siouxsie scorned. For
all the contrived cynicism, its
Budgies remarkable drop-beat
drumnastics that dominate the
exotic, danceable top-side. But
its the unbridled viciousness of
the ip supported by the cryptic
message Bye Bye Blackheads
etched next to the run-off
groove that overshadows the
whole affair. Obviously aimed
at former Banshees Morris and
McKay, its probably one of the
most venomous put-downs
ever recorded. Its as if Siouxsie
is gleefully sticking pins in wax
efgies as she shouts out her
abuse. When it comes to carrying
grudges, Sweet Sioux makes
Madams Thatcher and Ghandi
look like Sisters of Mercy.
Roy Carr

Curtis dolefully sings Dont walk

away in silence. This is deeply
moving music.
Shes Lost Control shows just
how far the band moved ahead
after recording the Unknown
Pleasures album. The song has
been given a totally new feel
to the original version, aided
by producer Martin Hannetts
masterful drum and bass sound,
and Closer-style synth work
towards the end.
Lynden Barber

Chapter 3

DEREK RIDGERS

1981

Small talk stinks

Northampton
discovers
art school rock!!
NME, 21 February 1981, p12

f the truth doesnt t, embroider

it. A basic rule of promotion is
to set up the myth early on and
hope the band will eventually live up to
it. The game can be fun, and Bauhaus have
always suggested that they were willing, if
not particularly adept, participants.
Formed a few years back, their evocative
name lifted from this centurys most
inuential art school irrevocably links
them with 1920s Germany, making it easy for
commentators to draw expressionist leanings
from their shadowy live shows.
But the true face of Bauhaus is far removed
from singer Peter Murphys pained onstage
mugging, and they go to great lengths
to deny the German connections when I
meet them at bassist David Jays pleasantly
suburban Northampton home. Jay and
drummer brother Kevin Haskins timidly
fend off criticisms, while Murphy reacts more
spunkily. Danny Ash, guitarist, is absent after
catching an iron ling in his eye.
Bauhaus deserve their cult following.
So far theyve made two very good
singles in their debut, Bela
Lugosis Dead, and the terse,
cogent Terror Couple Kill
Colonel; a failed commercial
gambit in their cover of
Telegram Sam; and one
op, Dark Entries.
But their debut album, In
The Flat Field, pointed up
all the limitations of their
approach. Murphys words
get inextricably tangled
in introspective journeys
through the terrors of a
Catholic past, but worse,
his classicist leanings
means he twists them
into needlessly inverted
sentences and forces
unnecessary rhymes.

I was brought up a Catholic Stigmata

Martyr is about total fixation with Christ
34 N M E

ORIGINALS

Matched as they are to tortuous hard rock

workouts over lurching rhythms, Bauhaus
have arrived at a pomposity almost equal to
that of the early 70s progressive bands.
I was brought up a Catholic, so I obviously
felt it was something to write about, Peter
says. One track, Stigmata Martyr was about
total xation with Jesus Christ to the point of
bleeding from the same places as Christ bled.
It seemed like a really strong subject to me.
Bauhaus are better appreciated live.
Murphys overwrought drama is highlighted
by stark white lights battened to the oor, thus
throwing up heavy shadows of the band onto
the wall. The effect is visibly gothic.
No, its not, contests Kevin Haskins: It
seemed to us like a no-nonsense thing that
contradicts that whole gothic romance thing.
Unless you see it in terms of old German
silent movies
We hadnt seen any lms like that when
we started, points out David Jay.
But this statements considerably
undermined when they hand me a copy of the
Bela Lugosi 12-inch featuring a back cover
still from The Cabinet Of Dr Caligari. David
Jay notices me glancing at it suspiciously.
Our guitarist Danny had torn it out of a
book and gave it to us without telling us where
it came from, he explains timidly.
Its not much of an excuse but theres no
reason to disbelieve him in light of Bauhaus
wilfully haphazard approach.
Made up of former art school students and
an ex-printer (Murphy) who wished he was
one, Bauhaus are laudably open to ideas, but
theyve yet to show theyre capable of using
them. After a brief description of art school
life from Jay, Murphy rues his missed chance.
I was accepted for art college but then I
changed my mind. I imagined you had to have
a good idea of what you wanted to do before
you enrolled.
Its the opposite, says Jay. It opens you
up to different levels and ways of thinking.
Going by their singles, Bauhaus have it
in them to pull off a masterpiece, but at the
moment theyre still stuck at the sketchbook
stage. As it is, hang onto those early sketches
look what happened to Adam & The Ants.

KEVIN CUMMINS/IDOLS

But school cad Chris Bohn picks apart Bauhaus designs

1981

Siouxsie: better
than Toyah. Then
again, what isnt?

NME, 27 June 1981, p34

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Juju

FIN COSTELLO/REDFERNS/M BRITTON

(Polydor)

Of course, I watched Top Of The Pops

last week. It was poor its going in
four-week cycles at the moment,
the good, the bad, the sagging, the
so-so but Siouxsie & The Banshees
were on. A savage gloss, a slashing
glamour amid the tepid turns, a
turn-on like few others.
The Banshees are a terric vision,
an exclusive attraction, a peak in
entertainment; Siouxsie & The
Banshees the display of hair, skirt,
boys, vanity, ash, thigh, smile,
cheek to cheek, back to back are
a discerning and devious
distortion of the Pop
Group that can be
traced back to The
Velvet Underground,
Hendrix, The Doors
and the dark side of
Bolan: never wise
or mellow, meek
or smutty, sweet
or signicant. None of this
romantic desire for action.
There is nothing earthy about
Banshee music. Their fourth LP
thus far, their second-best is a
gliding, comfortless delivery of selfdistrust, infatuation and fetishism.
Juju has an infernal quality:
nothing majestic or mysterious but
a kind of unawed unworldliness. The
mistake is to imagine that Banshee

words and images are intended

to be profound and responsible,
or brutally corrective. Juju songs
dont deal with dull matters, but
with peculiar things in a taut and
teasing manner.
The words are not as imposing
as people imagine. Precise syllables
and broken rhythms are used to
dramatise the music. The mood
of a Banshee song
is disapproval: not
a great intensity but
an idealistic, vexed
profanity. A Banshee
pop song is a bitter
twist, a grave grace.
The diabolical
themes, the emotional
poignancy and
remoteness are part of
the whole. Its not all a weeping
over lost pleasures, neither is it
a thanksgiving. Banshee words
are an effective way to reject the
prosaic, to avoid the vulgar, and
the grouping of the words, the
melodramatic undercurrents
enable the glorious Sioux to camp
and exult with priceless poise.
Side Ones highlights:

Spellbound, Into
The Light, Arabian
Nights, Halloween and
Monitor. Side Twos
highlights: Night Shift,
Sin In My Heart, Head
Cut and Voodoo
Dolly. Juju is the
rst integrated and
sparkling-complete
Banshees album since The Scream.
Its Electric Warrior to the Tanx of
Toyahs Anthem.
Paul Morley

of The Cures rst two albums,

might have spotted the penchant
for pop on the rst and detected
the spots of blood on the sombre
sleeves of the second and added
them together. But he couldnt
have predicted the richness and
deceptive power of Faith.
They start as they mean to go
on with The Holy Hour, where
Simon Gallups slowly phased bass
riff is beaten and punched by Lol
Tolhursts fat, dead percussion.
The rest of the rst side, except
the wonderfully streamlined single
Primary, offers variations on
these themes. Other Voices slyly
builds enough momentum to start
pushing crockery off the sideboard.
All Cats Are Grey (in the dark?)
adopts a more sluggish tempo
but wrenches it into a completely
different perspective via Robert
Smiths desperate keyboards.
Theres an inexplicable melancholy
to it which is overwhelming.
Overleaf, you run straight into
The Funeral Party, suggesting a
coach-load of pall-bearers enjoying
a works outing to the great morgues
of Europe. On The Drowning Man,
the skeletal structure is modied by
speaker-swapping overdubs and
clipped handclaps.
Doubt is Side Twos Primary,
slicing through the dominant
moody textures with angry vocals
and grunting bass. Tear that esh
and rip that skin, snarls Smith,
who would rather mince people
than words.
Mostly, Faith is a
sophisticated exercise
in atmosphere and
production, gloomy
but frequently
majestic. You may
not love it, but youll
become addicted to it.
Adam Sweeting

MM, 18 April 1981, p20

THE CURE
Faith
(Fiction)

Theres not a lot here you can

stuff carelessly into the drawer
labelled fun. Just check the
song titles The Holy Hour,
The Funeral Party, The
Drowning Man. Not the stuff
Mrs Mills albums are made of.
But its impressive. The
professional genre detective,
confronted by the evidence

The Cure: touring

the great morgues
of Europe

NME ORIGINALS

35

The sound of music

Pew, what
a scorcher:
bassist Tracy
with Nick Cave

MM, 17 October 1981, p15

BAUHAUS
Mask
(Beggars Banquet)

36

NME ORIGINALS

NME, 12 September 1981, p50

The Birthday Party

Africa Centre, London

strange venue for

a strange group.
Crammed into a hall
that is more used to hearing
discussions on African culture,
politics and poetry are a
motley collection of afterdark dancers, anticipating the
arrival of a group who have
been compared to The Pop
Group and The Cramps.
Welcome to The Birthday
Party. Forty-ve minutes of
sheer hell.
Nick Cave does indeed look
like a skinny Lux Interior as
he introduces the group, an
odd assortment of Australian
reptiles in checked shirts
and the occasional Stetson.
Their sound bursts from the
tiny stage like a primordial
beast shedding the chains of
convention a nightmarish
Gothic brew of Beefheartian
wordplay and nerve-jangling
guitars stirred into a bubbling
rhythmic broth.

Its like standing too close to a firework

dangerous but compulsive
Whatever reservations
I have about their Prayers
On Fire LP are immediately
dispelled by their dynamic
performance. There is
wildness in the air, a feral
psychosis that owes as much to
the modern notion of paranoia
as it does to a prehistoric,
animal instinct of survival.
Caves voice seems to come
from somewhere else; its
hard to believe his slender
frame can accommodate the
relentless howl that screeches,
screams and throbs its way
around the sexual/surrealistic
lyrics. Obsessions scuttle,
slither and crawl through the
songs like so many nasty little
creatures insects, sh, bugs
and bats are predominant
images reinterpreting the

normal rock concerns of sex,

sadism and sacrice.
Yet despite their apparent
strangeness, The Birthday
Party are a lot of fun. They give
so totally in performance that
questions of approachability
and involvement go ying
out of the window. Their
unrestrained enjoyment in
playing creates a positively
organic atmosphere a
steaming jungle in which you
can laugh yourself silly or be
scared to death.
The Birthday Party are
genuine (ab)originals.
Watching them is a bit like
standing too close to a rework
dangerous but compulsive.
Light blue touch paper and
stand near.
Neil Norman

TOM SHEEHAN

Bauhaus, though
I loathe to admit
it, are about to
be big.
The signs
are all there.
An inevitable
commercial dog-end of post-Joy Division
doom, theyve wedded that imageconscious, pretentious inner soul-searching
to Bowies glib theatricality and come up
crowd-pleasing trumps. At Bingley they
were showbiz magnicent.
In The Flat Field, their last long-player,
sold well on sub-Banshees pseudo-religion
and a splash of Cramps Hammer horror
alone. Mask (an apt name very Siouxsie)
is a suitably showy, hollow successor a
souvenir of their crass live show; all shock
no substance.
In the face of outmoded criteria like
originality, having something to say, etc,
Bauhaus are a joke; so old-hat Iggy-bound
they shouldnt exist. But with the current
accent on imitative image over anything
else, Murphy just MUST be an idol.
Teen mags will lap up his muscular
suntan and false aggression despite
the patent unlistenability of just about
everything theyve ever recorded except
the Young Americans-cloned Kick In
The Eye (re-recorded here).
Bauhaus are a soulless stance, a pathetic
excuse for idolatry in an era when heroes
shouldnt exist but seem to be so badly
longed for. Adam & The Ants and The
Human League all better watch out Mask
may not yield any potentially massive hit
singles but the leather-jacketed hordes
are eager and waiting.
The impression and atmosphere of
Mask counts today more than anybody
elses struggling commitment a Glitter
Band for post-punk depressives. Its appeal
is obvious: cosmic electronics, ethereal sax,
tribal drums, scratch-unfocussed guitar
and eerie, effective/affected vocals a
pantomime pretence of communication.
Bauhaus are an unstoppable surge
towards the sham/glam mid-70s. Mask,
more than Spandau, more than Rondo,
takes the stylistic route to success by the
short and curlies and aunts it as a virtue.
Top Ten. I hate it.
Steve Sutherland

1981

NME, 17 October 1981, p41

JOY DIVISION
Still
(Factory)

It shouldnt have
happened, but as it did
lets take consolation in
the fact that lan Curtiss
death on 18 May,
1980 didnt so much
bring Joy Divisions
journey to the heart
of darkness to an
abrupt halt as freeze
it for all eternity at the brink of
discovery. At least we can still travel
that far with them, and though they
had positioned themselves well for
a nal breakthrough, who knows
if theyd have been able to cope on
the other side?
Their quest remains just that, its
purity unspoiled by repetition, bad
moves or false conclusions. It was
founded in a courageous analysis of
their own condition, presented on
Still as a struggle towards a new,
more complete consciousness far
removed from the street squabbling
of the punk that spawned it.
Instead of moaning about the
mess they were in, Joy Division
confronted it and discovered the
causes of the current depression
to be rooted in spiritual rather
than material impoverishment.
They registered a profound
estrangement from their ugly
environment and shock at the
callousness of the age.
They were fascinated by that
which repelled them; their musics
tension often emanated from their
approximating the characteristics

pain either. On the

contrary, they viewed
exposing themselves
to pain as one way of
breaking the aura of
insensitivity, suggesting
that through brutality
or self-abasement
they might achieve
those elusive moments of true
feeling. On The Sound Of Music,
Curtis sings: Ill walk you through
the hard breaks/Show you all the
outtakes/I can see it getting higher/
Systematically degraded/
Emotionally a
scapegoat /I can see
it getting better,
with the ecstatic
afrmation: LOVE!/
LIFE!/Makes you
feel/Higher/
Higher /Higher!/
HIGHER!
At their
best, Joy Division were
awesome, frightening
and beautiful never
more so than on Dead
Souls, which somehow
embodied the tragedy
of their vision, their
grasping after the
unattainable and
the inevitable
disillusionment that
would follow.
Joy Division never
resorted to faking
emotions. Their
concerts seemed
to be purgative
experiences,
especially for Curtis,
who found release
in intense, brief
bursts of buttery
movement. To
watch him was like
witnessing the last
just man accepting the
sins of the world as his
personal burden.
The two live sides work
as a patchy retrospective,

naked feelings must have

got harder every time. Joy
Division presented them
with that hardest thing to
swallow: reality. Theirs was
all the more indigestible
as it juggled together
the commonplace with
the taboo, brutality with
sensuality and stark
horror with simple,
appealing melody. But Joy
Division never spared
themselves in their
pursuit of experience
and truth.
You can feel
it still.
Chris Bohn

KEVIN CUMMINS/IDOLS

They juggled brutality with sensitivity,

and horror with simple, appealing melody
of the very things they found
oppressive, either in undeniably
attractive abstractions of cityscapes
or in superbly drilled militaristic
marches. Unlike the dumb futurists,
past and present, they neither
embraced nor gloried the speed
of modern life, but presented it as a
symptom of their malaise.
They wouldnt shy away from

despite the fact the synths

went horribly awry on most
of the Closer material and
that Ians voice is often lost
in the shoddy mix.
Bearing in mind how
quickly an audience grows
accustomed to emotional
shocks to its ordered
system, expressing such

Ian Curtis:
grasping after
the unattainable

NME ORIGINALS

37

blast off!

Sometimes pleasure
A Manhattan melodrama starring The Birthday Party, by Barney Hoskyns

ts a chill, exposed night in New York

City. The East Coast has just recovered
from a week of torrential rain, and the
winds sweeping up the islands avenues
from Battery Park to the Bronx threaten more.
But the show must go on, and at a swanky
disco in Union Square called the Underground
its only just beginning. Strutting their stuff to
English imports like Planet Earth and Dont Say
Thats Just For White Boys are second division
preppies and neat executives from Hoboken.
They are trying to get their dates drunk.
The night is owing by pretty amorphously
when suddenly, at one oclock, the lights dim and
the sound dies. Everyone looks round; without
the disco their plans are ruined. Their faces drop.
Onto the stage are climbing ve undesirable
aliens. One, festooned in split-crotch goldlam drainpipes, his bruised features twitching
through black ames of hair, appears to be the
singer. Another, strapping on a bass guitar like a
giant dildo, sports a shnet vest, a Stetson, and
the sort of moustache you might cultivate for
hustling some meat on Christopher Street.
Perhaps most disturbing of all, a kind of

The management is not amused. After the

second song, Zoo-Music Girl, someones
climbing on the stage and telling them their time
is up. They thunder into one last, outrageous
exhibition of carnal mayhem and disappear.
This little scenario is roughly what The
Birthday Party call a really great gig. I mean,
how degenerate can you get?

In this climate of cold design and concealed

despair, The Birthday Party take the concept
of stage performance about as far as you
are likely to see it go. Live, the songs of Nick
Cave and Rowland Howard are driven to an
emotional edge where pain and pleasure fuse
in cathartic madness for the performer
and dithyrambic joy for the
audience. Their concerts
are feasts of energy, chaotic
spectacles which break the
surface of art and carry
sound and lyric to ultimate
violence. The Birthday
Party in performance burst
through the constrictions of

TOM SHEEHAN

Fuck it, what were trying to do is the

biggest musical clich in the world
gangling, psychotic hillbilly in a ridiculous suit
is fastening on a guitar like he was auditioning
for The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.
Its not quite what the management was
expecting. Hell, they havent even played a note
and already half the crowd is ling out.
The next moment, all the worst premonitions
are justied. Cranking out of the amps comes
this murderous death-rattle, like the gaze of
Medusa freezing the few foolhardy adventurers
who dare to look. The bass lurches obscenely
into the foray, and nally, his body doubling up
in unholy convulsions, the macilent wreck of a
singer starts to spit and fume
AMERICAN HEADS WILL ROLL IN
TEXAS!
Hmmmm like what is this? Some turn
away in nervous laughter, the rest suck on
straws and pray its over soon.
When the song ends, however, an ugly pause
ensues. Somethings wrong with the guitar.
Theres trouble stirring. Seconds later, theres
this ashen-faced nut behind the keyboard
shouting into his mic, very loudly but very
slowly, again and again and again:
WHATS THE MATTER WITH YOU
BASTARDS?. . . WHATS THE MATTER
WITH YOU BASTARDS? . . . WHATS THE
MATTER?

38 NNMMEE OORRIIGGIINNAALLSS
??

The Birthday Party:

Mick Harvey, Nick
Cave, Phil Calvert,
Tracy Pew and
Roland S Howard.
Jelly and ice cream
not pictured

intellect to a raw power, that original sin which

Iggy Stooge so rightly perceived as Laughing at
you and me
But the Birthday Party do not suffer from
delusions of grandeur.
I mean fuck it, says Nick Cave, what were
trying to do is the biggest musical clich in the
world. Its just that some people forget the clich.
Can you imagine Echo & The Bunnymen trying
to let themselves go?

1981

heads must burn

NME, 17 October 1981, p29

He sprawls across the bar, nding his drink.

I think its really important to rely on clichs
like Suicide did. Not that it sounds like a clich.
As a matter of fact I think King Ink is one of the
best songs ever written. That song can become so
intense it puts me on another planet, though
I dont think the recorded version is at all good.
The record, as a cultural event, is a very
limited concept. With the cover and everything,
it can be much more than just the music.
The Birthday Party have come to shake us
out of our inhibitions. They militate against the
sedative boundaries of Pop.
Cave: Theres a real need for an intelligent
but aggressive group in London. All the
treasured groups are just so softcore.
At one time there was a real
upsurge of new young groups,
like The Pop Group before
they sacriced the music

for that soapbox, toilet-roll politico.

Pew: Our last two London gigs have been the
best. Before that the audiences only lost control
when they were told to, like Pavlovian dogs.
Cave: Compared to the gigs in Australia,
especially in Sydney, theyre nothing. You
remember when that girl was slicing me up with
a key, Tracy? In Australia, you really feel youre
turning decent people into monsters.
Were not setting ourselves up as some
kind of demonic force, its just that things are
more successful when they become blind and
unconscious. You feel anything could happen.
Is popular music culture an important thing?
Cave: When the history of rock music is
written which, since its practically dead, will
be soon itll just be remembered as a sordid
interruption of normality.
Pew: Rock will be remembered as the

anus of culture. Not Del Shannon but Iggy Pop.

Cave: The point is that the creative process
is not some fucking craft. WERE A LIVING
MUSICAL CLICHE.

The Birthday Party started life as The Boys Next

Door. We went through a year in Australia
playing the most disgusting kind of shit. Like
[their 1979 LP] Door, Door, Cave recalls.
We were a bunch of snivelling little poofs,
Pew interjects.
So what happened?
Howard stares into his drink for an answer.
It was just a case of natural progression.
Yeah, like the state of a persons mind before
he drops acid to the trip itself. Tell us another.
Its the honest truth, he protests, things just
got a little wilder, thats all.
Thats obvious. It was on the 1980 LP The
Birthday Party that perennial inuences such
as the Stooges and Beefheart and more
recent ones like Pere Ubu and The Pop
Group began to coalesce in Caves
and Howards songwriting. The result
is unique and unmissable.
By this time, the group had been
so inspired by the weird sounds
imported from possible goldmines
abroad they decided it was time to leave.
Their sights naturally settled on England.
Cave clears his throat with an evil grin.
Coming to London has been one of the most
disillusioning experiences of my life. When we
arrived, we saw this package show at the Lyceum,
with Echo & The Bunnymen, A Certain Ratio,

Rock will be remembered

as the anus of culture
The Teardrop Explodes and so forth and
well, Ive never been able to take English music
seriously since. It was horrible.
The Birthday Party arrived in Britain just
as the last, perhaps most intense vestiges of
punk energy were burning themselves out:
the anger, the revolt, the sensuality went into a
coma. Perhaps as a result, The Birthday Partys
wake-up call has won them the kind of critical
approval whose terms simply dont apply to the
likes of Spandau Ballet. Release The Bats, their
voodoo rockabilly anthem, saw three weeks
at the top of the alternative singles chart. Their
latest LP, Prayers On Fire, has been in the indie
LP charts ever since its release. And attendance
at London gigs has been growing all the time.
After the year of pop, 1980, The Birthday
Party realised the solution was TO ATTACK.
So in the words of A Dead Song:
HIT IT! WITH WORDS LIKE
THOU SHALT NOT
THIS IS THE END.
NME ORIGINALS

39

mad eyed screamers

aint pretty, but theyre a welcome

antidote to the age of Ultravox.
Colin Irwin

MM, 28 March 1981, p18

THE CURE
Primary
(Fiction)

MM, 26 September 1981, p14

This is a triumphant return to The

Cures rushing, rhythmic roots
after the limpid wanderings of the
Seventeen Seconds album.
Robert Smith has rediscovered
the ne-tuning control installed
in his unusual musical sensibility,
and as a result Primary is
unbearably urgent, matching a
new-found sense of space with
brilliantly focussed precision.
Smiths propulsive guitar drone
is punctuated by crashing waves
of percussion, and his voice oats
yearningly over the top.
Its oddly like a more tightly
reined U2, and is a far better
pretext for a national holiday than
the forthcoming Royal Wedding.
Adam Sweeting

THE CREATURES
Mad Eyed Screamer/So
Unreal/But Not Them/
Wild Thing/Thumb
(Polydor)

NME, 4 July 1981, P31

BAUHAUS
The Passion Of Lovers
(Beggars Banquet)

The desperation of losers

Adrian Thrills

insensitivity by a band whove

overcome my inherent distrust
of Australians with a series of
hugely entertaining interviews.
Both tracks here wield similar
characteristics brutal and bloody
amid a volley of drums
and arrogant bravado.
The Birthday Party are the
kind of boys who bopped the
teacher while the rest of the class
sniggered and played with their
geometry sets. They certainly

MM, 25 July 1981, p23

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Arabian Nights
(Polydor)

MM, 23 May 1981, p27

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Spellbound

RETNA

(Polydor)

40

For a group thats accused,

and rightly so sometimes, of
hiding behind a pretentious
smokescreen of art, they dont
half make great singles. This is
one of them. Archetypal Siouxsie
vocal, set to a strident, even
military feel, that just takes off and
never lets go. As exhilarating as
Ricky Villas winner last Thursday
and you know how great that was.
Paulo Hewitt

NME ORIGINALS

More menacing childhood

memories dredged up and
dressed up in tired old riffs.
Siouxsie sounds disinterested;
McGeoch wrenches out the
standard guitar atmospherics.
Thin, brittle, forgettable; no push,
no magic; avoid this voodoo.
Allan Jones
MM, 22 August 1981, p12

THE BIRTHDAY
PARTY
Blast Off/Release The Bats
(4AD)

Three-minute horror movie

soundtracks of jarring

The Creatures:
some people will
do anything to
get on TV

I hear the sound of distant

drums again. The Sandie Shaw
of yesterdays punk, Siouxsie
Banshee delivers her usual
atmospheric vocals over Budgies
lonely percussion.
Its spread over a double-45
soft-porn epic that includes a
lame repeat of The Troggs nest
two minutes and ten seconds.
Jane Birkin was steamier than this.
Ian Pye

Chapter 4

DEREK RIDGERS

1982

Last Year I Was 21

MM, 27 FEBRUARY 1982, p11

The sisterhood of terror

From Detroit, pretending to destroy themselves before anybody else could, came Iggy &The Stooges
From Leeds, threatening to destroy everybody else in a multi-megaton pre-emptive strike, came
The Sisters Of Mercy. Adam Sweeting has a terrifying experience with an extremely dangerous group

nleashed into the no-mans-land

of Vanbrugh College dining room
(c/o York University), The Sisters
Of Mercy are four men in pursuit
of renegade drum machine Dr
Avalanche. No respecter of anything,
the doctor careers ahead manically
like a slavering Doberman taking
Norman Wisdom for a walk.
Attached to the mic like it was
a failing life-support system is
Spiggy, alias Andy, a skinny blackclad thing from the corners of the
night, kept alive by ginger beer.
These are the nest legs
in rocknroll, he boasts later.
These legs are thinner than any
of the Delta 5s legs. These legs
are the thinnest in Leeds.
Spiggy has a high opinion of
himself and his group. Were
not a provincial band, were
a MAJOR ENTITY. Theres
no reason we
should be
compressed
into this sort of
hicks-from-thesticks mentality,
which is so
damning. Its hard
being a cult band when
you really wanna be immense.
Theres no reason we shouldnt

and I think, er, Hunter Thompson, he was

twigging something.
As Dr Avalanche pumps through the PA
like a battery of AK-47s, the bespectacled Ben
Gunn cowers behind his guitar at the back
of the stage. A slight and tremulous gure,
how could he be caught up in this hideous
barrage of sound? He wont tell me, and he
wont have his picture taken.
Next to and in front of him, other guitarist
Gary Marx has no such scruples. A burly
gure in boots and thick socks, he storms
and rages through the songs, aying chords
with his hands and crushing the stage with
his feet. On bass, the stocky and stalwart Jon
Langford seems to be in control of his new
career he used to drum for The Mekons.
And whatever you do, dont compare
The Sisters Of Mercy to Bauhaus.
We made a tape once and took it down to
Rough Trade. Geoff Travis gave it one listen,
it was 18 minutes long, lotsa tracks, tapped
his feet all the way through and turned
round and said, Its like Bauhaus.
Youre continually coming up against
people like that. They work in weird and
wonderful ways, their marvels to perform.
Spiggy oozes a sickly sort of charisma,
which is surprising considering his lank
black hair and specs.
All the people who have asked me for
autographs have been under 16 and female.
Its amazing, when you go out and play that
raw sort of thing its not pretty.

Eldritch, aka
Spiggy: skinny
legs, big fat ego

be able to carry on playing more or

less like we do at the moment and
be IMMENSE.
Soon you will be able to
purchase a single from the
Sisters called Adrenochrome,
a double A-side with Body
Electric (sing it!).
Adrenochrome is
like a theme for the band
really, Spiggy reports,
inasmuch as I wake up a
lot of mornings and I look
at the wall, and Im not sure
if its the wall or the ceiling,

Through the boiling rage of massed

guitars and mechanik percussion, its
possible to discern the odd word that Spiggy
is spitting out. Ah yes, 1969
Spig: Its the rst song off the rst Stooges
album the rst album being the best,
whatever The Birthday Party say.
The Sisters Of Mercy all-time order of
merit: There was one great heavy metal
group and that was the Stooges, and theres
only two bands around that can touch them,
and theyre Motorhead and The Birthday
Party. Were not as good as Motorhead but
were better than The Birthday Party. That
makes us pretty damn good.

TOM SHEEHAN

All the people whove asked me for autographs

have been under 16 and female. Its amazing

1982
Nick The Stripper
on stage at the
Venue, London

MM, 27 February 1982, p27

THE BIRTHDAY PARTY/

LYDIA LUNCH
Drunk On The Popes Blood/The Agony
Is The Ecstasy
(4AD)

NME, 13 March 1982, p51

The Birthday Party The venue, London

PETER ANDERSON

hings werent looking

here rhythm is compressed
bright. The Birthday
to a disconcerting on-beat
Partys bassist, Tracy Pew, is
stiffness and vocals to a mere
back home doing time on a
gutteral rambling. The effect
labour farm, and his temporary
is compulsive. Some of the
replacement, Barry Adamson,
earlier numbers still prove
had only had one rehearsal.
troublesome, for theres no
But all fears were promptly
doubt that more than one
allayed by a volley of intense
of the groups arrangements
and hectic songs which reduced
outstrip their current musical
most of the spectators to
capabilities. Zoo-Music Girl,
speechlessness. Let us make
for example, has grown too
certain things clear from the
shambolic for its own good.
start: The Birthday Party
Chaos, however, is The
appal by revelling in the pain
Birthday Partys speciality.
of artice the desperate
With the stage in its normal
drive of will to emotion
state of disarray, bouncers and
through exhibition. Theirs is a
stage-hands scrambling about
genuinely ritualistic theatre of
madly in pursuit of overturned
frustration, a farrago of sound
microphones and tripped
so visceral it can only produce
wires, Nick Cave was at his
gestures of exhaustion and
most gloriously irresponsible.
despair. Some terrible void at
So perfect a parody is he of
the heart of human energy has
the rocknroll egomaniac
been reached here.
On Friday night, the group
revisited their surreal junkyard
of forms and images with a
higher intoxication than ever.
That forlorn and shimmering
ballad Shes Hit has taken on
added starkness and splendour,
perfectly brought out on
this occasion by Adamsons
languorous bass.
Previously unheard were
Dead Joe and Hamlet, two
brutal, mythopoeic parables
Cave: Religious
shorn even of the groups
conagration of
usual semi-jazz structures:
melos? Moi?

that he possesses an almost

intimidating innocence.
This group is an explosion
of sensuality and laughter at
the desensitised mediocrity
of our lives. They are our new
Rolling Stones, but holding
back their proles in shadow,
in the penumbra of myth. In
them jazz races with punk
and rocknroll slips on funk,
a collision of forms whose
domain is lust suspended in the
timeless zone of excess bodily
exhumation and spiritual
disease. Here Jerry Lee Lewis
meets The Modern Dance,
and sex meets death.
Who else is using words
so stridently as a musical
medium of rhetoric? They are
the religious conagration of
melos itself.
Barney Hoskyns

So much mumbojumbos been made

of adolescent art, of
pop or rock voicing
the vainglorious
views of each
new generation,
washing the sins
of the fathers (and
mothers) from the hands of the
kids, that its long been forgotten that the
real truth lies in tantrum.
Most lucrative noise is and always has
been made by (non) musicians old enough
to know better, but never prepared to admit
or accept it. Its not a well-aimed kick against
growing up and its values, but a blind sulk
and shout about already being there. Pop is a
toddlers plea for selsh attention, a me, me,
me, me not an I told you so. Its mean and
its meaningless. And thats its great beauty.
The Birthday Party, more than most,
appreciate the perverse practicality of
making a row. Theyre obnoxious, so much so
that they piss people off. Not only the clichd
old fuddy-duddies and traditional church
wardens, but also the hipsters and bofns
who fawn and dote over pop ash and fact.
The Birthday Party are awful. Subversively
awful. Awfully great. Awesomely brilliant.
Drunk On The Popes Blood is their second
really BAD long-playing record. Recorded
live at the Venue, it struggles in vain
to capture and/or castrate the ranting
confrontation of their stage act. Get involved
say something! Nick Cave screams while
Beefheart is brutally butchered behind.
Back beyond basics, this is what punk
ought to be like angry and futile with
nothing to say and barely the words to
express it. The critics turn pop into protest
because that gives it a comforting logic, an
aim and direction that renders it open to
sane comprehension. Sheer bloody-minded
pointlessness is too mad and too menacing.
The Birthday Party are violently pointless.
Thats why theyre important. Their 16
minutes of sheer hell is all ugly feedback.
Unlistenably listenable. Love it to death.
Lydia Lunchs unpleasant squawking on
the other side is even more potent. I hate it. It
neither exasperates nor elevates. It irritates.
And that, or course, is exactly the point.
Ah art! Dont you just love it?
Steve Sutherland
NME ORIGINALS

43

All We Ever Wanted

NME, 20 March 1982, p24

Bauhaus:
Breaking down the

walls of art-ache

When we heard that you were going to interview us, we came up with two possibilities:
a) being physical violence, and b) being a reasoned discussion. We decided to plump for the latter,
but this doesnt mean that the former isnt in with a f ighting chance Victim: Paul Morley

xcerpts from a conversation: Number

Two weak knees anticipate the kiss?
Murphy: by intending to provoke
us, maybe a reaction youll get will be one of
absolute anger and hurt.
Jay: You could have got your head kicked in
if we were Killing Joke.
The days labourer: Ive been through this
one (a similar situation) with Killing Joke.
Murphy: I know
Jay: The initial reaction when we read your
review and then heard that you were going to
interview us, we though how we were going to
approach it. We came up with two possibilities:
a) being physical violence, and b) being a
reasoned discussion. We decided to plump for
the latter, but this doesnt mean that the former
isnt in with a ghting chance
Excerpts from a conversation: Number Three
sex times technology equals the future.
Murphy: Ive always thought that as far as
Bauhaus were concerned what we have to say or
theorise about what we do isnt important.
The actual act of listening to the music is
the be-all and end-all of what were about. We
dont really want to analyse it all
the time, we dont want to have to
speak about it. We do it
The days labourer: Arent
individual interpretations from
within the group an important
thing, especially having made the decision to
accept the interview situation?
Murphy: One thing I nd really boring is
when an artist talks about his work in a really
over-the-top way. It just really spoils it for me.
If you like something, its there

The days labourer: But because of the

system that you operate within, a withdrawal or
a vagueness tends to suggest that youre merely
trying to create a mystique, an enigma.
Murphy: Its not that if were going to
try and label our work, which a lot of the time
comes from our subconscious, it will be a wrong
labelling. What we might say about one aspect
of what we do might be totally wrong because
we are not really sure ourselves. A lot of what
I do is totally spontaneous. It comes from my
emotions and, uh, how can you
Jay: We believe in the beauty of an idea,
without grinding it into the ground. If
something is working, no matter how simple it
is, we try and maintain it without elaborating
upon it. Thats really important to us.
Ash: We think that a lot of the best ideas are
the simple ones.
Jay: Thats nearly always the case. If
something is overworked it will show.
The days labourer: But your stage
presentation does seem to be overworked.
Ash: We feel that if the stage is there, why
just stand on it and play you might as well
put a record on. You are there to entertain to a

is received that you go over the top and the idea

gets smothered by incidentals.
Jay: No its just theres a belief in the idea
that we have, a passionate belief, it really is
Ash: Also, when were on stage, our feelings
are concentrated into one hour its all
intensied and enlarged. Its all going into one
hour, not one week or one lifetime. Its all got to
be condensed and so you put everything into it.
Additional remarks: One one little streak of
grey that matched the wall.
Bauhaus are recording some new music at
Morgan Studios in North London. The group
are sat close together when I arrive, collected
around a small mixing desk. Theyre almost
holding hands. And I am completely ignored.
I am dirt the winds blown in. They dont care
for me! Its not surprising.
Recently I reviewed their live show which
they say is an extreme but vigorously valid
integration of the very anxious stuff theyre
about and implied that at the core of their
entertainment lay a lump of shit. I suggested
that their heart was made up of sick.
In the little studio my presence is nally
tightly acknowledged.
The studio is probably well
heated, but its very cold.
When you came in, singer Pete
Murphy shudders later, it was a
real sick feeling it was horrible
Who would have thought that a collection
of words, a pile of images, teased together and
presented in such a trivialised context could
cause such antipathy: but then half a wink in the
wrong place can cause murder.
We move to the studio bar. I try to be

I implied that at the core of

Bauhaus lay a lump of shit

44

NME ORIGINALS

certain degree. I have the feeling that you think

that it is all really worked out, but it isnt. Its
totally spontaneous.
The days labourer: I detected an overcompensation you have a particular idea or
image and youre so eager to make sure that it

1982

FIN COSTELLO/REDFERNS

Bauhaus: (l to r)
Kevin Haskins,
Daniel Ash, Peter
Murphy, David Jay

friendly; theyre content to stay blank. They

make it very clear that I have bruised them.
All I wanted to do was blast away the sheets of
vagueness that have covered Bauhaus.
I turn on my tape recorder. They turn on
theirs. The conversation will be recorded by two
cassettes. This is serious: its surprising. This is
desperate: its terric.
Drummer Kevin Haskins is prepared to
thump me: hes so quiet that at one point
Murphy asks him if hes alright. His brother,
bass player David Jay, consistently looks at me as
if to say who is this puddle of drabness and how
dare he come along and question our radiance?
Guitarist Daniel Ash is as reasonable as I am.
To Bauhaus I am just another pop journalist.
I am just a days labourer.

Excerpts from a conversation: Number Six

let us be friends even if we cant hold hands.
The days labourer: I have a very apathetic
view of Bauhaus the dark side of the damp
patch. Do you pay attention to all sorts of
things, messy things and nice things?
Ash: Its all in there its just that we seem
to get picked up on the dark things
Jay: Its not as though we have a whole set
of Bela Lugosis Dead. I think that record has
cast a backward shadow over everything and its
been hard to move out into the sun.
Excerpts from a conversation: Number Eight
creative activity can undoubtedly act as a
defence against all kinds of threat.
Jay: We all wanted to do something where

there was a certain amount of return. We felt

we were putting a lot into things like a job and
getting nothing out of it
Ash: I think initially we were ghting for
something better than the mundane its also
to do with gaining respect
The days labourer: From who?
Ash: From people around you. You want to
make a statement saying, I am worthwhile, I am
necessary, Ive got something to do Its about
saying that you are worthwhile as a person
Murphy: Youre gaining self-respect as
well and everybody has potential everyones
wonderful this is really idealistic oh shit
butwe should all search for ourselves, learn
to love yourself before you can love others. You
have to go through shit. Or life
NME ORIGINALS

45

Happy Hunting Ground

Excerpts from a conversation: Number 15 why

are you wasting your time with snowmen when
the basement needs cleaning?
Haskins: if someone is working in a
factory and they have Radio 1 on if we came
on it would make them stop for a moment.
Ash: Oh, I very much doubt it Pop music
is for young people, and theyre pretty mixed
up anyway Im categorising, putting people
in boxes, but its like when they get to their
thirtieth year they wont be listening to pop
music, or pop music wont be inuencing their
lifestyle even if they are listening to it. It will be
part of their past.
What Im trying to say is that pop music isnt
really that important, because it only affects
people when theyre mixed up and young
Murphy: Thats like one sad fact
Ash: Its not necessarily sad
Murphy: That space which you can achieve,
its potentially a really valuable vehicle and if
you can, if you use that space, and if youre able
to enlighten that is amazing, youre asking for
the world, youre asking for a saviour
The days labourer: I know an avid fan of
the group whose attitude is, Oh theyll never
be on Top Of The Pops, theyre not that sort of
group, yet I feel it can be the only logical, useful
conclusion for a group like Bauhaus. They have
got to be in that space, as a cult theyre surely
wasting their time.

46

NME ORIGINALS

Shivers down
your spine:
Bauhaus live

Our guitarist is an accident victim.

Im a weed. Our singer is A Mouth
Jay: That is exactly what we think
Haskins: Right from the very start weve
hated that label of being underground. If you
listen to our singles, any of them could be
potential hits we were really pissed off that
they werent hits, any of them.
We want to go on Top Of The Pops. A lot of
people do take it for granted that we wouldnt
go on but they couldnt be more wrong. You can
reach more people through that programme
than you would doing three or four tours, it
would be absolutely ridiculous not to
Jay: In a way its to our advantage that its
taken this long for us to break through because
now were
Murphy: more determined.
Ash: If wed suddenly catapulted into view
with the second single I think wed all be drug
addicts by now
Excerpts from a conversation: Number 13
how much applause, after all, has God got for
his troubles over the years?
The days labourer: Have Bauhaus always
been aware of how they could use certain
aspects of the group, such as Murphy as
conventional frontman, to attain commercial
success or has this developed recently?
Ash: There are various vehicles to be used.
Murphy: Although the live show is an honest
representation of our music, were also aware
of how it will draw people to come and see us
because of our reputation as a really good live
band. And then they might nd out about us
The days labourer: And once people become
aware of you and youre no longer underground,
is that the achievement: Bauhaus become part of
their day, along with the food, the commercials,
the radio?
Murphy: Not their day once a month
The days labourer: But is that all you can
expect to make an occasional interruption?
Ash: I think as far as music is concerned
that is all you can expect. Thats as powerful
as it can be. For example, PiL, their stuff is
very intimidating, its very strong, but it does
make an impact to a certain degree. It isnt that

powerful only a certain amount of people are

going to draw from it, and accept it, because
you cant force anything down peoples throats.
You only have a certain amount of strength to
make a statement. Its not that potent because it
doesnt last for long and there are hundreds of
other groups.
The days labourer: So can Bauhaus claim to
have any distinctive value?
Ash: It is a distinctive value but only to a
certain amount of people. We cant do anything
about that, because people are only going to
draw on something that they want, that they
relate to. Obviously we dont think that were
just another band lost among hundreds.
Excerpts from a conversation: Number 21
and then we kissed goodbye.
The days labourer: Do you envisage a
situation where Bauhaus doesnt exist?
Ash: Well, Bauhaus wont exist for ever
it might not exist next week. It might exist for
another ve years you cant say We have
other interests. But we seem to be climbing the
ladder slowly, so we continue
Additional remarks: Two do not think I
underestimate your great concern.
The interview has been tidied, arranged and
edited. It fails to evoke the Bauhaus art-ache:
sex or nightmare. It fails because I do not enjoy
their music and so placed a continual emphasis
on pressurising the members to justify their
existence and examine their work, and because
the group are reluctant to explain their work.
Perhaps Bauhaus are healthy. Perhaps they
are healing people. I wouldnt like to say. I am
only the days labourer. I get merely a bland,
unsensational impression of a group who are
committed, idealistic and questioning its
still very cold and I cant wait to see them
on Top Of The Pops.
Excerpts from a conversation: Number 17
the difcult bit to grasp.
Ash: It all boils down to getting that shiver
down your spine.

SANTOS BASONE/LFI

Excerpts from a conversation: Number Ten

what young man is by nature diligent, sober
and regular in his habits?
The days labourer: Was the initial impetus
to escape Northampton? Did you want to be pop
stars or were there greater intentions involved?
Jay: Not greater intentions, but not pop stars
either
Murphy: No, but that is part of it. For me
a part of it, not all of it
The days labourer: And that part ts into
the whole?
Murphy: No, nothing ts in it is Im not
Bauhaus, hes not, hes not, hes not
Ash: Its always been and always will be
four very disparate views and attitudes its
a mental chicane: all the ideas colliding and
meeting in the middle
Murphy: I think we really respect each
other well, I hope so. Its like a real love
relationship I really miss them when Im
away from them It was my rst experience
of creating something and when you live with
them on tour and work with them it really
brings you together, it really brings you close.
Jay: But its not all love and peace
Murphy: But neithers marriage, dear you
and Ann cant love each other and be smiling at
each other all the time
Jay: Im not saying that Im trying to give
a clear view of the situation theres a lot of
friction there. Its central to the whole thing
The days labourer: How would you describe
the four inputs that knot together?
Jay: Our guitarist is an accident victim, Im
a weed, our drummer is a plain Ron and our
singer is A Mouth
The days labourer: What is the truth?
Jay: Ah

NME, 1 May 1982, p52

Southern Death Cult/

Sex Gang Children
The Clarendon, London

ndi Hayward fronts Sex

Gang Children with a
pretension to angst that
would shake Pete Murphy. This
pained face, painted white,
fails to convey
the feelings so
protractedly
projected he
strikes you as a
howling Marcel
Marceau lost for words and
signalling rejection. This is a
Sex Gang Child.
The name of the band

may invoke perverse and

paedophilic images, but they
fail to live up to their name.
There is no overt or even subtle
sexuality. They are sterile and

braves and how! Southern

Death Cult come to sacrice a
prepared audience. The band
enter and the war paint daubs
the fans with re. Ian is more
a warrior than Adam
ever was pushing
the primitive drums,
encouraging the tribal
war of sound.
They cross the plain
between Theatre Of Hates
energy and the dark, percussive
dance of Joy Division. Strict
co-ordination is their essence
and their strength.
Lyrically the songs vary
from the polemic Moya
to the rampant chant
of Fatman. The band
are not great creators or
innovators they are a
four-piece with all the
restrictions that implies
but they are savage, and
they blow fresh with that
same Western breeze
that whistles through
Westworld or Your
Cassette Pet.
The followers know
the signs and read the
signals, all a perversion
of Indian pride, in
songs like Vivisection
and Today. All this
is enhanced by the
shaman-like qualities
of the singer, wearing
full war paint; this is
Crazy Horse coaxing
the faithful into his
war dance.
The tribal factor
has been exploited
before, but only in a
fashionable sense all
suede, Worlds End
and Kings Road. This
is REAL Northern
heart and soul. When
Southern Death Cult
charge London again
it will be for scalps and
for the happy hunting
ground.
David Dorrell

KEVIN CUMMINS/LFI

This is Crazy Horse coaxing

the faithful into his war dance

Ian Astbury:
a man called
Hoarse

uncoordinated warm where

they should burn, tepid where
they should freeze.
Movement from graves to

NME, 8 May 1982, p31

THE CURE
Pornography
(Fiction)

It wont improve your

social life or relieve
you of your load, and
this music provides
an antidote to
nothing much at all,
though it may clear out your
system. But what Pornography does show
is that The Cure do have a certain air for
identifying symptoms.
This record portrays and parades its
currency of exposed futility and naked fear
with so few distractions or adornments, and
so little sense of shame. It really piles it on.
The Cure have collected the very purest
feelings endemic to their age, and held them
right on the spot in their most unpleasantly
real form. Here is an album written from
the knife-edge of despair, and as a piece of
craftsmanship in expressive sound, it is a
very big, very harrowing achievement.
The drums, guitars, voice and production
style are pressed scrupulously together
in a murderous unity of surging, textured
mood. We are better off not picking about
at particular parts of the whole: too close a
look at the poetic permutations on the lyric
sheet, taken with the occasionally irksome
whine of Robert Smith, and he and his
friends can quickly become the tiresomely
self-analytical young sensitives Ive always
feared The Cure might be.
Pornography was not designed to be
probed, but taken en bloc as a dense wash
of emotional colour, portraying one soul on
a leash, ghting the panic in the dark. And,
as such, it really works. The confessional
returns, fragile, frightened, horribly forlorn,
and very nely drawn. A killer of its kind.
Dont have too much fun, now.
Dave Hill
NME ORIGINALS

47

Raise The Teutonic

of, their awed but furious

debut, Prayers On Fire, but
it also signals the end of a
phase, maybe even the end
of the band. Welcome to the
car crash/You cant tell the boys
from the girls, can deservedly
claim a premium place in this
hacks hierarchy of tasteless
punter-baiting, but to what
end and at what cost?
Prayers was a genuine
shock, a aunting arrogance,
a ick-knife slash and a boot
in the groin of last years
short-lived trends. Junkyard
nds the Party
comfortably
assimilated into the
scene as welcomed,
accomplished
shock-rockers;
a species to be
studied but no
longer a startling
experience.
Weve outlived
their aggressively onedimensional examination
of the atrocious potential of
language and sound; weve
moved on while they ounder
in a seemingly inescapable rut,
merely shifting the emphasis
from the soggy bass mix of
Prayers to the arid guitar
scratch of Junkyard.
Dont get me wrong:

MM, 10 July 1982, p16

THE BIRTHDAY PARTY

Junkyard
(4AD)

Three months ago, Id have given

you this: Junkyard is brilliant;
an essential, abrasive album,
something to sort out once and for
all the malcontents from the chartmesmerised morons.
Now Im not so sure.
Living with The
Birthday Party is much
like living with pain you
numb to the hurt with
the passing of time.
Not to say Nick Caves
grotesque parody of
a rocknroll messiah
doesnt stink as bad
as it always did, its
just that a skeletal
production and the most cruelly
callous of lyrics liberally battered
by primeval grunts cant hope to
emulate the theatre of the brutal

48

NME ORIGINALS

live confrontations, cant disguise a

formula struggling and strangled at
the end of its tether.
Great rock or pop should act as
a springboard, a jolt
for your adrenalin,
a catalyst for your
emotions, a trigger
for your reexes
to run ruinously
apeshit. Junkyard
nds The Birthday
Party foreclosing
on interpretation
and demanding
attention like the spoiled brats they
mercilessly seek to dismember.
Junkyard is, without doubt, an
improvement on, and extension

lyrically, musically, monotonously,

magnicently, Junkyard spews
all over anything youll have heard
all year. A harrowing pantomime
of the preposterous power of pop,
it maliciously delights in exposing
self-inicted wounds and fertilising
them with gangrenous germs. A
skirmish with Big Jesus Trashcan
should suitably offend.
But such wanton offence can
only command brief attention and
recorded revulsion soon subsides
to neglect. Uneasy listening is no
longer enough. Almost ironically,
this partys been fun. Pity now its
over. Therell never be such garbage
in Honeys sack again.
Steve Sutherland

NME, 23 October 1982, p30

BAUHAUS
The Skys Gone Out
(Beggars Banquet)

Dark Entries was a wonderful single

a shuddering, wired monolith
of implacable ill-intent. Since
then Bauhaus have consistently
disappointed, and this half-studio,
half-live double album does nothing
to change my view.
Bauhaus undeserved popularity
demonstrates rocks time-hallowed
need for Princes of Darkness,
but razor-sharp
cheekbones and a
style that went down
with the Teutonic
does not entitle
them to the Stones
(or Doors, Velvets,
Stooges) satanic
raiment.
Their fundamental
fault is the simpleminded equation of a lurid,
melodramatic narcissism with
the elegant trappings of terminal
weltschmertz. Pete Murphy comes
across like David Bowie imitating
Jacques Brel declaiming a pastiche
of Lautramont backed by the
early Banshees. As silly as that.
What Bauhaus believe to exude
the alluring scent of the forbidden,
merely stinks of atulent rhetoric.
But the band that made Dark
Entries and romped with such brio
through that camp impersonation
of Ziggy Stardust cant be all bad.
The Three Shadows and All We
Ever Wanted Was Everything faintly
evoke the sinister musical-box of
Lou Reeds Berlin or even Bowies
Kooks. Exquisite Corpse concludes
the studio album as Bauhaus
resounding riposte to A Day In The
Life, though not half so frightening.
Side One is more turgid, starting
with a crude version of Enos Third
Uncle, but it recovers on the last two
numbers, Swing The Heartache
and Spirit. The latter sings the
praises of Bauhaus communion
with their audience of worshippers.
Its set to one of those pounding
anthems of the sort popularised by
the late, lamented Skids. Curious.
The live set, titled Press The Eject
And Give Me The Tape, is a brutally
procient run-through of their
greatest hits, including John Cales
Rose Garden Funeral Of Sores, a
rather Blacker Mass than any of their
own songs. But the album ends on
a cheerful note with Dark Entries
which is where I came in.
Mat Snow

DAVID CORIO

The Birthday Party

throw good taste
and decency on
the barbie. Again

1982

People in A GlassHaus
Steve Sutherland (Christian) faces up to Bauhaus (Lions)

TOM SHEEHAN

t a pre-arranged whisper and nod from

the wings, Bauhaus bassist David Jay cut
the hack stone dead. Theres very little
spontaneous about Bau the hack had been
babbling when David smartly cut in
Thats a load of shit! Wed thought of this
literally hours ago so surely that indicates an
amount of spontaneity. This is all part of it
anyway. The whole point of this is to show
that an interview situation, far from being a
comfortable, informative gathering, is totally
absurd and bizarre so, to put it on stage in front
of an audience, simplies the abstract nature of
an interview and, therefore, shows it for what it
really is a load of old balls!
(Somewhere, high in the auditorium, the spirit
of Sir Robin Day guffaws: If you believe that youll
believe anything!)
Satised that the tumultuous whooping and
wailing signalled sort of psychological victory,

the bassist staged an animatedly agitated exit,

followed, rather sheepishly, by the rest of the
band. The hack, somewhat stupidly, stood his
ground, dismayed but barely rattled, and waited
for the barracking and hailing glasses to cease
before attempting to vindicate the idea of an
interview. His efforts were largely lost in catcalls,
encouraged by Jays sarcastic nal comment:
The journalist always has the last word!
Strange, thought the hack, swollen with
pride, that this sentence of prophetic spleen
should amount to the only sensible comment
that Bauhaus had mustered all evening!

Just how the hack found himself on stage at the

Lyceum and subsequently engaged in a heartto-heart with a band he hoped hed washed his
hands of forever is a rather protracted tale, but
one thats vital to grasp if any sense at all is to be
made of this extraordinary encounter.

MM, 30 October 1982, p24

In the 4 July 1981 issue of Melody Maker, the

hack had published his conclusions on a weekend
spent on tour with Bauhaus. The piece was
presented as Anarchy in Aylesbury and subtitled Steve Sutherland travels in the shadow of
Bowie with Bauhaus nothing new, nothing
startlingly original, the article merely sounded
out opinions already widely expressed by others
and subsequently echoed many times.
The band had baulked at every word,
contested every connotation and yet, 14 months
later, they seemed to be conceding an odd aboutface, putting Ziggy Stardust back in the charts.
The hack was intrigued; hadnt the band
already publicly chastised his assertions on stage?
Were Bauhaus perpetrating some perverse con or
had they simply gone stark, staring bonkers?
The hack decided to check for himself and
after a phone call to their press ofcer, Chris
King Carr, was informed that Bauhaus would
NME ORIGINALS

49

Hack In The Spotlight

grant him audience on their own terms
which involved two separate rooms in their
native Northampton and an interview conducted
over video. Sounded silly but a cracking good
story, so the hack unconditionally agreed.
Unfortunately fame, fortune and Top Of The
Pops put the kibosh on the whole idea as the
band were due to mime their hit for the cameras
the day the interview was supposed to take place.
Suddenly Bauhaus were overnight big shots
and the liaison was scheduled and rescheduled
according to their every passing whim.
Eventually it was mooted that the hack should
meet the band between their soundcheck and
their gig at the Lyceum. Then, in a bewildering
urry of late evening phone calls, King Carr
informed the hack that he was being set up.
Seems the band thought the hack should be
brought to the Lyceum where, without prior
warning, he would be bundled onto the stage to

about imitation were about humour um

DEATH, BLACKNESS But youve been very
brave to accept this offer and we appreciate that.
Hack: Why? I see an interview as a situation
where, if you want to read about somebody and
what they think about what theyre doing, it can
be quite a revealing thing.
PM: Well, the fact is, you were on tour in our
van, under our hospitality, hiding under a cloak
of friendliness and amiability and yet, when
the article came out, you absolutely turned and
showed yourself to be a very cynical, hypocritical
person. It was a very dirty trick to do.
Hack: You havent answered my question.
Daniel Ash: Why did we put out Ziggy
Stardust? Well, weve been tapping away at the
door of acceptability and it just seemed that the
door needed a fuckin good kick so we kicked it
out. Once inside the room we shall attempt to
follow up with original compositions.

I dont think anyone else could do a cover version of Ziggy

Stardust like weve done it. Its so dangerous so on edge.
conduct the interview in front of the audience,
in place of a pulled-out support act. The hack,
again, agreed but when King Carr informed
the band their scheme had been rumbled, they
ummed and aahed for 24 hours, nally giving
the go-ahead hours before the event.
(The spirit of Robin Day whispers in the hacks
ear: THAT indicates an amount of spontaneity?
Tell us another!)
And so the stage was set: ve microphones and
a table with glasses of water, all in an elaborate
attempt on the bands behalf to belittle the hack,
conduct the conversation in front of witnesses so
the little rat couldnt wilfully misinterpret their
words and to prove, through their theatrical
mock-up, that all interviews are worthless.
The hack, for his part, was determined to get
a good story, to escape the proceedings with life,
limb and self-respect intact, to belittle Bauhaus
as Bowie plagiarists and to show that it was
only an interview situation with Bauhaus that is
totally absurd and bizarre.
The following events and conversations are
documented, as far as space allows, as near as
possible the way they occurred. Any additional
comments the hacks own home crowd if you
like are attributed to the spirit of Robin Day.
Those who want the grist without the gripes are
therefore advised to ignore his asides.

The Hack:

Good evening ladies and gentlemen.

Im Steve from Melody Maker and this is
Bauhaus, otherwise known as Ziggy Stardust
And The Spiders From Mars. Im here because
Ive written stuff about Bauhaus that hasnt
pleased them, so maybe the rst thing we should
take up is that I accused you of being second-rate
Bowie copyists, which you denied and yet heres
Ziggy Stardust. What do you think of that?
Peter Murphy: Were very angry and very
pleased as well. This is a really good occasion
to get him back. In effect its changing the
whole interview situation into something else;
its using it as performance, something very
dangerous, which is what were about nothing

50

NME ORIGINALS

Hack: So what youre saying

is you took the easy way out?
PM: No! I dont think
anyone else could do a cover
version of Ziggy like weve
done it. Its so dangerous
so on edge
DA: And we know the
chords!
Hack: OK, it was a brave
song to tackle, but what have
you brought to it that wasnt
there already?
PM: Weve reincarnated it,
we havent attempted to make
it any different. The original
version was excellent, no way
could we rearrange it. Weve put our heart into
that song because its part of our past, part of our
interest when we were young. The way we did it
on Top Of The Pops was also very humorous.
Hack: OK, but as Ive been cast as the cynic,
it seems to me youve been releasing a string of
singles which werent getting anywhere and so
you used Ziggy to get there.
PM: We did a string of singles which should
have got somewhere but never did.
Hack: Everybody says that.
PM: But were different!
Hack: OK, lets talk about the new album,
The Skys Gone Out. Isnt making it a double
package with an album of old live numbers the
oldest marketing ploy in the business?
David Jay: Fuck off!
PM: Of course we want people to hear our
music.
Hack: But what has it achieved that hasnt
been achieved before?
PM: Its up to the audience to interpret it
in whatever way you want. We feel theres a
progression there. Full stop.
Hack: Progressions a very easy word to use.
From what Ive heard, the new album sounds
much the same as your others melodramatic
but pretty empty. It doesnt seem to say anything,

Media circus:
Melody Makers
Steve Sutherland
(centre) on stage
with Bauhaus at the
Lyceum, London

it uses stark, crude images in a dilettante way

with a little bit of reggae, a little Bowie, a little bit
of Eno I mean, who are you and what are you
saying? At the end youre left feeling as empty as
you started
DA: Thats up to the individual.
Hack: Thats a cop-out. What did you want
it to do?
DA: Making that album, we had a lot of fun.
Hack: Everybody says that.
(Spirit: There ensues an embarrassing series of
squabbles concerning the value of entertainment,
captive audiences and references to Des OConnor,
the hack elding platitudes, left, right and centre,
hurling them back in at the wicket. Sad to see
a band so sensitive that they resort to the oldest
trick in the book, adopting superior, sarcastic
detachment and patronising benevolence as if, in
humiliating one hack, they repudiate all criticism.)
Hack (some time later): Whats the point in
being in Bauhaus?
PM: What dyou mean, whats the point?
Were excellent and thats it. Were a sparkling
cell of activity, were really enjoying our work.
Hack: Why wont you answer my questions?
Why are you putting forward all this bullshit?
PM: What do you mean, not answering your
questions? Youre putting out all these comments

1983

You deal in Hammer horrorisms. I mean

lyrics about fishes piss Jesus Christ!
and opinions which are totally wrong. Why
should we bother to argue with them? Youre so
negative, so uninterested in what were doing,
youre not really attempting to understand
Hack: Well shouldnt you, in that case, be
thinking about the way you communicate to
people if Ive so obviously missed the point?
PM: Youre one of the people who shouldnt
listen to us. Why should you even interview us?

Moments later theyd stormed off stage. The

hack, head reeling, heart thumping, joined them
in their dressing room.
Hack: Very nicely rehearsed spontaneous
walkout! Very John Lydon 1977! Now that
charades over, when do I get the real interview?
DJ: That was it! Thats all!
David storms out and doesnt return for about
half an hour. Later he declines to stay for a photo
session and leaves after the show.
Hack: Surely he doesnt believe the sham out
there was serious. Come on! You cant just leave
it like that!
DA: OK. The idea of doing Ziggy Stardust
was partly a reaction to people like you who
were slagging us off as Bowie rip-offs. Its like
a statement that were not ashamed of: liking
David Bowie. Instead of running away from it
were admiring the guy. Full stop.
Hack: But I nd the whole idea of Ziggy so
pathetic because it doesnt say anything it just
creates myths for people to escape into. OK, so
Bowie made a few people dress up, moved on

and made them dress

a bit differently so
what?
DA: I get your
point now totally,
but what the hell are
That journalist is
you supposed to do?
interrupting my
meditation. Slay
Change the world?
him, my pretties
Hack: No but
we can try!
DA: Well were
not. Were not trying to change the world at all,
were trying to open peoples minds. We arent
interested in politics or political parties because
theyre all a fuckin waste of time.
I think you can open peoples minds
on a personal level its not about telling
other people what to do, its about suggesting
something and its up to them to take what they
want from the music.
Hack: But I dont think you suggest or open
up anything. The area you delve in is so small
and morbid. Its easy doom for a doomy time.
You may see humour in it, but I dont. What you
deal in is Hammer horrorisms. I mean lyrics
about shes piss Jesus Christ!
PM: Shall I dissect that lyric? Its not
Hammer horror. Its tapping my own experience
of here we go again the religious suppression
of a lot of people. Its like a mirror of the reaction
I experienced to the absurd images that my
teachers, for instance, put into me. I was very
impressionable at the time, very young and

they frightened me silly and now, after burying

them for years because theyre too painful to
remember, they come out and I write about it.
Its like tapping the subconscious, which is
something Bauhaus is very interested in doing.
Its not giving answers, its almost asking,
expressing the pus. I mean the sh symbol was
the original Christian symbol; it wasnt supposed
to be shocking, it was just an image I used
Hack: Thats exactly why an interview is so
valuable with a band like you. Who would have
guessed in a million years thats what the sh
image meant? See, Im prepared to believe youve
got something to say, but I still think youre so
off the mark you go beyond communicating
badly to not communicating at all.
PM: Well Id admit theres a lot of mask
there. Ive still got these inhibitions and if I
express them literally I think Im afraid of the
comeback from my family or whatever. But I can
read those lyrics like an objective reader and,
although theyre very blacked with mystique and
obscurity, I still nd them interesting.
Hack: But arent they dangerous? You
unleash an awful lot of energy
live, if not on record but
so few of your implications
get through that you excite
people, get em up, make em
angry and what do they do?
Punch each other! I call that
irresponsible
DA: Music of any
particular type, of 1982, can
only reect the times, how
people think it doesnt
actually say do this, do that.
Music is only a reection and
thats what we are.
PM: My view is that
you should never attempt
to be a philosopher until
youve reached a point of
understanding. Until that
point youre questioning and
whether people understand
that thats the only thing
I can do. Theres so much I
havent learned yet
Hack: But your fans see you as an idol!
PM: Thats a sad result of human need; like
someone to enact ones fantasies, to take them to
the edge and experience the edge for them.
DA: All we can do is be honest with ourselves.
If we started considering if what we do was
gonna upset somebody or have an adverse effect,
then we wouldnt be able to do anything. I think
its very unfortunate if the public like you say
they do take what we say as gospel. I would
never have imagined that to be the case!
(Spirit: The hack disappeared to lubricate
shattered nerves, Bauhaus prepared to dress down
for the show and Im left here to have the last say. It
seems Bauhaus may know what theyre on about,
but the fans who think theyre peddling solutions
and the foes who take them for trumped-up tarts
just arent catching the clues. Worshipped for almost
all the wrong reasons, Bauhaus poor handling of
the Lyceum asco proved they arent up to putting
their plans into practice. For fans, band and hack
alike, it must have seemed like a kick in the eye.)
NME ORIGINALS

51

Lets Go To Bed
And then there
were two: Lol
Tolhurst and
Robert Smith

s
e
l
b
a
r
u
c
in
The

MM, 18 December 1982, p18

Have The Cure split? Is Robert Smith joining the Banshees?

Does anybody care? Steve Sutherland investigates

52

NME ORIGINALS

The Bunnymen theres very few, but I think

theyve kept a sort of intensity.
Thats what I was always striving for
with The Cure, but there were far too many
things working against it really; things of
our own making like anti-image and all that
rubbish. That was probably a big mistake, not
establishing ourselves as personalities earlier.
The Cure always seemed to me to promote
a woolly, unvaried
imprecision, refusing to
entertain any conclusions.
That was through
apathy more than anything
else. As long as I would have
bought stuff that we were producing, then that
was reason enough for releasing the records.
There was never any idea of covering a
certain section of the market or broadening out
and appealing to more people. Ive never been a
public face, I wouldnt ever dare to presume that
people hold me up a some kind of gure and,
if they did, theyd be really stupid because Im
much too horrible to be a model for anybody.
You cant gear your life around presenting
yourself as something to be consumed by

What virtues

and values should such lasting

music exhibit?
I cant say its impossible to verbalise.
Everything weve done has been instinctive.
You never well, hardly ever have pure
insight. Theres really no answers or solutions.
Thats a cop-out. Your music is presented in
such a manner as to suggest signicance.
But the rst line on Pornography is It
doesnt matter if we all die. There could be
nothing more throwaway than that. To me,
thats a really funny line

It doesnt matter if we all die.

To me, thats a really funny line
Or a really pretentious one
No, its not pretentious I really think that!
Im as convinced by arguments for the end
of the world as I am for saving whales its a
completely theoretical area. If I saw someone
jumping on a baby, Id probably go over the try
to stop them but, at the same time, I can sit here
and glibly say that it doesnt matter if we all die.
Its not sixth-form angst or immaturity. Its
a paradox in that what we were doing, to most
people, seemed really doomy and depressing and

TOM SHEEHAN

hatever happened to The Cure? Parttime Banshee Robert Smith sits in the
lounge of the Kensington Hilton, sips
his ice-cool Perrier and worries whether its time
to write his babys obituary.
Do The Cure really exist any more? Ive
been pondering that question myself. See, as I
wrote 90 per cent of the Pornography album,
I couldnt really leave because it wouldnt have
been The Cure without me.
But it has got to a point where I really dont
fancy working in that format again. People
keep saying, You mustnt break up, because its
become like an institution that almost gives
me an incentive to pack it in anyway. I think
its really awful seeing bands just disintegrate
slowly in a stupid way, dont you?
Whatever happens, it wont be me, Laurence
and Simon together any more. I know that.
I wonder if you ever did have any idea what
The Cure were doing?
I dont know. Its impossible to articulate
really. It sounds really horrible but its more
than words and music. Ive always aspired to
be like certain bands who affected me: Joy
Division, New Order, the Banshees, Echo &

the people. I mean, people like Culture Club

do, but we were trying to reach beyond that
faade, beyond current fashion to actually do
something that was gonna last.

1982

yet, as a band, we were almost absurdly happy.

Ive never really considered that Ive had
anything of importance to say on record and
yet we get hundreds of letters from people who
are very concerned about what weve done; its
almost been like a soundtrack to their crises.
Exactly. The Cure were not a Cure,
they were an ailment, pandering to the
emotional afictions of their listeners.
No, its not like an incentive for
someone to wallow in their own despair.
Its impossible for me to justify what
weve done because it only really mirrored
our experiences, it never really sought to do
anything more than that.
Fiction have just released a new single, Lets
Go To Bed, credited to The Cure but really

recorded by Robert and Laurence Tolhurst as

a disco experiment. Laurence has packed in
drumming and is learning keyboards; Simon
Gallup has formed his own band and Robert has
recorded a pop single with Steve Severin.
Meanwhile, the guitarist relaxes on tour with

What about as far as the Banshees are

concerned?
I dont know, we havent really discussed
it that much. I thought it would be very
presumptuous to say something like that
but well, once a Banshee, always a Banshee.
I dont think Ive said anything
in this interview, have I? Its all so
ambiguous. It just perpetrates the
wanton obscurity.
Youve managed to not clear up the
Cure and Banshees mysteries quite
successfully.
Yeah, its all just a state of ux at the
moment. Theres nothing clear-cut to say
except I know what I want for Christmas,
Melody Maker readers a hologram kit.

The Cure are almost like a

soundtrack to peoples crises
the Banshees as a substitute for John McGeogh.
Rumours abound that the position may prove
permanent. How bout it Robert?
As far as Im concerned, Im just doing this
tour. Never believe rumours.

NME ORIGINALS

53

High-Camp Menace

NME, 20 February 1982, p 17

BAUHAUS
Kick In The Eye
(Beggars Banquet)

Bauhaus are a cumbersome,

archaic as hell, hard rock blurge
who owe more to The Stranglers
gothic battering ram than the
Pistols explosive rage. They trade
in the old high-camp pseudoart menace with their onstage
theatrics and ponderous musical
attack. Kick In The Eye is one
of their most popular songs, so
hopefully all who want it have got
it and well be hearing as little of it
as possible in the coming weeks.
Gavin Martin

wiping riff of Adrenochrome

still sounds like the greatest fourchord sequence ever invented.
Look, the Stones, The Kinks, The
Byrds, the Pistols, the Stooges,
The Clash and all the other morons
were just testing out a few ideas.
THIS was the riff they were looking
for. Put it this way: its not bad.
Vocal-wise the lead Sister (a
male) sounds like Lux Interior if
he were given a decent group
and some proper songs instead
of a collection of musical cripples
like The Cramps or Ian Curtis on
Transmission, even. Purchase.
Lynden Barber

NME, 17 April 1982, p22

MM, 15 April 1982, p22

THE SISTERS
OF MERCY
Adrenochrome
(CNT)

Ha! So theres life in the ould beast

yet, the creature in question being
a form of music characterised
by a simple repetitive beat and
extremes of volume, popular
among young people during
the post-war economic boom.
(Concise Oxford Dictionary, 1993
edition.) Rock, that is.
The Sisters come from Leeds,
wear young rebel trousers and
make a din so glorious they sound
like they stumbled on rock music
by accident without ever having
heard a note of it before.
About six plays after rst
digging this from the bottom of
the vinyl junkyard, the brain-

54

NME ORIGINALS

MM, 16 October 1982, p23

COCTEAU TWINS
Lullabies
(4AD)

days, a decline in standards

reinforced by the inclusion of
the original versions of Killing
An Arab and A Forest on one
portion of this doublepack.
Its just as well that The Cure
have now jettisoned what was
their nest moment, Boys
Dont Cry, a song now being
respectfully refurbished in a
Glasgow home by The Bluebells,
who seem to be the sort of people
that appreciate it more.
Believe it or not, I was actually
the rst person to write about
The Cure, although its not
something I tell anyone but
my closest acquaintances.
Adrian Thrills

Its a sad comment on the state of

Music Today (assumes grandadlike posture and nestles into
rocking chair) that there are
hundreds of groups who make
their livings by impersonating
their heroes as accurately as
possible, in much the same way
as 57 years ago a group called
Wild Wally wore out the tarmac
on the M1 bringing watered down
rocknroll to the kids. What is
worse, some people appear to
accept their liverish dross.
All you need to know about
The Cocteau Twins is that they
make Siouxsie & The Banshees
records. OK?
Lynden Barber

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Fireworks
(Polydor)

Unfortunately theres not a

rework within earshot on this
song, which is a pity because side
two of the Banshees Once Upon
A Time The Singles Collection LP
is a record gourmets delight.
Gary Crowley

NME, 27 November 1982, p17

THE SISTERS
OF MERCY
MM, 9 October 1982, p23

Alice/Floorshow
(Merciful Release)

NME, 10 July 1982, p21

THE CURE

BAUHAUS
Ziggy Stardust

Hanging Garden

(Beggars Banquet)

(Fiction)

Peter Murphy blows his cool badly

and reveals a hidden yearning
to be Mike Yarwood. Quite good
facsimile of Bowies voice, but
maybe hed be better off doing
Robin Day or Dennis Healy next
time. Inexplicable.
Adam Sweeting

Dont be fooled by the Bansheeesque title, Hanging Garden

is a dismal exercise in rolling,
tumbling rhythmic textures. The
Cure have drifted disappointingly
and indulgently from the idyllic
pop invention of their younger

Theyre sounding not unlike The

Psychedelic Furs, this group he
said, crushing their chances of a
fair hearing in one fell swoop.
No, dont be put off. This is
dark and powerful stuff from
Yorkshires Sisters. Maybe a bit
too dense for extended listening,
but this much I like a lot. And
a big improvement on their
Adrenochrome debut.
Paul Du Noyer

Chapter 5

DEREK RIDGERS

1983

Mercy Mercy Me

The

w
o
h
s
r
o
o
l
F

s
l
i
Dev
Adam Sweeting unravels the stream of consciousness gushing
forth from The Sisters Of Mercy

MM, 15 January 1983, p20

56

ur problem is that talking usually

ends up as a very serious affair,
which isnt a true reection of the
band as a phenomenon, said Andy,
singer with The Sisters of Mercy. Its very hard
to convey the non-intellectual aspects of any
band through talking.
What the hell, we talked anyway. We talked in
Andys front room in Leeds, all four Sisters and
me. Then I talked to Andy and guitarist Gary
Marx in a Chinese restaurant. Then back to the
front room. I vetoed the full all-nighter around
3.30am. Andy probably spent the rest of the
night talking to himself, because hed nally got
warmed up, the night creature pacing in his lair.
Before he found himself in the spotlight with
The Sisters Of Mercy, Andy studied languages.
Where, I queried.
Oh, all over the place, he said guardedly.
I never nished a course because I kept nding
more exciting things to do, like petty vandalism.
Ive done French and German and Italian
and Latin and Chinese and a smattering of
Russian and a smattering of Dutch in my time.

NME ORIGINALS

Chinese was the best. Latin helped me no end

I dont know whether it helped my brain any,
but as a linguist it was certainly vital. And I can
do crosswords in a zillionth of the time it takes
anybody else. I cant do the ordinary ones, but
the cryptic ones are a doddle.

The day of our meeting found The Sisters Of

Mercy unaccountably quiet, possibly the result
of a sordid and thinly attended gig in Bradford
the night before. Consider these men: guitarist
Gary Marx is tall, lanky, thick white socks
of the sort favoured by mountaineers pulled
up over the bottoms of his jeans. He watches
the proceedings with apparent indifference,
occasionally throwing in an oblique comment.
On stage, he wreaks violence on his guitar.
Bassman Craig Adams crimps himself into
the corner of the sofa and reads an old Batman
annual from cover to cover, pausing only to light
another cigarette. He only uses three strings
on his bass because one of the machine heads
in broken. His cheerful exterior seems quite at
odds with the grinding, warlike attack of his

playing. Craig is the beer-drinker of the group.

Guitarist Ben Gunn sits quietly in an
armchair, boyish and suspiciously innocent,
the classroom swot who goes home at night and
makes explosives in a shed in the back garden.
Then theres Andy, frontman, writer of all
the material so far, dominant theorist and
mouthpiece. Andy likes logic, order, Motorhead,
cats, industrial design, The Birthday Party, The
Psychedelic Furs, aeroplanes and TS Eliot.
Andy hates Bauhaus, Kid Creole, false
spiritualism, numerous groups from the Leeds/
Bradford area, fashion, eating and alcohol.
The Sisters use of a drum machine instead of
a drummer makes excellent sense Andy can
growl and roar and the others can torment and
punish their instruments, but the beat will not
slacken or surrender.
Andy, if you do all the writing, how
important is the rest of the group?
Its vital. The personal chemistry is very
important. Craigs response is just to play the
bass like he does, that sort of awesome noise,
and that says a lot to me.

1983
Sometimes at soundchecks, maybe after
weve been in the van all day, he just plugs in
and wham! It just knocks me out. Mark provides
the more lunatic side of things. And Bens got a
much more open mind on things. The balance
of all these four is what makes it work.
Even minor decisions are ludicrously
democratic. Thats one of the reasons why we
never got a drummer, because drummers just
dont t into anybodys personal chemistry.
You talk a lot about the humour in your
music, but does it communicate to an audience?
Well, basically it involves the dialectics of
cynicism, which is something that takes a long
time to explain, said Andy. Its a
very, very, very, dry joke.
Gary: I think the gigs are pure
slapstick.
Because you make them that
way or because of the places you
have to play in?
Andy: It starts off OK but by the end of the
gig Garys just not in control any more, hes just
destroying things. And it is very slapstick.
But every bands got that anyway. Its just
that most of them dont realise it. And of course
the fact that youre being serious about it only
makes it more ironic and the whole thing about
irony is that is compounds itself at every stage.
Of course, a jokes no longer a joke once
youve picked it apart and explained it. I
can only say that the rst time I saw them
something clicked at once. Perhaps its a little
like that horric thrill of driving fast on a
motorway in the rain and the car suddenly
starts to aquaplane, or realising that youve gone
over the line this time but wasnt it worth if for
the rush? Gamesmanship par excellence.
Check, for verication, available Sisters
vinyl on their own Merciful Release label:
the erce, teeth-clenching bobsleigh runs
of Adrenochrome and Body Electric, the
relentless Alice. At the moment Im xated by
the suspended torment of Floorshow, a roaring
electric tarantella, the kill-or-cure dance of
death. Its hard rock without the pomp (though
Andy can and will pose like a good un), heavy
metal with keen critical faculties.

Its the only thing which

separates us from bozos.
Do you advocate selfdestruction?
Andy: Under certain
circumstances, yes. Nietzsche
once said that a mans greatest
power is the power to decide
the time of his own death,
and that seems perfectly
reasonable. I wouldnt hold Andrew Eldritch:
your regular
that suicide is necessarily a Renaissance Man
symptom of unsoundness
of mind, or being not in

Reading some of his lyrics

on paper, I was surprised by the
formal attention to detail which
had gone into them. Generally
the voice is used as a strand in
the groups overall sound.
Our sound says a lot about
me, Andy explained. People
say things like, Whats your
attitude to nuclear war? and
I say, Just listen to the sound
what the fuck do you think
our attitude to nuclear war is?
The voice is much more
personal than the instruments,
so its better to mix it down,
because youre very vulnerable.
I think with Anaconda we
might include a lyric sheet.
Wed never print the lyrics on
the sleeve cos that would spoil my artwork.
Andy does the Sisters artwork himself, and
typically its cold and neat, iced with sharp
detail, using livid monochrome to index the
stark polarities contained inside.
Anaconda is about the hip games people play
with heroin addiction, now worryingly back in
vogue at prices too many people can afford.
Theres far too many smack songs which are
a bit too callously irresponsible. Junkie chic is
not where its at. We do Sister Ray because its
just an orgy of self-destruction every time we do
it. Thats what its all about.
All of the lyrics are designed to be taken away
and used. Its not just purging myself. I couldnt
go and perform it or make a record of it if I didnt
think it was generally useful. Besides, the band
wouldnt let me and why should they?

The names a nice 50-50 balance

between nuns and prostitution

What do you love about rock?

Andy: We like a loud noise, we like a
good tune. We like the relentlessness of
classic rock music heavy metal.
What do the Sisters do thats any
more than a loud physical noise?
Well, our attitude towards parody is
designed to show people how this loud
noise is ideally to be taken. You can
frighten people and amuse them at the
same time, and excite them and inspire
them. Because thats what it does to us,
it does all those things.
Are you offering your audience
some kind of faith?
Yeah, I mean to us cynicism
is very closely linked to faith or
belief or holding something dear.
Its the sort of cynicism that comes
out of disappointment with ones
environment rather than despair of
it, and thats a very precious thing.

possession of all ones faculties.

Gary: Which is one of the connotations of
the name of the group. It was picked because it
had several strong images, not just one.
The names nice and ironic, said Andy
with a thin grin, very corporate. A nice 50-50
balance between nuns and prostitution, which
seemed like a very suitable metaphor for a rock
band. All this pseudo-faith business and high
ritual, and yet prostitution.
And Merciful Release?
Suitably pompous, chortled Gary.
Vincent Price delivered the line very well
once, said Andy. And its a nicely selfdeprecating way of releasing stuff. When you
make a Merciful Release its like, Well, thats
out of the way, the agony is now over.

By Andys own admission, the Sisters are still

embryonic, but plans have been laid for 1983.
Depending on trivial little factors like money,
they should have a single called Anaconda
out in February, and an EP is also high on the
agenda. An LP is not envisaged before 1984.
Theyre currently entering a slower and
heavier phase, which Andy feels he has to work
out of his system forthwith.

Is there anything youd die for?

[Long pause] I might die for someone. Not for

any cause. Dying when you dont intend to is not
my idea of an intelligent act.
What would you be doing if you werent in
The Sisters Of Mercy?
Id like to do all sorts of things whether
anybodyd give me the chance is another thing.
I wouldnt mind being your regular Renaissance
Man, but whos gonna employ me
to do that? Not many vacancies for
them in the Exchange & Mart.
How about you, Gary?
Working Class Hero. Its
true, thats what my name is, its
just sending it up. Im just a born
Working Class Hero deprived
background, almost a footballer.
What use are you to anybody?
Andy: You could say, Well look,
four million people cant be wrong
and thats how many weve sold, and
it wouldnt justify it. You could say,
Well it stopped one person jumping
off a bridge, and that wouldnt
justify it. Whatever justication you
had wouldnt prove the point; you
can only offer an opinion.
That question not only asks What
do you do? but also Do you regard
The Sisters in 83: (l to r)
it as worthwhile?, and obviously one
Ben Gunn, Andrew Eldritch,
Gary Marx, Craig Adams
does or one wouldnt do it.
NME ORIGINALS

57

Redskin Rock

Tunes of glory
MM, 5 March 1983, p20

Adam Sweeting sings the praises and questions the poses of Southern Death Cult

met Southern Death Cult in Liverpool

on a cold grey afternoon. Id wanted
to meet them because theyre one of a
sadly tiny number of groups who have
some sort of aura, who project more than just a
chart position or a certain brand of hype.
Foolishly, Id believed what Id read in the
papers about them being the spearhead of
some new movement, and consequently I had a
whole clutter of preconceptions. I saw them as
potential fakes (probably arrogant), who maybe
believed what theyd been told about their own
importance. But I hoped they didnt.
From their side, the view was different. The
Death Cult dont read the papers much, probably
because what theyve read about themselves
has in general disgusted them. They saw me as

58

NME ORIGINALS

the latest in a long line of labelling machines

(probably unscrupulous). After some nervous
false starts, and probably to everybodys surprise,
we nally found some common ground.
A lot of people want to accept us for some
reason, said Ian, the singer, so theyve got to
try and understand us. To understand us theyve
got to put a label on us. By putting a label on us
theyre linking us with other people. But it is
dangerous, its like the nails going in the cofn.
With their loud declarations of their
absorption with North American Indian culture,
the Death Cult were instantly pegged as Redskin
Rock, and visions of Adam & The Ants started
to haunt them. But Ian, you must have known
that would happen?
I was aware of it but I thought if I could get

into an interview situation I could explain why

I was interested in Indian culture. But I never got
the opportunity and we were already labelled.
So I thought it would be better for the four of
us if I toned everything down, and now I dont
wear those clothes any more. I havent packed it
in cos its still in me heart, but I thought if I take
the image away and people wanna nd out, then
they can go deeper than that

Meet the

Death Cult theres guitarist Buzz,

blond hair falling bashfully down one side of a
face which can only be described as pretty. Buzz
likes Woody Allen, Mad magazine and George
Melly, all of which came as a bit of a shock since
Id expected him to say something like Sex
Gang Children and grave-robbing.

Southern Death Cult:

Ian Lindsay (soon
to be Ian Astbury),
Buzz, Aky and Barry

Theres drummer Aky, whos Pakistani.

He admits to reading Mayfair and likes old
rocknroll the happy stuff as he puts it.
Im a really ambitious person, he confesses.
On bass, theres Barry. He looks very serious,
shakes my hand with great solemnity. He speaks
in a wistful tone which sounds like the faintest
breath of wind could carry it away. Barry reads a
lot of books. Aky says: I can never understand
the questions when we get interviewed, so if they
ask me I refer them to Barry.
And nally Ian, frontman and performer,
chief talker of the group but
not necessarily the last word on
what they do or why. Ian does
like Sex Gang Children Im
pretty much obsessed with them
now. Theyre about the only new
group that I really like.
Ian is emotional, an extrovert in an intense
sort of way, and has a penchant for selfdramatisation. Useful credentials for a singer
with a rock band, but he needs more realistic
qualities of the other three to prevent him from
ying out of control.
Ian started to tell the story of an incident
which had taken place at Friars in Aylesbury the
night before. Ian had been on stage at the time.
There was this little Asian kid and he sort of
looked up and motioned me over, and he said,
Youre fuckin in love with yerself, arent yer?
I thought, You little bastard, you dont fucking
know how I feel.

I started babbling on to him, everything I

could think of to show I wasnt what he thought
I was, but he just sort of opped into the crowd
and shrank away. But afterwards I was talking to
him for like two hours, and he said, Please come
back and play again. It was good. But that rst
thing he said sort of knocked me on the head for
the rest of the evening, it really cracked me up.
Having been elected as baby Messiahs, you
have to expect problems like these. Meeting the
Death Cult, I was startled by how unprepared
they were for the kind of status which has been

To a certain extent yeah, but were not sorta

like puppets, you know, we do have feelings and
we are sorta reecting what we see around us
through our music. I wouldnt like to see what
we do being taken purely as an entertainment
thing, just a dance band. Id like to see maybe a
bit of thought going into it.
But isnt it an entertainment industry?
I think it was.
You mean its changed?
Before, people had a choice of what they
wanted to be into. Now theyve got it forced upon
them, like Kajagoogoo and
all that shit. I think thats
pretty wrong.
Were not forcing
ourselves upon anyone
if people want us were
there, but if they dont want us then fair enough.
Were not sort of on every fucking kids TV
programme, trying to push our product to them.
Were just where we are.
There has to be an element of performance,
though. You have to pose to some extent to be
the frontman with Southern Death Cult.
No I dont, said Ian hotly. I just do what
I want. Sometimes Ive just got to control meself,
like when that kid said that thing to me at
Aylesbury I just felt like getting a microphone
stand and shoving it down his throat. But you
just dont take your frustrations out on people.
What Ian does on stage isnt a pose, its from
the heart, added Barry seriously.

Moya is a near-classic deployment of simple rock

components, adding up to an aura of eerie suggestion
thrust their way. I thought their Fatman/Moya
single was ne stuff, moody and evocative, but
Id been disappointed by a thoroughly drab
session they recorded for John Peel.
At the moment theyre still probing their
own weaknesses and strengths, which is why
songs like The Girl can end up sounding like
a raw tangle of noise, while newer stuff like All
Glory? begins to resonate with a dawning sense
of power. Moya is still their best song a nearclassic deployment of simple rock components
which adds up to an aura of eerie suggestion.
So Ian, are you aiming for the group to work
on that basic level of just being something for
people to dance to?

NME ORIGINALS

59

Creature Discomforts

NME, 12 February 1983

THE BIRTHDAY PARTY

The Bad Seed
4AD

The Birthday Party have

always seemed more an
exercise in exhausting
self-parody than the
gothic Beefheart
claimed by their rabid
supporters. They may
have come to bury
rocknroll, but the
trouble is they keep digging the
grave over and over again.
And after listening to this four-song EP, it
seems that it wont be long before Nick Cave
and his performing troupe of deviants fall into
their purpose-built tomb.
Its impossible to avoid the obvious when
youre talking about The Birthday Party simply
because they are so ludicrously larger than
life: sex, smack and death are all over into this
unctuous assault.
The playing sounds tired and overwrought,
any tension lost in a barrage of clichs. The rusty
stabs of bass, drums and guitar are used more as
a means of colouring Caves schlock accounts of
love gone awry than as a force in their own right
which places the emphasis on lyrics that are
no longer disturbing or genuinely dark.
Deep In The Woods is a swing love song for
psychotic misogynists Tonight we sleep in
separate ditches, croons Cave. Sonnys Burning
is a black account of energy-saving. Fears Of
Gun boasts a chorus that runs Fingers down
the throat of love and Wild World is a plea for
protection and little more.
This is a ight into miserable fantasy; a
diversion that offers hardly any insights into the
sometimes poignant state of the truly wretched.
The Birthday Party pretend to be crucied
for the consequences of irrepressible extremes.
Yet, like most of their supposed obsessions, this
record is another plaything. Theyve probably
forgotten it already and if youve any sense
youll do the same.
Ian Pye

Ian: It just reects the way I see

things things that may have happened to
me through my life that have made me the
way I am. Ive got it all built up inside me.
When I get on stage I can hit some
levels where I just open my heart
completely. Like last night before I went on
it was really strange, cos I closed me eyes
and I could see me own face looking at me.
I wasnt scared, but something like that
had never happened to me before.

What are

the things that have happened

to Ian to make him the way he is? Hes
lived in Canada, Belfast and Liverpool,
and spent a month in the army before
deciding that wasnt for him. Hell talk
about some of it, but then infuriatingly
stops just when the subject sounds like its
getting weird. Such as: The subjects you
Did we really just
admit to liking
could talk about, Im too scared to, so Id
Supertramp?
rather not talk about it. Its something
Im aware of within meself, so thats why
I control meself. Like
I know certain people who
think theyd like to fuck
off to Nicaragua, pick up
a gun and ght there, cos
theyre too scared to ght
in this country. It depends what youre into
inspirational to go out and make whatever you
Look, youre hardly the rst band to sing
do a bit better, you know? You can shut things
about jingoism (Patriot or All Glory?) Or
out around you, make yourself feel good.
genocide (Moya).
I think the Death Cult could fall into the same
Oh no, certainly not, said Ian.
traps as The Clash, of promising more than you
So isnt there a danger of just turning these
can deliver.
topics into clichs?
We dont base everything on image and we do
I dont think human feelings can be clichd
a lot of things on feeling, said Ian. I suppose to
its not a little trend or fashion, it is a feeling.
a very very small extent we do things for effect,
You cant clich feeling. You get psychologists
I think everyone does. Ive got a hell of a lot of
saying a certain condition is schizophrenia or
respect for The Clash; I think theyve still kept
something thats garbage. How can you sort of
their integrity. Maybe theyre past their peak.
put somebodys frame of mind into a category so
Its in your favour that you draw on a very
you can understand them?
basic, traditional kind of rock power it has a
Are you offering people faith, or
weight of history behind it.
I dont think Im offering anything. Im just
Oh yeah, it goes a long way back. Back to,
myself, stating the way I feel about things. Im not
I suppose, when people were banging sticks
a preacher. At one time I thought I was supposed
and stones together.
to be a preacher cos I thought I had to say things
Well, I dunno about that
to get people to look at me in a certain way, or to
People are always looking to the future for
look at us and say, Well, Southern Death Cult
answers thats why everythings falling apart.
are about being free or fucking the system, or
If you go back to the past, you know what you
whatever. But now I think no, thats not the way.
are and where youre going.
I dont wish to become a leader or anything
Even us, looking back into the 60s for
like that, I dont think any of us do, because of
inspiration Before the Sex Pistols I was
the responsibilities that wed have.
listening to stuff like Supertramp and Genesis
In the end, arent you just one more rock
I used to pass off The Who and that as dinosaurs.
group out of thousands of rock groups?
Its only been in about the past year that
I dunno, sighed Ian.
Ive been doing a hell of a lot of listening to 60s
Within ourselves I guess not, said Barry. As
stuff, like Jimi Hendrix, The Who and The Small
regarded by other people, probably yes.
Faces, and its fucking mind-blowing.
Ian, isnt the problem with music that
like being a good year for rock groups,
anything you want to say is simultaneously an
and Southern Death Cult will become one of the
escape or a social occasion for your audience?
best of them. How much does this matter, Aky?
Yeah, I would say that. Um I think music is
The whole thing about the band and all
one of the only things people have got left where
is that sometimes when we do gigs it shatters
everyone can express themselves the way they
that whole image thing. Ian will just say or do
want to, through dancing. A lot of people cant
something that shatters peoples image of us, like
paint or draw or write and they dont even care
Oh, Southern Death Cult, theyre just another
about stuff like that, but when people come to a
Haircut One Hundred which is really good.
concert they can do what they want.
There is something more than just a band.
You can use the concert as a focal point. It is

Last night, before I went on stage, I closed my

eyes and saw my own face looking back at me

1983 looks

Nick Cave: Sex,

smack and death?
Mmm, yes please

60

NME ORIGINALS

1983

as a lash-up, though a mess is

probably closer. Its been botched
together from a couple of Radio 1
sessions, some unreleased demo
versions and a live recording made
at Rafters in Manchester, and on
MM, 11 June 1983, p27
the whole does the chaps little
justice. Its a painful irony that
Southern Death Cult, of all people,
should have got themselves
lumbered with a contractual
Southern Death Cult
obligation album of the
(Beggars Banquet)
most transparent sort.
The sudden implosion
The three live
of Southern Death Cult
tracks, Crow, Faith
a couple of months
and Vivisection,
ago, when they seemed
are probably best
to be on the crest of a
forgotten. Crow is
wave, was a rude shock
a mere fragment,
to the numerous pundits
while the other two
whod been touting them
suffer badly from the
as everything from The
shrill, dry quality of the recording.
Meaning Of Life to The Best Rock
Faith merely demonstrates that
Group Since
guitarist Buzz has been listening
The very model of
to Jimi Hendrix.
untogetherness, the Death Cult
There are versions of the Cults
made their hasty exit leaving loose
dynamic duo, Fatman and Moya,
ends everywhere. This posthumous
engineered by Mike Hedges at the
LP doesnt really tidy them up, it
Playground studio. Moya is slower
just collects them together in one
and altogether less sinister than
place. It can charitably be described
the ofcial single version cut with
Mick Glossop at the helm,
while Fatman displays a few
The Creatures:
the Sonny and
minor differences in tone
Cher of the
and balance. Um so what?
psychiatric ward
On the more positive side,
you get versions of the ne
All Glory and the passionate
False Faces. Apache, too, is
a useful addition to available
Cult material.
Today is a dramatic
non-song, all breast-beating
vocal from Ian Lindsay and
thundering drums from
Aky, demonstrating that
SDC were regularly strong
on atmosphere but short of
decent pegs to hang it on.
Finally theres The
Crypt, which is decked
out with moody piano and
some weird studio effects
promising, but like the
rest of this stuff a mere
blueprint for what might
have happened if Southern
Death Cult had been able to
put time and effort into a
full scale album.
I cant imagine the group
are particularly proud of
this tatty compilation,
which should really have the
phrase Dont remember
me this way displayed
prominently on the sleeve.
Meanwhile, we await their
various next moves
Adam Sweeting
questions to be asked about Hawaii,
but The Creatures sub-Campari
ad gushings Good ere, innit?
answer none of them.
Julie Burchill

SOUTHERN
DEATH CULT

NME, 28 May 1983, p26

THE CREATURES
Feast

STEVE RAPPORT

(Polydor)

For one brief,

wonderful winter when
I was 11, three of my
friends and I formed a
small theatre company
and showed off to the
rest of the school with
plays that we wrote,
produced and performed
ourselves. Wed write a certain scene
time and time again a Rising From
The Grave scene, effected by the
application of talcum powder to the
face and getting up slowly off
ones back with a glazed look
in ones eyes and hands out in
front like a sleepwalker.
Eventually some squealer
spilled the beans and we
were hauled up in front of the
head words like unhealthy
and morbid were thrown
around. Morbid! We were only
HAVING FUN.
Siouxsie is stuck in the sort
of adolescence in which the
stuff dreams are made of is
sances, car crashes, ketchup
and the house of Hammer I
could never take her seriously
with the Banshees, and The
Creatures the Sonny and
Cher of the psychiatric ward
are even more transparent.
Theyre not evil incarnate,
theyre comedians.
If you take a girl from
Chislehurst and drop her on a
paradise island Hawaii in the
case of The Creatures Feast
obviously shes going to
be impressed; but Siouxsies
instant impressions leave a lot
to be desired. The sounds of
the sea and the jungle, what
with Siouxsies complaining,
droning voice imposed
over them, give the record
the avour of a travelogue
narrated by someone
recovering from a nervous
breakdown; the voices of the

Hawaiians featured seem totally

superuous and show-offy.
Siouxsie will hate to face the fact,
but what she does is very 60s, very
hippy, very Bad Acid.
Her voice often sounds
like Julie Driscolls, and
her songs could be
Arthur Brown or Edgar
Broughton, or even
Donovan.
The key words of
the record are (in
order of popularity)
FLOWERS, COLOURS,
FIRE and DANCING very Bad Acid.
And the lyrical content throughout
is as orid as Denis Healeys face.
There are doubtless many

NME ORIGINALS

61

Glove Story
MM, 9 April 1983, p3

Party weary

NME, 18 June 1983, p14

Following months of rumour, The Birthday Party have announced that they are splitting up.
Drummer and co-founder Mick Harvey attributed the decision to lack of artistic direction,
and audience inflexibility. Brett Wright reports from the bands home town of Melbourne on
their f inal dates in Australia, and talks to Nick Cave about his own plans for the future

he tour was a debacle. They

were reasonably well-received
in Sydney, but opped in Perth
and opped in one of two concerts
in home town Melbourne. The other
Melbourne show was a qualied
success, but many felt cheated by
the groups unwillingness to play
any more than eight lousy songs,
as several patrons put it.
At the Perth show, the absurdity
came to a head. Cave was bitten on
the leg by a hospital clerk named
Sarah and knocked to the ground
by the former lead singer of a band

62

NME ORIGINALS

called The Shufing Hungarians.

Both said they liked Nick a lot.
Back in Melbourne a week later,
Nick Cave was convalescing at home
in his mothers place in the afuent,
tree-lined surrounds of Malvern
East. He looked carefully wrecked:
dark lines under the eyes; a weary,
dismissive manner, drainpipe jeans,
a swastika belt buckle
I have tried to make it clear to
the audience that despite what
they think, I dont like being pulled
under a crowd stomping feet and
so forth. Now the British audience

treats us in a very different way. Its

like they wait for some sort of signal
from the group as to what way we
want them to behave.
The group return to their muchhated outpost of London this month
supposedly to complete a double
EP which was begun in Berlin before
the tour.
And that, says Nick, will be the
last project for quite a long time for
The Birthday Party.
Caves next project is the staging
of 50 or so one-minute plays hes
written with Lydia Lunch. He
doesnt have too many details about
this project, but he does have a
philosophical position on it.
I nd theatre the most awkward,
restricting medium which you
can work in. Which is primarily the
reason Im working in it and why
these plays are going to be put on
under the banner of traditional
theatre rather than performance art
or fringe theatre. Or at least, it will
be presented under that guise. Once
the audience are trapped within
the doings of the plays it will be no
longer remain respectable.
I bet it wont.

PETER ANDERSON

MM, 16 April 1983, p4

The Glove
The further adventures

he comely young wife with her hands in

the sink smiles as her hubby strolls into
the kitchen of her Los Angeles dream
home. Just back from the ofce and starving for
his dinner, he skirts the table and folds his arms
around her ample waist, twisting her into an
affectionate embrace.
She tilts her head back to receive his kiss, and
suddenly tufts of her hair drift gently to the
tiles. As he recoils in horror a carving knife arcs
up out of the suds and strikes and strikes and
strikes again

MM, 3 September 1983, p20

of Steve Severin and Robert Smith, by Steve Sutherland

This, or thereabouts anyway (its a long time

since Ive seen it) is a scene from Blue Sunshine,
a superbly harrowing B-movie that did the
rounds to little acclaim towards the end of
the disillusioned 70s. Taking its name from a
reputedly super-potent strain of LSD, its plot
was lip-smackingly simple: anybody who had
sampled a certain contaminated batch of the
said hallucinogenic would, without warning, go
bald 10 years to the day that they dropped their
trip and then turn into a homicidal maniac. The
revenge on or of the love generation?

Some people out there would do well to start

checking their diaries smartish.
Blue Sunshine is also the name of the
rst and only album by The Glove. This is no
coincidence. After all, The Glove thats Robert
Smith, Steve Severin and Zoo, aka dancerturned-singer Jeanette took their name from
the Blue Meanies giant st-cum-executioner in
Yellow Submarine. The same glove that turned
back into LOVE when the power of music
overcame bad with good. Theres either message
or madness in these mindgames.
NME ORIGINALS

63

Kitchen sink drama

Of course, both the Banshees
and The Cure have always mucked
about with the romantic notion of
love, happiest with a relationship
to dissect or an emotion to torture
into screaming confessions of guilt,
so it should come as no surprise
that when Smith and Severins plan
for a single called Punish Me With
Kisses expanded into a feverishly
claustrophobic album project, love
should end up on the rack.
It does come as something of a
shock, however, when Smith sits crosslegged on the oor and says: Its quite
a happy album really. Its good that its
gonna be a summer release.
My mind swiftly retracks in panic
the nightmare-in-a-nursery of Mr
Alphabet the brooding cacophony of
Orgy the sance tension of Blues In
Drag? I catch a hint of a smile.
I should have known: once a Banshee
always a
We havent got together to do this
because theres anything trapping us
within the music that we already do,
Severin insists in a whisper. I know
that Im quite free to do whatever I like
within the Banshees and always have.
The main reason the whole thing started
was because, when I listened to The Cure, I
could understand why Robert was putting a
certain thing in a certain place; the sense of
dynamics and melody was fairly similar to
what I was doing with the Banshees.
The main thing now though is its a
completely different situation, a completely
different way of working
Smith agrees: It was a real attack on
the senses when we were doing it. We were
coming out of the studio at six in the morning,
watching all these really mental lms and then
going to sleep and having really demented
dreams and then, as soon as we woke up, wed
go virtually straight back into the studio, so it
was a bit like a mental assault course towards
the end.
When we were writing the words, we were
picking up on things wed experienced within
the time of doing the album. I mean, God, we
must have watched about 600 videos at the time!
Thered be like all these after-images of the lms
wed watched cropping up in the songs.
It wasnt deliberate, but after a while, they
were chosen, I think, almost as inuences.
When we were waking up, in the half-hour or so
that we were just like in a coma, Id put on a lm
or a piece of music that was completely different
to what wed been doing the night before, so that
it would inuence the day. Wed set ourselves
the task of writing two songs a day, so it was the
only way we could refresh ourselves.
We just kept going at it, Severin conrms.
We had to make it sound complete. At the
beginning, it was just like a dozen, 15 songs
completely different from each other.
Songs? laughs Smith. It sounded like
15 different groups! The other thing that
inuenced it, talking about snippets, was the
amount of junk we were reading, the amount we

64

NME ORIGINALS

their fame. Where others make commercial

success the be-all of their existence, the
Banshees contingent want to use it as a
weapon. Hence the splintering of the band
into its offshoots experiments with the
attraction of reputation.
Its basically an album and thats where its
gonna stop, says Severin of The Glove. And
thats what The Creatures is, just one album.
The more time The Creatures are seen to be
around, the more people think, Have the
Banshees split up? And all sorts of nonsense.
So were just gonna do the minimal amount,
then concentrate on other things.
To me, it seems perfectly natural to
be involved in so many different areas,
says Smith. But it still seems odd to other
people, Funny that

The trap is, of course, that ensuring your

Severin and
Smith: Evil Dead
meets the Blue
Meanies

The Gloves Blue

Sunshine sounds like a
journey into the tunnel
oflove that took a wrong
turn into the horrors
spent on idiot magazines and stuff like that! We
were making big murals of all these cuttings and
pictures and stuff, big day-glo posters.
And the lms?
Oh, The Brood, Evil Dead, Helicopter Spies,
Inferno I dunno, what else? Some Divine
stuff Yellow Submarine
Ah, but what purpose these days to such
perversions of love? Can they act as anything
beyond kitsch, choreographed titillation?

The love-peace vision of the 60s has long been

reduced to a fashionable quirk and ridiculed
for its naivety. We tend to dismiss the whole
ethos as stoned-out lunacy and look instead
to cut-throat private enterprise as a means of
personal, rather than global, salvation. So much
for Sergeant Pepper and Blue Sunshine.
And even the promise of promiscuity and
dark fantasies fullled inherent in Severins
chosen pseudonym and Smiths psychotic
imagery are a confusion, a wry comment on
societys sordidly accepted double standards.
On the surface, Blue Sunshine sounds like
a journey into the tunnel of love that took a
wrong turn into the horrors. But underneath,
there beats a subliminal pulse, a frantic desire to
test out ways of working within the con nes of
pop without contributing to its malaise.
Severin and Smith want to do something with

own working environment remains vibrant

doesnt mean that what you produce will
be valid to anybody else. Just because
Robert Smith plays a lot more keyboards
than guitar on The Glove album doesnt
necessarily mean the albums any good.
Severin is acutely aware of the problem.
The idea that The Glove could get away
with anything vanished very quickly because
it became a real responsibility to get it to
sound not indulgent. What I wanted was for it
to have more of a specic personality than the
Banshees or The Cure.
I think weve nearly got to an idea of
what me and Robert are like as people, our
relationship. Songs like Blues In Drag are the
kind of thing Im most pleased about because,
if the Banshees had approached that from
the beginning, it wouldnt have ended up like
that. I just wanted to do something a bit
softer, a bit more introverted, probably.
Thats what I wanted to achieve, the kind of
things that are exclusive to our friendship.
Everybody Ive played this to has almost
immediately said it sounds really fresh and
added to that by saying that everything else
thats coming out now is really horrible.
Last year, Fireworks being in the charts was
unusual and this year, when a Banshees single
gets into the charts, itll be even more unusual
because the climates just horric!
Chartwise, so much of its down to melody,
Smith intrudes. You nd yourself humming
most of the Glove songs but, at the same time,
theyre not pop songs. I like that about it.
The Banshees coterie are more vulnerable
now than ever because, in a musical climate that
encourages safety and contrition, being different
for being differents sake is one hell of a virtue.
The Banshees/Glove/Creatures particular
genius is that not only do they advocate constant
change but they remain fertile and unbridled
rather than cynical or calculated.
We havent got a clue what the next Banshees
album is gonna be like, Severin chuckles. If
you stuck the Creatures album and The Glove
together, I dont think anybody could know
what is coming next from the Banshees. Theres
a certain amount of glee involved in that but its
not contrived at all.
No, Smith agrees, smiling. Just manic.

1983

Twindrops Keep
Falling On
My Head

NME, 10 DECEMBER 1983, p26

Robin and Elizabeth are

The Cocteau Twins but
they dont like to brag about
it. Paul Morley attempts to
discover more about this
obscure couple

TONY MOTTRAM

obin and Elizabeth, two friends, are sat,

drinking tea from cheap mugs, in the
kitchen of their at. It is a Wednesday.
The at, in Muswell Hill, London N10, they
share with some people I do not meet. Robin
and Elizabeth have their own room where they
sleep and which they tidy. In the kitchen they
make the tea and plan the day.
The kitchen looks just like a kitchen that a
few people share well used. You almost want
to pat it on the back and say well done for all its
been through. Robin and Elizabeth sit on small
wooden chairs at a skinny table. Calm, I burst
in, noisy, with a carrier bag of strong lagers and
a plastic case containing a mono Sony recorder
and two TDK C90 cassettes. Storm.
The couple in the kitchen are soft, and quiet,
and remote, and only really smile for each other.
Robin eyes me suspiciously. Elizabeth grips her
mug as though it contains wonderful secrets.
So what do you want to talk to us about?
asks Robin, using a soft Scottish voice that is
quite at home in this cold, shared kitchen lled
with old, used utensils. He places a careful,
deprecating emphasis on the us and at the
same time he challenges me.
Oh, vague things, I say.
The couple consider this reply. Vaguely.
The three of us get used to our positions in

Mere Mortals

Robin softly

complains: Everybody at our record

company tells us how popular and important
The Cocteau Twins are, but I cant comprehend
any of that. All we have to go on is our record
sales, and we dont really sell that many records.
That was something to think about.
We needed something to laugh about. I asked
Elizabeth if she considered herself a writer: by
this time she was talking to me, not sneezing or
staring down past her knees at the clean carpet.

who found, somehow, that she could sing. A

technician and a voice.
Thats a bit hollow, Robin snorts.
Well, tell me more, I implore.
Oh, weve been spilling our bloody life stories
out to you he sneers.
Spilling? This was an exaggeration.
Dripping, more like.
A couple of drops.
Twin drops were falling on my head.
It was torture.

I asked Elizabeth if she was excited about being a

Cocteau Twin. I thought it might be interesting
if she could explain whether being a Twin
had taken her anywhere exciting, disturbing,
stimulating, and I didnt mean on a bus. Are you
excited about being a Cocteau Twin?
Yes and no. Drip and drop.
In what ways yes and no
Er A pause as long as your grandmothers
life. Or death. Oh A pause as long as a
sleepless night. The clock ticks. The trafc turns.
Oh God Cmon woman. Im going to say
sorry again
What are you trying to provoke us into
saying? demands Robin.
Tell me some stories, tell me where you are,
tell me where you might have been tell me
something. Unfair, decides Robin.
I dont think we should have to explain
anything. I would have thought that the music
explains everything really
You feel that the music is the end, not the
beginning. You wont accept that your music,
something you feel very close to and involved
with and therefore special to you, will attract
attention and questioning you dont seem to
want to acknowledge all the complications that
must go with making pop music.
It all comes from a rejection I have of certain

People would come along to interview us and theyd go,

Oh God, we thought you at least looked good!
Are you a writer?
No.
Do you call yourself a singer?
No.
So what do you call yourself?
She turns to Robin, touches his leg.
Oh, youve got a lot of names that you call
me, havent you
Robin smiles at her: Youre a wee bastard,
thats what you are
That made us laugh.
Robin looks into a corner of the room: I get
a funny feeling up my nose and my back when
people go on about having to label yourself.
He looked as if he was in some sort of pain.
Robin and Elizabeth are The Cocteau Twins.
If you wondered why we were all brought
together, it was to talk about The Cocteau Twins,
or not talk, or try to talk. At the end of our
talk-not-talk I tell Robin that I have a conclusion
about The Coctwins.
I conclude that The Cocteau Twins are
one detached Scottish boy who wants to be a
record producer, and one distant Scottish girl

66

NME ORIGINALS

ideas in the music business the selling the

competing the music is there, it represents a
particular time for us, and there it is If I was
someone else I wouldnt want to know about
me, all those little personal details, my opinions,
thats all to do with packaging, a packaging I
dont want to know about
Is this purity possible in such a rough, raucous
world?
Well, its a nice thought to have with you
But it means that youre completely defensive
all the time, even towards people who are, so to
speak, on your side.
On the whole in interviews I am defensive
because generally the rst question is, Oh,
why do you copy Siouxsie & The Banshees?
Something like that.
In the days of Garlands, especially, people
had these notions that we would be clad in
leather, with make-up all over, and po-faced.
People would actually come along to interview
us and theyd ask us where The Cocteau Twins
were. Theyd go, Oh God, we thought you at
least looked good!
Robin smirks out of a kind of triumph
he cannot hide it, although he tries at this
memory. Elizabeth shivers a little, as if this
memory, like most others, was a cold wind.

Will enters

The species cocteaus

geminus emerges
from its burrow. Liz
and Robin with Will
Heggie (left)

our time together. Will and Robin

wanted to make some music together, there
in Scotland, and found Elizabeth dancing in a
club. If she could dance that well, it was decided,
surely she will sing superbly.
I look at Elizabeth sat on the bed, as perplexed
to be involved in a conversation about pop
music as your grandmother would be, dead or
alive, and I nd it hard to think that she has ever
danced. She rubs her ngers.
At that time, had you nothing planned, did
you know where you were going, or where you
would be pushed? Elizabeth cannot quite ick
this memory into play. Robin answers.
I think this is probably the last place she
thought shed end up.
Its Elizabeths regretful, exultant voice that

TOM SHEEHAN

the kitchen, defending in our own ways the

almost handsome silence. I open a bottle of
strong lager. Robin, at a distance, mixes a gin
and tonic and adds a slice of lemon. Elizabeth, to
my surprise, frantically rubs her ngers together,
in a state of true anguish. I thought Id been
invited, but it appears I am an intruder. I could
kill them, because they make me feel so ugly.
But I had a feeling this would be indulgent, so
I gently enquired if we would have to talk in the
open wilds of the kitchen.
They invite me into their room. Trafc
turns right outside the windows in this room,
which doesnt smell of anything, and a clock
ticks proudly by their bed. You can hardly hear
Robin defending his virtue and describing
his disappointments, and even he seems to be
bawling compared to Elizabeth. The loudest noise
she made was the rst noise she made during the
conversation, after many meandering minutes.
She sneezed, startling me, Robin and herself.
At one point Robin will pull a hair from
Elizabeths throat: the length of the hair shocks
us all, but dont worry, it wasnt growing out of
her throat. It must have fallen there somehow.
Records in the room are stacked very neatly.
The room is dustless, there isnt really a hair
out of place. Or at least, if there is, it is removed
with some drama, and it nds its proper place.
Oblivion, or something. Theyre from Falkirk.

1983

Will leaves the time we have together. He played

bass in the group until a long European tour
supporting OMD: this tour hit them at with the
impact of routine and the greyness of repetition
and only the two lovers could survive.
As much as Id like to be able to say Ive not
spoken to Will since we split out of choice, I cant.
Id love to speak to him, I just cant bring myself
to talk to him. Im sort of frightened. He was like
my best friend for eight years or whatever and
suddenly hes not here.
How can this be?
I dont want to talk about it.
From sight, from mind. Loss, and gain.

Talking to

Liz and Robin:

Youre a wee
bastard, you are

Elizabeth, she makes me so frustrated

I could hit her over the head with a lager bottle.
Hearing her sing, she just leaves me moved.
When did you realise you could sing?
Robin answers: It was a Cocteau Twins
rehearsal. When we rst started she would never
sing until Will went home for his tea.
Elizabeth boldly interferes: He fucking told
Will hed heard me sing and
he hadnt.
So Elizabeth having this
supernatural voice was fate.
Fates a rather romantic word
for it, says Robin, Luck was
more like it. I suppose fate will
look better in print.
Was it a kind of liberation, Elizabeth, when you
discovered you could sing?
Elizabeth utters Robin answers. It started
off wonderfully, I thought.
Can you remember the moment?
I can smiles Robin. I burst out laughing.
I was just amazed.
What did you sing?
I cant remember OH! she squeals,
delightedly, unexpectedly. I remember! Four
lines, Id written four lines I had to squeeze
them out they were awful The memory
rapidly burns itself out. I cant remember them.
Was it a liberation for you to sing?
I didnt keep at it Elizabeth fades away.
Robin: She wanted to be a singer, then she
didnt, then she did
When did you want to be a singer why? This
question seemed important, considering the
uncanny power Elizabeth discovers when she sings.
Oh, I dont know what to say I never think
about these things its all very natural we dont
force ourselves in any way
Is this beauty? This rare, precious belief in
the natural? Are you scared that you might lose
something if you analyse it?
Robin: Well, if we just made records to make
everybody else happy, wed make shitty records.
In your lyrics, Elizabeth, are you trying to
compile your own logic, make up your own sense,
create your own reality?
No no I dont think thats right at all
Do you know what you do?
No but I dont think thats right at all

I think about cooking the tea and

Elizabeth about hoovering the carpet
has over the last 18 months, between the two
LPs Garlands and Head Over Heels, made The
Cocteau Twins just that little bit better, a little
bitter brilliance, a little brittle beauty. A light at the
beginning of the tunnel.
Elizabeth declares war on established language,
and the songs allow a kind of orbit or cluster
of possible responses, tangential readings and
splintered echoes. The songs pivot inwards and we
follow as best we can.
The Twins music has a magic that has cut
through everything that should have destroyed it:
their innocence and insolence, which in the cold
plight of the pop interview sometimes just seems a
stupid modesty or a hopeless purity, has somehow
worked, and a standard success has come to them.
They are bafed by this.
The more successful we become, says Robin,
the more it will get cocked up, the more we will
have to do things that are nothing to do with the
music and well probably feel shitty about it.
Isnt the attention you are receiving a kind of
reward?
The idealist in me says, No, fuck that, it doesnt
matter about peoples attention the realist in me
says its quite nice for eating and things like that.
You have to survive.
Do you feel that maybe The Cocteau Twins can
encourage other people because out of nowhere,
you have shown that it is possible to establish an
audience in this deadening joyless world, making
something unique and unclouded?
Robin lets this soak in. Elizabeth doesnt let it
touch her. I would say were the biggest shits, no
example to anyone. Were such a mess we never
think about those kind of things
You dont think about yourself at all?
Robin: Not on that sort of level I think about
cooking the tea and Elizabeth about hoovering the
carpet like mere mortals you could say

Elizabeth sneezes. Its a very loud sneeze. Im

sorry, she whispers. Its OK, I say. But shes gone.
Maybe shes in the kitchen. Robin tries to join her.
Theres time for me to go.

NME, 5 November 1983, p35

COCTEAU TWINS
Head Over Heels
(4AD)

The Cocteau Twins

new record suggests
innite distance, or
at least a massive
space. Its rst boom
is like an avalanche.
From there they
wing a course over
soundscapes that
hypothesise Phil Spector producing
Spellbound. Till I heard this, I considered
Liz and Rob a Banshees for the bedsit: Liz
Fraser, I thought, a Siouxsie-as-SandieShaw; Rob Guthrie as a doughboy McGeoch.
I still say theres something hollow and
vaporous at work here, but when Liz is
singing cosmic Chrissie Hynde and Rob is
striating these ice-oes with crystal shards
of guitar and huge splashes of percussion
and carrying the girl away in a swirling,
swooshing mist of sound, Im not going to
quibble. Its probably a good thing, too,
that we cant hear Lizs words, if the sleeves
snippets Fig up my love paramount/Ooze
out and away onehow are any indication
of their general quality. Better to think of
this extraordinary voice as being just an
exotic sort of instrument.
Were the sound more thistled, more
thorny, Liz would be a proper Mavis of the
moors, but the warpnwoof of the lasss
warble is not one of dulcet heather purity
but of, how can I say it, dry ice. That is its
mysterious charm. In her elementally nave
universe, sheets and esh dont gure
much. Everything is sugar, tinderboxes,
glass and candles. It is empty of sex; empty,
too, of fear and joy. You ow to pure space,
soar to endless ice-capped peaks: an alien
child-world.
The record, this wreath of epic innocence,
only comes undone when The Cocteau
Twins get too cocooned, too gloved in
Banshees. Then they are weak. Multifoiled
is their poor Cocoon, in fact; Tinderbox Of
A Heart is just too morbidly deadpan. Other
parts of Side Two suffer from the languor of
A Kiss In The Dreamhouse.
But then, of course, the record goes
out on its most exultant, unabashed
passionade, Musette And Drums, an
impossibly cavernous nale to the free
ight we have enjoyed across such
spectacular surfaces.
Did I mention escapism? These are
garlands where I feel secure.
Barney Hoskyns
NME ORIGINALS

67

Feverish concoctions

NME, 29 January 1983, p15

BAUHAUS
Lagartija Nick
(Beggars Banquet)

Now that theyve broken down

the doors of the music biz with
their inch-perfect Ziggy Stardust
(that was their plan, you dig),
Bauhaus offer us revolution?
Salvation? Anarchy? Actually no.
Just another lifeless, predictable
rock song with all the usual
trappings of pompous vocals,
forgettable riffs and numbskull
drums and bass. What catalysts
you turned out to be boys, eh?
Paulo Hewitt

MM, 9 July 1983, p22

THE CREATURES
Right Now
(Polydor)

No one else had a hope this

week. The Creatures slipped in,
ransacked the place and left with
the best ideas in a fast car.
From the earliest seconds of
Right Now you know youre on
shifting ground. Siouxsie babada-babing to the noise of her
own ngers clicking until Budgie
barges in with congas on speed.
Christ, which way is this going?
The one direction you dont
expect is a vagrant big band
coughing out drunken bursts of
brass in a Starlight Room of its
own making. Theres no telling
where their feet are going to fall
next. Probably on your head.
Paul Colbert

68

NME ORIGINALS

MM, 13 August 1983, p22

THE GLOVE
Like An Animal
(Polydor)

The Severin-Smith axis of the

Banshees nally break cover
with a vivacious confection.
Eminently preferable to the
Gothic big band swing of The
Creatures Right Now, this is a
feverish concoction: ignore the
lyric, the words are nonsense;
just listen to the noise. Like An
Animal sparkles. Whooshing
swathes of synthesizer and
keyboards erupt colourfully and
continuously; jangling guitars
peel away, mostly on the lip of
the main action; the percussion
clatters with a nervy rattle that
recalls Wall Of Voodoo, while the
bass simply hums through the
mix, playing a melody adapted
from the nal vocal cascades of
The Go-Betweens Cattle And
Cane, providing a challenging
counterpoint to Jeanettes keenly
pitched but rather thin vocal.
Like An Animal provides the
same kind of spacious rush as
The Byrds Eight Miles High and
races along with the exhausting
momentum of the thunderclap
climax of Loves Seven And
Seven Is. Are The Glove the new
West Coast experimental pop
art ensemble? Whatever: like
all good pop records, Like An
Animal sounds like its always
been there.
The Glove may yet prove to
be a real handful.
Allan Jones

NME, 17 September 1983, p19

Tobe Hooper to direct a series

of Jeeves, The Lovecats is a
post-modernists dream of a
nightmare, a purrrfect example of
the past purrrceived impurrfectly,
then put to use on this purposeful
madness, the last of The Cures
fun single trilogy.
The Lovecats is Smiths
masterpiece of disorientation,
a mental collage of history
unhinged. Herman Munster takes
spiked tea with Jean Cocteau
while a taxidermist twitches the
net curtains in anticipation of a
cannibal feast. But how to praise
something so zany? Well, at a
pinch its psychedelic cocktail
jazz, a strychnined nursery rhyme
where every allusion (illusion!)
triggers off a tunnel of ashbacks,
but its so much sillier than that.
Sing the slap-dash chorus,
swoon to that devil-may-care
decadent swing. Single of the
week? Single of the year(s)!
Steve Sutherland

SIOUXSIE & THE

BANSHEES
Dear Prudence
(Polydor)

A beautiful sleeve and a less than

astonishing cover. As Siouxsies
pop standing dissolves from
light to dark and back again
the records of her group are
getting fogged and indecisive.
Whirlybird guitars and even some
nostalgic phasing scarcely paper
over a cracking and under-fed
treatment of a dried-out chestnut.
And it goes on, and on. What will
they do next The Continuing
Story of Bungalow Bill?
Richard Cook

MM, 29 October 1983, p22

THE CURE
The Lovecats
(Fiction)

As if some macabre folly cast

Vincent Price instead of Jeremy
Irons in Brideshead Revisited,
or some sinister senility chose

MM, 3 December 1983, p27

COCTEAU TWINS
Sunburst And Snowblind
(4AD)

When The Cocteau Twins

perfected their impersonation of
Joy Division nobody liked them
much; now theyve learnt another
act The Banshees gothic wall of
sound it seems suddenly theyre
very desirable. Yet this four-track
EP only serves to underline that
the Twins still prefer artice to
substance. Everything about
their music appears to have been
chosen because of its supercial
immediacy: the grandiose guitar
lines, the fake majesty of the
frequently incomprehensible
lyrics, even the fatuous song
titles: Sugar Hiccup and Because
Of Whirl-Jack! This is music for
people who want to play at being
serious young persons but lack
the resolve to see it through to
the bitter/positive end.
Ian Pye

Chapter 6

DEREK RIDGERS

1984

Look At My Squalor!

NME, 19 May 1984, p33

NICK CAVE &

THE BAD SEEDS
From Her To Eternity
(Mute)

From Her to Eternity is one of the

greatest rock albums ever made.
Patti Smiths Horses is, I think,
the last album to achieve such
extremity of feeling, scope of
reference to animate it, and theatrical panache
to bind it all together. Dynamic, subtly layered,
funny and obsessive, From Her To Eternity is
the work of a visionary unfettered by worship
of the romantic rocknroll mythology, and who
thus reaches peaks hitherto unscaled.
Like Horses, From Her To Eternity starts
with a cover. Leonard Cohens Avalanche looms
ominously for a few seconds, then explodes into
a melodramatic demon-showman snarl not far
removed from one of Nicks heroes, Alex Harvey.
That gap-toothed stage pirate was a master of
sinister disguise and distorted self-projection,
and so too is Nick. Avalanche has as its
protagonist a vengeful hybrid of Caliban, Christ
and Nietzsches Superman.
Whether you like your savage messiahs wellread or not, you cant escape the, er, avalanche
of Avalanche: you will hear no more slashing,
grinding, throbbing, wrenchingly physical
rocknroll ever. The Bad Seeds are drummer
Mick Harvey (ex-Birthday Party), bassist Barry
Adamson (ex-Magazine), guitarists Hugo Race
(ex-Play With Marionettes) and Blixa Bargeld
(Einstrzende Neubauten). These men storm
the ramparts of sound, these men will make you
sweat. When was the last time that happened?
To continue:
Cabin Fever! is a
sister song to 83s
Mutiny In Heaven,
another tale of
Nick the crazed
mariner adrift on
the boiling seas
of souls torment.
Wheels clank and your minds rope is stretched
to quivering tautness. Never has a keel-hauling
and a hanging been so much fun.
And that rope recurs in Well Of Misery,
and from it dangles the bucket of sorrow
which swings slow like a bell and its toll is dead
and hollow. Note the smooth procession of
imagery united in the single theme of death,
for Nicks little girl oats at the bottom of that
well. Two favourite songs of Nicks are Hey Joe
and Neil Youngs Down By The River: his motto
could be You always kill the one you love.
From the mordantly stalking bassline
through the chain-gang rhythm and chorus

to the extraordinarily twisted bottleneck

guitar and harmonica at the end, Well Of
Misery exemplies the range and logic of
Nicks songwriting and the staggering musical
imagination that has gone into its realisation.
Wings Off Flies is a malevolent wordassociation game on the themes of life, loss
and retribution. Wickedly funny, its also worth
mentioning that when Mick Harveys drums
thunder to a crescendo during the
rst chorus, I nearly fainted with
their crushing force.
Back to the central concern, the
oldest and saddest story of them
all, three versions of which fall
either side of the spine and right
at the very end of the LP. They
are the title track, Saint Huck,
and A Box For Black Paul epic
tragedies, rock psychodramas
as they used to be called. Were talking Land,
were talking The End, were talking Heroin,
were talking Desolation Row
These three songs aspire to an ambition
greater still than Mutiny In Heaven, Caves
masterpiece thus far. A whole welter of
referential detail has been plundered from
clich-dom to be restored to its original force,
though not perhaps a force of quite the same
meaning as when rst coined.
Achtung! : in Saint Huck you will be
crushed by a relentlessly stormtrooping
drive from claustrophobia to lebensraum;
Robert Mitchums fake Southern preacher
out of Charles Laughtons Night Of The Hunter,
LOVE and HATE tattooed on clenched white
knuckles, an Amerikan Gothic knell tolling
across the turgid Mississippi. Melodramatic
yes, but overwrought no.
From Her to Eternity, the song, is an epic,
starring the most icy scalpel of a piano motif
ever to cut to the heart of trauma. And backing
it up is an arsenal of breakdown, electrocution
and massacre that rises and rises in the multiple
orgasm of a man torturing himself to death.
And nally the funeral oration of A Box For
Black Paul. A piano maudlin with moonshine
melancholy drifts over a steaming swamp,
surveying the
aftermath of
the lynching
of Black Paul.
(BP also stands
for Birthday
Party, and
that inquests
verdict must
thus stand as murder, not suicide.) Death has
reared up again, and so this elegy wends it way
to the broken heart of Elvis Heartbreak Hotel,
rewritten as the testament of a man whose
loved one has not survived her leaving him.
And thus Nicks girl nally fades away in the
coda, leaving just the echo of the sound thats
dominated this record, the mutated electric
blues collage of a man as much in the tradition
of Howlin Wolfs Moanin At Midnight as he is
of Dostoevskys Raskolnikov
As I said, this is one of the greatest rock
albums ever made.
Mat Snow

You wil hear no more slashing,

grinding, throbbing, wrenchingly
physical rocknroll ever

70

NME ORIGINALS

If this
Im

1984

is heaven
bailing out

he enigma of The Birthday Party, like that

of Werner Herzogs saintly idiot Kaspar
Hauser, begins with grunts in the darkness
and ends in murder.
Slithering between irony and tragedy last year,
The Birthday Party slug nally sliced itself open
on that razors edge, but instead of the unsightly
mess you might have expected, it left behind the
nest examples of its art in The Bad Seed and
Mutiny two four-track EPs that shone through
the amorphous mass of transparent mediocrity
released in 1983. Both are testaments of romantic
daring and sick obsessiveness, full of feverish
images of guilt, pictures of murder that are
simultaneously horrendous and secretly attractive.
It was at that point that it rst became clear
that Nick Caves songwriting was departing from
every mode known to rock and developing into
some new, iridescent form, by turns trenchant
and direct, epic and overblown. Meanwhile,
the music was hurling itself into a state of wild,
epileptic disorder.
And yet in the midst of the crash, Nick
captured the mood of modern Britain with an
acute perception that the desperate, depressing
worthiness of a Weller could never have
approached: At night my body blushed to the
whistle on the birch, he raved. With a little
practise I learned to use it on myself .
With that line, ostensibly referring to religion, he
encapsulated the masochism of a nation that seems
to be yielding any notion of individual power to
a higher authority. It was a reaction against the
dulling of the imagination. It ended The Birthday
Party in the only way possible violently.

NME, 12 May 1984, p28

Who is the real Nick Cave and will he ever emerge from his
gallery of masks borrowed from classical fiction and the
hallowed museums of rocknroll? Don Watson goes in search of
old Nick as he releases his debut solo LP, From Her to Eternity

NME ORIGINALS

DEREK RIDGERS

From the

wreckage of Mutiny, Cave has now

emerged with a solo LP, From Her To Eternity.
Released from all controls, Caves songwriting
has spiralled into a wild and wheeling poetry of
cruelty, pursuing the most nightmarish strands
of The Birthday Partys fascinations. Its not
constructed without a certain humour, but its
dark, even by the standards of The Birthday Party.
From Her To Eternity is a statement of romantic
irrationalism stretched to the very limits.
Talk to Nick Cave and youre talking to a
variety of characters. Like JG Ballard he views
external reality as a sinister novel, and he seeks
to play more parts: the irresponsible artist, the
wounded romantic, the hunched grotesque,
the Nietzschean individualist. He plays with
the cartoon personae of Nick Cave in the same
manner that he manipulates the images of Elvis
Presley or Iggy Pop.
Right now hes playing a character very close to
the consumptive hag displaying her blood spots in
Dostoevskys Crime & Punishment, as he indicates
the cramped surroundings of his current living
conditions. Look at my squalor!
Nice, isnt it? he asks with ironic relish as we
enter the single room he shares with Bad Seeds
Blixa Bargeld (also of Einstrzende Neubauten)
and Hugo Race. At the moment, though, Blixa has
ed to Berlin and Hugo to Oxford, leaving Nick
to share the room with a handful of telephone
messages, a copy of Moby Dick and a treasured
portrait of GI period Elvis Presley.
He runs nicotine-stained ngers through his
back-combed nest of hair, an amused glance
reected in the bathroom mirror as he watches

71

In The Ghetto
the latest voyeurs stumbling around in search
of standing space amid the dirty laundry.
I always think its important to show people
where you live, he continues.
So what are the chances that Nick Cave will
give himself away? Show us the bleeding heart he
delights in setting against the swastika?
Well, rst wed have to distinguish just which
one of the many faces on show, both here and
elsewhere, precisely is Nick Cave. His art is one of
dramatic fakery, executed with a wicked delight
in defying expectation.
Of course theres the Wild Man Of Rock/
Thinking Man Of The Modern Age dichotomy
between the most readily recognisable Nick Cave
stage personae and the calm and contemplative
demeanour of Nick Cave the interviewee. But his
gallery of masks contains less easily classiable
characters than that some borrowed from
history, some from classical ction, some from
the most hallowed museums of rocknroll.
In his songs ction merges into reality: the
shadow of Raskolnikov mingles with Hamlet;
Caves own creations Gun, King Ink, The Dim
Locator mix with hybrids like Saint Huck.
All of them are partly, but never entirely, Cave
himself. His latest fascination stares down at us
from the wall.
Ive just joined the Elvis Presley Fan Club, he
grins. Theyre sending me some posters; cant
imagine Ill go to many of the meetings though.
The Presley infatuation is reected in a vocal
inection at the end of Box For Black Paul;
more specically theres the next single, a version
of In The Ghetto.
Theres very little in it to suggest that its
recorded with anything other than the
greatest respect and admiration, he
says with a certain bemusement.
I love it but I can imagine a
Birthday Party fan might have some
difculty knowing what to make of it.
As with most of Caves fascinations, his
interest in Presley is in his decline, in the
artice rather than the art.
The inuence that I get from any ctional
character, he says, is from their cartoon
selves, the point at which they themselves
become clichs. In that sense, all of my own
characters are cartoons of themselves as well,
in that they begin with a stock clich that
people can latch on to, that will trigger off
the desired initial impression.
You have to remember what a clich
is which is something that was formerly
powerful, but through overuse has become
meaningless. You can restore its meaning by
putting it in a different setting.

form at all, but he has some method of tuning

the instrument that can produce the most
amazing noises without the use of any effects
whatsoever. He would regard using footpedals
or whatever as a hopelessly middle class, public
school form of playing.
Where the music is simple and direct, though,
the lyrics have developed a new complexity. The
images are direct and violent, but theres always
something deeper and darker than the surface
indicates. It makes demands on the listener that
Nick describes with a typical arrogance.
I see it in same the way as a tight, tense drama
in the cinema my songs require you to listen to
the storyline from beginning to end, to listen to
and understand each line. Otherwise you get lost
in the same way as you would if you decided to
visit the toilet in the nal scenes of Taxi Driver
and expect to know what the lm is about.
As he proclaims, he has abandoned any
careerist notions that he might have entertained.
Its a brave attempt to escape the tyrannies of
commercial punishment and reward.
I would like to escape dening my own
reality in terms of punishment and reward, in
preference to what I consider to be good and bad.
Those lines in Mutiny referring to
punishment and reward were intended to point
the nger at religion, and why people believed
in the conventional concepts of good and bad,
which are based on greed and fear.
Im very interested in discovering something
within myself that is not affected by other forces.
I have very strong feelings that the way I am is
not due to the inuence of my parents or my
environment that I was brought up in any

external factors are basically quite supercial.

I would like to consider myself totally alone
and above those inuences, which is to do
with developing a character that is sufciently
strong not to be inuenced by the way that other
people think, but to develop a moral code that
is not under the inuence of ordinary laws and
religious laws and be able to live under that
without a nagging conscience.

Murder,

of course, looms large in Caves scheme

of things.
My songs are fairly harmless vehicles for
expressing what I might entertain within my
mind, Cave says. The things that I write
about are things that, outside of the obvious
difculties, I would like to witness. I dont dwell
on these themes in order to be controversial.
There are things that I do for those reasons but
theyre very deliberate and obvious things that
are making a comment on the idea of being
controversial, and how ridiculous and shallow
such a way of life is.
You mean the vacuity of the good-old
fashioned shock value?
Well In the case of the swastika Ive always
used it in the most deliberately moronic fashion.
Ill also do that in the writing, by inserting a line
that is deliberately shocking or irresponsible. Its
nding those symbols and thoughts that are far
more shocking in certain contexts than they are
in others. As Ive said, certain clichs in the right
context can still be reasonably effective
As the conversation continues in a local pub,
an old man leans across to our table, and xes
Nick with a stare.
Youre an arrogant fellow, the
old man accuses.
Ive got a right to be, Im a
famous person, Nick replies. Ive
just done a European tour.
Oh yeah, whats your name?
Im Napoleon, answers Nick, with
a twinkle.
Yes, the role of the irresponsible artist
as provocateur, as enemy of the tidy world
of liberal moralists has been in existence
for some time now, long enough now to
qualify for clich status.
All the same, some of us are grateful
that the rich tapestry of rocknroll has
been splattered with the pus and gore of
The Velvet Undergrounds, the Iggy Pops,
the Foetuses and the Nick Caves, gures
who will play with re and seek to scorch
the glossy package of the shiny pop fantasy.
Nick Cave is an ardent irrationalist, too
complex a creature to plod the straight
line of the liberal path. His images are a
perpetual provocation contrived to throw
even his admirers into a state of crisis.

Musically, From Her to Eternity is a

sparse sound, snagged with Blixa Bargelds
corruption of the blues guitar. As a
longstanding friend of Nicks, Blixa was
the natural choice not only because
Neubautens philosophy is in accord with
Caves search for a simpler, more directly
violent form of expression, but because as
a non-musician he is incapable of seeing
things in a conventional manner.
As far as I can work out, Blixa cant
actually play the guitar in the conventional

72

NME ORIGINALS

I would like to dene this irrationalism as

the ultimate principle of innity in our art
the yearning for meaning in madness the
continuation of life by other means, including
the issues of guilt, the work of mourning as
the reection of this loneliness of innity. At
its start suffering; and at its end morality.
Hans-Jurgen Syberberg, taken from Hitler:
A Film From Germany.

DEREK RIDGERS

Ive got a right to be arrogant.

Im famous. Im Napoleon

1984

MM, 9 June 1984, p32

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Hyaena
(Wonderland)

Robert Smith:
tipped for
The Top

MM, 5 May 1984, p24

THE CURE
The Top

TOM SHEEHAN

(Fiction)

Trying to get to the

bottom of The Top
is a bit like trying to
decide whether a happy
lunatic would be better
off sane. Its silly and
sinister, like Syd Barrett.
Its selsh, irresponsible,
perfectly amoral and
completely incompatible
with anything else
happening now or, indeed, anything
thats probably ever happened.
Its playing practical jokes where
the victim dies. Its Vincent Price in
Theatre Of Blood plotting, sawing
the head off another nice song.
In a way its as carefree and cocky
as the White Album but it never
sounds wilfully disorganised. Its
logic is strict, just unhinged.

The Top is psychedelia that

cant be dated, the sounds and
shapes of somebody revelling in
an identity crisis. It recognises no
values but its own existence; no
rules, no precedents, no
preconceptions. The
Top is perfect freedom.
Ive yet to meet
anyone who can tell
me why The Cure are
having hits now of
all times. Have we
discovered something
in Smiths busy
lethargy (two bands
and still dreaming all day!), and if so,
what? Or has Smith uncovered some
twitching nerve near our funny
bone that reacts instinctively to
his whimsical tortures? Whatevers
going on, Smith has done what all
the Wellers have been bleating on
about hes escaped his past and
wriggled out of the cul-de-sac that
we knew and loved to death as
The Cure. He doesnt care what we

think any more hes not the guitar

hero in black with a head stuffed
with Camus, but he could be next
Wednesday if he felt like it. He just
doesnt give two hoots.
Smiths voice is all over the place:
mock-passionate, whining, daft as
Steve Harley, devious as Devoto.
Where his heads at is something
else; most of the lyrics sound like
video cues to egg on Tim Pope to
weirder excesses.
Could it be drugs? The Wailing
Wall could be an acid trip in Israel.
Could it be The Banshees? The Top
itself worms around similar tunnels.
Could Smith be a hippy? Dressing
Up is a gorgeous acoustic ditty,
yawning and stretching like vintage
String Band. Could it be cunning?
Oh, very. There are clues to Smiths
inspiration: the
utey feedback
of Wailing Wall is
Hendrixs If Six Were
Nine; Give Me It
echoes Nick Caves
Mutiny In Heaven.
Still, accounting
for The Top is like
accounting for a dream
you add it all up and
theres still something missing.
I reckon either Smiths gone mad or
we have. Maybe both. Who knows?
Who cares? Love it!
Steve Sutherland

The laughing dog. The scavenger.

The survivor, picking over the bones
of the past to nourish the present.
At times ignoble, essentially alive.
This is the Banshees.
Their prey may have varied
over the years, but its still the
same old carrion carry-on. At their
transcendental best, the Banshees
are a million times more than the
sum of their parts. That arrogantly
independent attitude, those
embarrassing excursions into the
occult, the creeping spell and the
sudden rush of blood is so unique
that it takes on a life of its own.
There are many such moments
on Hyaena, moments where
the Banshees are caught up in
the revelry of their own creations.
Parts of it are so wistfully carefree
that its impossible not to credit
Robert Smith as the talisman
his irreverence seems to course
through everything.
Take Me Back is the Banshees
rollicking like some primitive jazz
combo drunk on the Good Lords
wine. On Belladonna, Smiths
liquid guitar relaxes Sioux to the
extent that she drops a few masks
to reveal her vulnerability. When the
siren sings daylight devours your
unguarded hours, shes illuminating
her own predicament so acutely it
surely cant be coincidence.
Dazzle, too, is naively daring:
Siouxsies voice, framed alone
against the rmament of strings.
It could be Lloyd Webbers Cats or
something by Vaughn Williams.
You can get impressed, wrapped up
and lost in this. Thats the beauty
but then theres the complacency.
Running Town tries to sound eerie
but instead of evoking the awful
truth behind the clowns
cheery mask, it just sounds
giddy and silly. And
Hunger For This and
Pointing Bone are just
the Banshees being
the Banshees.
I doubt Hyaena
could be any other way.
It urges itself to the
turning point where we
stop assuming what the Banshees
should be and start accepting that
they can do anything they like.
Hyaena is an immaculate
conception. Again.
Steve Sutherland
NME ORIGINALS

73

The Last Great Rock Band

Horse Nation onwards. Gritty and

noisy (Spiritwalker) with nesse
and calamity (83rd Dream), The
Cult take great strides to ease
Dreamtime
the emotions home. Flower In
(Beggars Banquet)
The Desert and Bad Medicine
Only connect. (EM Forster)
Waltz are not merely hypnotic but
Instinctively coveted but
strangely uplifting and reassuring.
words still unclear. So it is with
Try it, dumbo.
The Cult. Something magnicent
The Stones, eh? Hmm. The
glows within these songs, ideas
trouble is that people are no longer
and lyrics as emotions swirl, crash
inclined to be shaken awake,
and dance
particularly since the introduction
and connect of course, while
of those spectacular video
the over-the-top press release
nightgowns. But The Cult are on a
makes much, with tongue piercing
precipice. Not since the Ants have
cheek, of their Rolling Stones
there been clandestine guards
similarities (in terms of the future).
meeting commercial success,
Its not far from the truth. The
without excess. The Ants, of course,
Cult, almost accidentally, could
made that unexpected shift into
be the last great rock band. With
pantomime, so the crown is there
their rhythmic ferocity, their guitar
if The Cult want it. They could really
predominance and purely unique
do something.
vocals, membership is open to that
Musically they are spruce and
club of U2, Big Country, The Clash
hard-hitting. Nigel Preston, man
and Simple Minds, but there is an
of a thousand arms, is a rhythmical
important difference:
lynch-pin of some
The Cult dont come
versatility.
out of a packet.
His partner, Jamie
Theres an ethereal
Stewart (retired from
re burning in their
acting), is a shade less
songs (although the
assertive, although the
title track seems rather
live album (given away
crass), which could have
free with the rst
quite an effect when
10,000 copies) shows
they bite deep into the
him in ruthless form.
charts, as they clearly will.
Billy Duffy (currently
And the beneciaries of that will
keeping clear of swimming pools)
are us. Hooked and pampered by
exhibits true mastery, the notes
falling in viscous ringlets. And of
course theres Ian Astbury. A
telescopic voice, rearing up in
front and then nipping round
the back for a bit of wellgroomed gargling.
And this live album, where
Ian harangues the sleeping
characters at the back, catches
them in explosive form: We
played our fucking hearts out for
your tonight. The least you could
do is show some appreciation!
Get stuck in. All of you.
And before I go lads, a piece of
The Cult: (l to r)
advice in case, on your travels,
Billy Duffy,
you should come to a town
Jamie Stewart,
called Altamont.
Ian Astbury,
Nigel Preston
Keep driving.
Mick Mercer
MM, 25 August 1984, p29

THE CULT

74

NME ORIGINALS

MM, 10 November 1984, p34

COCTEAU TWINS
Treasure
(4AD)

Trust true brilliance to arrive by

accident. With Treasure echoing
all around my head, it all seems so
obvious. Only something this naive
could shake the shame from all
categories we worry about.
Relax. Treasure sounds like
nothing youve ever heard and
everything youve ever wished for.
Most people change; The
Cocteau Twins blossom. The break
from the hellish Gothic shackles
of the awkward Garlands to the
heavenly scorpion
cocktail jazz of Head
Over Heels was
a metamorphosis
beyond the imagining.
But how were we to
know that the chrysalis
had only just cracked,
that the colours we were
devouring were just a
dazzling secretion?
Without meaning to, without
caring, Treasure is what so many
strive for a new pop music. Anyone
can listen to this and feel enriched.
Its stirring, sensual, stately, subtle.
Its bubblegum spiked with acid. Its
candy-coloured, its timeless.
Crack its sugary shell and you
read the name right through. Pin
its plump, squirming body to a

board and examine its translucent

wings and its an anatomical marvel.
Simon Raymondes sturdy, haunting
bass forms a vertebrae, the drum
machine drops heartbeats like
bombs and Robin Guthries guitar
congeals into a pale, perfect skin.
The creature thus far is grubbing
in the dark, begging for sight. Its
the voice that leads it from sweet
ambience to poignant emotion. Liz
Fraser must be schizophrenic, she
speaks in so many tongues. During
Lorelei shes a panting orgasm,
a celestial turn-on. As Pandora
shes The Angel From Ipanema;
as Otterly shes the spectral
confessor; as Amelia, the lady with
the lamp.
It would be easy
to point out that The
Cocteau Twins use
Lizs voice as an
instrument rather than
a narrative, but thats
like reducing ight to
the motion of muscles.
Liz isnt accomplished,
shes inspired.
Its weird. The Cocteaus barely
seem to exist off record. They work
like receivers; something plays
itself through them and reaches
us untainted and pure. There are
dimensions to Treasure which
strike me as spiritual it invades the
body, intoxicates the imagination
and succours the soul. Surely this
band is the voice of God.
Steve Sutherland

TOM SHEEHAN

Cocteau Twin
Liz Fraser: the
voice of God

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Hooked On Classics

pretentious, three traps which

most previous classical/rock
experimenters have fallen into
headrst. In fact, the power of a
classical orchestra is the perfect
foil for the bands grindingly
insistent sounds and theres
something about Siouxsies
voice which benets from such
a combination of chaos and
formality. Overground is the
undoubted highlight, with the
orchestra churning away at a
sort of spaghetti western
backing full of castanets and
snare drums while the guitars
snarl angrily between them.
A little reminiscent of Deep
Purples Concerto For Group
And Orchestra but lets not
go into that.
Mark Jenkins

NME, 17 March 1984, p21

Singles

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Swimming Horses
(Polydor)

Siouxsie! Listen to me! It is

obvious by now that your career
will be at its most pungent if it
is composed solely of covers,
the Cilla Black of the Blackheart
Set nothing wrong with that,
someones got to do it so may
I recommend Martha My Dear,
the crooner Paul McCartneys
love song to his late sheepdog
it is a Beatles song from The
White Album (ring a bell?), a
song about an animal (you go
for our furry friends, dont you?)
and ripe for reproduction. So
may I recommend it to you as
a wise career move?
Oh, sod you, then.
Julie Burchill

MM, 12 May 1984, p30

MM, 25 August 1984, p30

THE CULT

THE CULT

Spiritwalker

Go West
(Crazy Spinning Circles)

(Situation 2)

If they keep this up, The Cult soon

wont have a name at all. Still,
they can be relied on to deliver
a bit of clout, and this bristles
with hostile voice and scorchedearth guitar. Not much of a song,
unfortunately.
Adam Sweeting

(Beggars Banquet)

Exuberant youths become

strapping lads, the rebel
yell controlled but
not calm. There is
smooth cloud cover,
but you cant hide
the lightning storm
within.
Mick Mercer

Sioux: the Cilla

Black of the
Blackheart Set
NME, 21 April 1984, p21

Pearly Dewdrops Drops

THE SISTERS
OF MERCY

(4AD)

Body And Soul

In The Cocteau Twins scheme

of things, putting on a black
dress and looked pained = a
cosmic Piaf! A plodding tortuous
dirge = a mark of sensitivity!
Screeching like a doolally shwife
= passion! These precious little
people are one of the nest
arguments I have ever heard for
bringing back National Service.
Tony Parsons

(Merciful Release/WEA)

STEVE RAPPOST

COCTEAU TWINS

76

NME, 4 August 1984, p16

NME ORIGINALS

Heres a nugget to start with.

As I write, Body And Soul
has crashed into the Hot 100 at
lets see, now number 100.
Oh well, its magnicent all
the same: a gorgeous swell of
sensurrounding warmth.
Where will the indie charts
be without them?
Paul Du Noyer

NME, 25 October 1984, p20

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
The Thorn
(Polydor)

Remixed and remodelled

with strings, choirs and all the
production of a Hooked On
Classics effort, Overground,
Voices, Placebo Effect and Red
Over White do The Banshees
credit it doesnt sound in
the least bit silly, clichd or

Chapter 7

DEREK RIDGERS

1985

Amphetamine Logic

MM, 16 March 1985, p30

SS

CARELE

SPERS

WHI

Steve Sutherland swaps badinage with Andy Eldritch of

The Sisters Of Mercy. Eldritch reveals little about his
new LP, but we learn that he intends to eat lemons on tour

he self-styled Mr Eldritch drags on his fag and takes

another of those long, practised, meditative pauses. Ive
just asked him how come he wasnt asked to sing on the
Band Aid single. Almost a minute elapses.
He exhales audibly: Thats a tough one, isnt it?
This self-same Mr Eldritch, stubble-chinned and bone-dry
behind shades in a Leeds living room, is explaining why The
Sisters Of Mercys debut album, First And Last And Always,
has taken so damn long to crawl into the light of day. He
conrms the rumours of illness, revelling in revealing just
what he wants and no more. Just like his songs.
Ive got the scars to prove it. I think I just started working
too hard and, at the end of last summer, my body said, No
thank you. This has gone far enough. Itll end in tears. So
Ive calmed down a bit I enjoy it so much, being strung out
for a very long time Im told you cant do it for that long.
This is, of course, the only possible reaction from a man
associated with the doomier side of existence.
Doomy is a housewives word for realistic. Its a
dangerous world.
Now this Mr Eldritch is a man of starchy intelligence,
the sort of fellow you can say words like art to and not feel

78

NME ORIGINALS

1985
like a dickhead. And so it was that I asked him
You have to laugh at it because you have to
whether his art informed his life or vice versa.
see it for what it might do to the nations youth
And, naturally enough, this was exactly the sort
and, God forbid, to the nations housewives to
of question he loves.
hear Amphetamine Logic.
After so much practice, its very difcult not
This Mr Eldritch, as youll have doubtless
to live it so, yeah, the lifestyle informs the art.
surmised, is one wry customer, a bit of a master
I keep putting myself in this godawful position
when it comes to a wind-up and I, too, have had
quite deliberately. Its possible to get out of it but
my moments so we joust a bit and I ask him what
Ive chosen not to.
hed say to somebody who considered his antics
The next question is, Will there come a point
pathetic because some people really are ill while
where you cant? And then what will you do?
his maladies are generally self-induced?
And the answer is, I dont know. I shall probably
Id probably tell them to fuck off. He rasps
just keel over.
and I take it to be laughter. Telling people to
I tell this Mr Eldritch that I think hes a damn
fuck off, that sense of glorious vindication, is a
good actor, creating for himself the classic role
primary, motivating factor, I think.
of romantic victim.
Rocknroll
He rather likes this
outlaws, eh?
notion too.
Arent we just! No!
Ive spent so long
We have appetites!
doing this that I cant
Were human! We
distance the two. And
have needs! Its
its more interesting
about time we were
than what I was
pandered to.
before. I was so shot
Such as?
when I wrote the lyrics on the album that theres
Such as the 12 fresh lemons I have to have
no distancing of persons at all. Its not a problem
every night on the next tour.
to live up to it, its just a problem to live, period.
This is exactly the stuff of which legends are
The way I seem to end up living these days, Im
made and, of course, Mr Eldritch forever keeps
very aware of how fast the bloods going round
an eye on legend. But I wonder, can someone
and how high the sugar level is because Ive been
so cryptic with such an advanced, nay, chronic,
forced to be aware of it.
sense of irony ever attain that status?
I now decide its time Mr Eldritch and I
No, because I always let people know just that
stopped beating around the bush and started
bit too much. It disturbs them.
talking serious drugs so I inform him that, in my
Mr Eldritchs favourite word is oblique and
humble opinion, the second side of First And
yet his followers tend to be the new Goths, the
Last And Always is about being wasted, nding it
ersatz Siouxsies. Strange. Mr Eldritchs fantasy
hard to cope and relishing every agonised second.
is much more subversive. He likes to irt with
He smirks: It would be
clichs. He likes twisting his
dishonest to write anything
sources. Goddamn, he even
more homely. I dont think
acknowledges his sources!
the bands particular
The Sisters once recorded
pleasures are destructive.
Gimme Shelter.
Its horses for courses. At
Everybodys doing
our age, you generally know
exactly the same thing to
whats good for you and
a greater or lesser degree.
what isnt and, most of the
Were just rather shameless
1. His favourite lm is The Blues
time, you stick to whats
about it. People dont like to
Brothers
good for you. None of the
be reminded of it. Theyd
2. He supports Manchester
songs on the album are
much rather we went out
United
about being a victim of ones
there like messiahs from
3`. He is currently courting Josie
own pleasures except in the
another planet whod never
from Vicious Pink
case of getting emotionally
heard of Chuck Berry
4. He owns a spifng collection
involved with people who
or he whispers this bit
of Likely Lads videos
arent very good for you.
Led Zeppelin.
So what sort of
5. He idolises Jake Thackeray
If its only rocknroll, is
6. Hes currently launching a
irresponsible hero is this
this Mr Eldritch really happy
campaign to get Reg Varney as
man in black who stalks
being a Sister?
the next Dr Who and, failing that,
the streets of Leeds 4 in a
Smug might be a better
Eleanor Bron
battered cowboy hat?
word. Were in a good
7. He studied French and German
The sort of irresponsible
position. We can step in
at St Johns, Oxford and then
hero who makes it very
and out of the mainstream
Chinese at Leeds University
clear that certain things
and the band decide whats
8. His black coat/cloak was given
are irresponsible. Theres
required, not someone else.
to him by The Gun Club
no actual propagation of
Is there anyone else, I ask,
9. He owns the 12-inch of
irresponsibility on the
who Mr Eldritch reckons is
Careless Whisper although he
records and thats why you
doing anything worthwhile?
doesnt own a record player. Its
need detachment, irony with
He pauses that pause:
important to have the artefact if
a capital I. You have to be
Roy Kinnear, always.
the records that good.
clinical about certain aspects
My, he is a smug bastard
10. Theres a picture of Jimmy
of portraying any persona,
isnt he?
White above his replace
even if its your genuine self.
Well, yeah. Why not?

Telling people to fuck off,

that glorious vindication, is a
primary motivating factor

DEREK RIDGERS

Ten things you

didnt want to know
about Mr Eldritch

MM, 16 March 1985, p28

THE SISTERS OF MERCY

First And Last And Always
(Merciful Release/WEA)

James Dean is alive!

Hes living in a at
in Leeds disguised
as Andrew Eldritch
a 24-hours-a-day
enigma, complete
with permanently
afxed shades.
Last year it
seemed that
success had eluded the Sisters once and
for all. But their new album is packed with
glistening gems, and just as Andys beat-up
crow hat appears to be riveted to his head,
so his lugubrious baritone-drone rivets
the attention in turns commanding, then
inviting, following a path wrought with morbid
depression and reeking of misery.
I have heard a million conversations going
where theyve been before/I dont care for words
that dont belong. Ah, music to hum over the
three-minute warning. Yet the doom-ridden,
gloom-trodden world of the Sisters is but half
their appeal. Delicacy showers the spheres of
Black Planet as Waynes infectious guitaring
slopes and spirals around words cradled with
dark innuendo, rhymes invested with sparks
of aggression, and a chorus that once heard, is
never to be forgotten.
The Sisters supplement the intensity of
Walk Away with the bittersweet tang of No
Time to Cry, while A Rock And A Hard Place
breathes life into the ossied remains of
post-punk using Eldritchs dulcet tones to bind
together the ornaments of instrumentation as
they dance on the grave of circumstance.
The second side unveils Celtic guitars that
career through arid wastelands until theyre
swept up by the blistering chorus of First
And Last And Always. The surge of drums
nally yields to a sustaining piano note that
stretches suspense to a point only dreamt of
by Hitchcock. God forbid, but these songs are
almost explosive enough to launch a goth
revival (the third this year?).
Have Mercy! And pass the razor blades.
Andrews sense of humour rattles with such
ominous overtones that laughter takes fright
and takes ight. His prowling voice veers
dangerously close to pastiche, but the songs
are so striped with splinters of power and pain,
his words remain dangerous.
Here, all past promises have been fullled:
the Sisters have successfully accumulated a
startling array of timeless jewels.
It can only be a matter of time before they
accumulate success.
Ted Mico
NME ORIGINALS

79

MM, 8 June 1985, p34

NICK CAVE &

THE BAD SEEDS
The Firstborn Is Dead
(Mute)

Nick Cave and his Bad Seeds

continue their excursion into a
nightmare world where perdition
will never lead to
salvation, and pain
and horror are not
eeting agonies,
but the only true
religion.
Despite the
obvious drawbacks
of coming from
Australia (and not
the Deep South),
being white (and not black), and
looking like a cadaver (and not
having a dead grandfather who
was a slave) Cave has achieved

a startling grasp on
the John Lee Hooker
and Screaming Jay
Hawkins world of blues.
Thunderclaps and the
acid rain of futility drench
the sparse Bo Diddleystyle guitar of opener
Tupelo, which quickly
sets this album far above
the standard post-junkie blues
epics that are dampened by crass
sentiment and self-pity.
Knocking On Joe chimes to the

beat of a ritual drum at a sacrice

as Barry Adamsons bass hauls the
lumbering beast across landscapes
of mock hell. Caves voice aches with
persecution, but his stories of woe
are tinted with the blackest humour.
Its not clear if Say Goodbye To The
Little Girl Tree is a joke pretending
to be funny, or a man pretending to
be a joke, but either way it succeeds!
Black Crow King: Blixas lone sixstring scrapes the crypt oor while
Nick recounts the tale of a King who
is set up for worship only to nd
his former authority turns to
parody. Sound familiar?
Nothing like as familiar as
Wanted Man which sounds
remarkably like Dr Feelgood!
The albums lugubrious
chain-gang beat marches
on arid and remorseless,
punctuating Nicks hollow
and morbid
chant. Halfway
through the
murderous
Train Long
Suffering
you wish
someone
would hand
Nick a razorblade and
put us all out of our misery.
Its sordid, its predictable,
its sickening, and its quite
indispensable!
Ted Mico

MM, 31 August 1985, p27

THE CURE
The Head On The Door
Fiction

Black crow king:

Nick Cave in his
Berlin bolthole

80

NME ORIGINALS

No more Mad Bob? Maybe.

Maybe not. Robert Smith
has wormed himself into
an enviable but precarious
position over the past 18
months. We dont know
what to expect any more.
But, then again, we know
to expect nothing. Hes
slipped the straitjacket
of brooding depression
that shaped Faith,
cleaved through the

claustrophobia of Pornography,
checked himself out of the funny
farm where he turned out The
Top, and now roams among us,
a harmless eccentric. I cant help
wondering if the magnicent liberty
that fashioned The Head On The
Door wont cement into another
image, comfortably digested and
easily dismissed.
Certainly, this album is as
wilfully enigmatic as ever. The
only difference is its determinedly
languorous, nowhere near as
tortured or tense as its predecessor.
So The Head is a collection
of pop songs, its as simple(?) as
that. Bursting with potential hits,
it staggers under its inuences,
rescued from dilettantism solely
by Smiths steady presence. Some
stuff, like The Baby Screams a
classic Cure concoction of mixed
metaphors and creeping guitar
will satisfy the Faithful. Others, like
Close To Me a squirming, sobbing,
pleading disco thing complete with
handclaps will seduce just about
any Tom, Dick or Vanessa.
The Head makes a mockery
not only of the accepted parameters
of what the radio will play and the
public accept, but also of what The
Cure are supposed to be about.
Theres nothing obscure or sinister
about A Night Like
This it deals with
love and despair in
desperate balance,
toys with a joyously
incongruous singalong
and accommodates a
sax break more at home
with Hall & Oates.
Its a neat ragbag of
the arbitrary, each song
a separate piece from a different
jigsaw. Some shapes bear the
imprint of exotic scenes Kyoto
Song sounds Japanese while The
Blood stamps through its paces to
a amenco guitar. Others suggest
there are more strident, less ckle
things ahead. Push, for example,
is stronger, less whimsical than
anything on The Top, and Sinking
is more majestic, more honest
perhaps than anything Smiths done
since All Cats Are Grey.
As a compilation of possibilities,
The Head On The Door is
perfection of sorts a romp more
than a rage through the closet,
trying things on, not tearing them
up. This Cure is boisterous but
relaxed and reliably unreliable.
Im used to it now and I use it with
pleasure.
So, no more Mad Bob. Next time,
something else. Again.
Steve Sutherland

BLEDDYN BUTCHER

Southern
No
More Mad
DeAth
BobCult

1985
MM, 17 August 1985, p24

A Suitable
CaseFor
Treatment
Has Robert Smith taken the cure? He says yes.
Steve Sutherland isnt convinced. Now read on

o more Mad Bob.

Pardon?
No more Mad Bob.
Oh, I see. Robert Smith is happy.
Deliriously happy. Think about that
for a moment.
Doctor Doom. Mr Miserable.
The Prince Of Paranoia. Happy.
Happy with life. Happy with death.
Happy to wind us up. Happy to let us
down. And happy to talk his head off
about The Head On The Door,
the new Cure album and another
departure from what we might expect.
So whats he got to tell us, this
smudge of lipstick in a lions mane?
Will he spin us a yarn to match the one
he foisted on Smash Hits you know,
the one about the album title referring
to a nightmare childhood vision
engendered by a chicken-pox fever?
Oh, did I tell him about that one?
Robert grins sheepishly as he attacks
an onion bhaji. Well its sort of true.
Do you want me to give you a different
version?
Oh, yes please.
Alright then. (Are you sitting
comfortably?) When I was little, I used
to sleep in the same room as my little
sister and we used to have one of those
Noddyland scenes, quite a big event,
made out of felt.
Oh really.
Look, this is deadly serious. I couldnt
make something up like this, now could
I? Right. You had all these particular
characters who existed in Noddys particular
brand of reality, which is basically Big Ears
and his family hundreds of em oh, and
a policeman. That was about it.
Anyway, my big sister was going to art
school at the time and she used to make us
toys out of felt, nice things to put in this twofoot window into Noddyland, and my brother
got the idea that it would be really good fun to
introduce a sort of Texas Chainsaw Massacre
element. So there I was, sitting up in my
bunk-bed before I went to sleep and suddenly
I noticed hed cut Noddys head off, and it
really, really scared me.
I went really mental Noddy had such
a sweet face, he was always Mr Happy, and
I remember thinking at the time that it was
a really evil thing to do. Even now it seems
pretty awful. Uh dyou know, the biggest
evil I could imagine then was Catwoman.
Remember they used to have bubblegum cards?
Well, I used to have Catwoman under my pillow.
I used to think that was pretty dangerous, my
rst stirrings of lust.
But cutting Noddys head off I was in
trauma! And at the same time, Father Christmas
arrived in our street on a lorry. What a pile of
cack! It destroyed my faith in things like that.
Still, I dont suppose people of my generation
keep that kind of thing going for their kids. I
mean, how can you possibly believe in the tooth
fairy with a Conservative government? You
NME ORIGINALS

TOM SHEEHAN

81

Sick Boy
dont get something for nothing any more.
There are a lot of references to dreams in my
songs. It seems to bother other people but its
never really worried me that I have vivid dreams.
I nd it very reassuring. Its not always nice to
wake up with your whole body vibrating like an
engine it sometimes takes three minutes to get
back to normal but thats OK.

Does Smith the visionary rise, I wonder, from his

Robert Smith:
doesnt look at all
mental ,does he?

Ive always really wanted to kill someone.

You know, just a casual murder
I ever met him, Id kill him. Every ght Ive ever
been in, Ive thought Im ghting that person but
Ive never met him. Not through want of trying.
What on earth did the blackguard do?
Ah, thats the story that will remain forever
secret. He once did something not actually to
me, but I always vowed to avenge it. It was quite
an awful thing that I witnessed.
See, Im still very moral, I still have the same
ethics I always had but I dont really think that,
if I did kill someone casually, there would be any
retribution if I didnt get caught. Id just like to
do it as an experience. I wouldnt like to torture
somebody or anything like that.
Ive decided this No More Mad Bob
business might be a little premature, but I press
on regardless, wondering if Smith thinks hed
feel like a different person burdened with the
knowledge that hes taken a life?
Yeah. The thing that always put me off is that
its not really the sort of thing you can mend.
And what if you grow to like it?
Well, there is that. And if you dont like it,

82 NNMMEE OORRIIGGIINNAALLSS
??

youd probably end up confessing anyway. But

its not that big a step, not really. Were gonna be
rotting in 50 years time anyway so why not rot
now and give someone some pleasure from it?
If someone dies naturally, everyone cries. There
may as well be someone dancing round the grave
and it may as well be me.

As I said, Robert Smith is happy, even when

hes contemplating the inevitable. Can
this metamorphosis from gloom to glee be
permanent or is it just another of his infamous
emotional see-saws?
Well, Im very aware of my periods of
instability and Ive tried to think, If its going
to happen to me, I may as well use it for some
benet, but last year all it succeeded in doing
was getting in the way. I couldnt really do
anything at all whereas now I generally feel
much better. Ive cut down on my vices Ive
only kept drinking, everything else has gone
out of the window.
Everything?

Everything.
Isnt that hard?
No, not at all. I just decided one night. I
was doing absolutely nothing, yknow? It got
to the point when cleaning your teeth seemed
too much bother. Its cack when you get to that
stage, so I tried to learn to water-ski and things
like that the other extreme. It actually shocked
my body back into a happy status quo. I didnt
get t but, at the same time, I didnt keel over
and spend a month in a rest home which is what
everyone said I should do.
I thought that idea was bollocks you know
your own body or you should do. The older
you get, the more you know it. Im afraid I can
no longer wake up in the morning and boast that
I havent got a hangover.
Me neither. Never. Wonder how this affects
Boy Smiths public image?
Id be hard-pressed to imagine what my
public image is, to be honest. Indifferent. It
varies, actually, from place to place. Here its
very obvious from the general media myth thats
perpetuated character assassination, thats the
phrase Im after. But in America Im considered
a really radical bloke, a really dangerous person,
on the Wanted list, because they lter through
the more sordid elements from England and

TOM SHEEHAN

bed onto some imaginary psychoanalysts couch,

combing his slumber for secrets and signs?
No! I think the whole concept of interpreting
dreams is the biggest wank really. Freuds
obviously the most well-known exponent of
delving into your subconscious and examining
it but the idea that you can have secrets from
yourself is such a paradox, its unreal.
I can understand it if you suppress things but
you know, youre suppressing them. The idea of
tricking yourself is one of those imponderables
its impossible. Who are you to trick yourself?
My dreams are very straightforward, very
much like my life. I murder in my dreams, much
as I murder in real life. Ive always really wanted
to kill someone but its wearing off now. Yknow,
just a casual murder.
I think I understand. Ive always thought if I
was gonna go crazy, Id do it creatively, riding
in the passenger seat of a monstrously fast car,
blasting oncoming cruisers with a shotgun. That
way you get the bullet impact and the crash.
No, no. Much more physical. If you use a
gun, you might as well shoot a bird really. I used
to murder a great deal in my dreams people
that Ive never even met and who, no doubt, hope
I never will. But I wouldnt murder any more,
Im sure of it.
Has this Smith, lately labelled a nouveau hippy
because of his beads and baggy bits and pieces,
ever hated anyone enough to kill them?
Oh yeah, of course. I know theres one that if

1985
then they also invent their own oh, and also,
when Im in America, I misbehave more than I
do in England because its far away from home.
In Japan, its teenybop hysteria. We went
mega there we were on television arriving at
the station. But in New Zealand were still doom
and gloom, so when we go there, we only smile
behind closed doors.

I think you deserve an update on this

schizophrenic Smith character, just to help you
make up your own mind. Hes writing a book on
The Cure in conjunction with a French lady. The
book, he claims, will be far more honest than
anything I could cook up. He speeds around in a
four-wheel-drive jeep which his friends consider
a post-nuclear vehicle or what?
He owns a at in Maida Vale with a
soundproofed bedroom to shield him from
the professional writer of musicals who lives
upstairs. Hes decided to holiday in London this
year to catch up on all the movies hes missed
He saw Ghostbusters three times at the Marble
Arch ABC, because he enjoyed watching the 300
teenies punching the air during the theme tune
It reminded me of a David Cassidy concert.
Not that I ever went to one, you understand, but
its the sort of thing, looking back, that I wish
I had done.
He never drinks on planes You cant
drink on an eight-hour ight, pass out then
go on stage Well, you can, but then youre
Spandau Ballet.
His back garden is a football
pitch-cum-dogs toilet I havent
plucked up the courage to play
in the team yet but I think, in my
current state, Id probably play a
sort of Glenn Hoddle role fading
away for 80 minutes then a killer 10
minutes towards the end.
His band, The Cure, is now a
quintet, with Simon Gallup, the original bassist,
welcomed back to the fold. Roberts ecstatic
about this line-up its a group again and the
pair of them reckon theyre pretty hot at pool. In
fact, Ex-Mad Bob had a table installed in his at,
a slate bed six-by-three, but he was a bit mental
when he measured it up, so the t was a mite
cosy no room to make shots and the table
now resides at a local youth club.
Smith the sportsman warms to the subject.
Me and Simon, were known as The Hackers,
thats the name of our pool team as in
Computer Hackers, because were both Luddites
and the rest of the band are very pro whatevers
new. Boris and Porl, who reckon theyre the
best but we hammer them, are called The Bros,
because they both have this fantasy that theyre
constantly driving about on huge throbbing
motorbikes.

I was getting a bit too close to falling into

Mad Bob and people were saying that to me,
jokingly mainly inspired by what you wrote
about The Top actually. People picked up on
what you wrote and decided that I was going
mental. Well, for a while I was a bit unstable but
I think its horrible when people make a career
out of being something.
What, professional loonies, like professional
Cockneys?
Yeah, its cack. The last thing I wanted to do
was drive my jeep into a swimming pool.
I dont think this record heralds us doing
anything. I know Im supposed to be selling
it but I never see it like that. Pornography or
Faith are peculiar in that quite a lot of people
probably think If I could only listen to one
album for ever and ever, it would be this album.
But I dont think this ones like that because it
doesnt inspire that kind of emotion.
Its the same as when The Human League
brought out Dare I thought it was a really
good collection of songs. It didnt send shivers
down my spine but Ive got drunk to it and
danced to it a lot over the years.
I tried to make this album really obvious
because I was aware that people thought I was
getting too obscure for anyones good. I suppose
they are still obscure in a way but theyre as plain
as I can be. Thats why I nd most songs in the
Top 20 at the moment really boring, because
theyre like end of conversation you dont
really need to bother.

is, though, despite all this gaiety, Roberts

beginning to act as if hes old. He recently told
some other hack that hed always anticipated
being dead by 25 but here he is, no grey hairs in
sight and tter than ever.
I feel old because of what people have been
saying to me. Ive consciously done interviews
with Just 17 just because its pap. All these
17-year-olds are coming along saying, Well,
as an established band As a famous and
eventually it gets to you.
But I defy all these people to name me
someone we are comparably old to. I look at the
ve of us in a metaphysical mirror and were still
100 years younger than all these people who are
physically younger because theyre so fucking
worried about nothing.
I mean, when I was young I didnt feel young
but I still feel younger than any new group
except The Jesus And Mary Chain.
I feel a story coming on.
The occasion was me being more drunk than
I had been all year, my one night out in London
clubland. Seriously, I cant risk more than one
night out. See, we were doing Top Of The Pops,
and we usually drink loads and loads of vodka
in the bar beforehand, which explains our
frighteningly exciting performances.
But this time we went to the bar afterwards
and we stayed there until we got thrown out,
by which time we were pretty hot so we decided
to go to eat, but I had to go to this studio rst,
supposedly to do backing vocals on the new
single and listen to the brass section,
yknow, to give em the Popes seal
of approval.
So we went to the studio and
I couldnt even make out what the
song was, so I was helped out and
we weaved our way mysteriously
down to the Sun Luck Restaurant
where I proceeded to eat a washingup bowl of prawns heads and feet and tails,
yknow not thinking, talking rapidly and
just eating. And then me and Lol staggered
outside and someone grabbed hold of Lol and
said, Excuse me, youre The Cure. My friend
wants to meet you, were drinking in this
bar. Well, the next thing I knew we were
descending the steps to this really dingy
place and I was thrust in from of William
from The Jesus And Mary Chain.
All these people gathered around expecting a
confrontation or something but actually it ended
up that I did a little bit of pogoing and I ended up
throwing up, I think, in the ladies toilet.
I was actually being sick in the sink because
someone was in the toilet and someone else
came in and said, You cant do that mate, youre
blocking up the sink and I want to have a wash,
so I then proceeded to pick up all my sick in
my hands and throw it on the oor. It was all
perfectly formed prawns in fact, had I picked
up my meal initially and thrown it on the oor,
it would have been the same but Id have had a
really good night.
As it was, Lol ended up carrying me home
which is why I know it was my last night out in
London. Because when you get to the stage when
Lawrence puts you in a taxi and takes you home,
youre in fucking big trouble.

I was being sick in the ladies

toilet. Then I proceeded to pick up
my sick and throw it on the floor

Theres more you should know about this Robert

Smith and The Head On The Door.
I think its the most entertaining album weve
ever done in the sense that it doesnt require very
much from the listener for it to be enjoyable,
mainly because its very simple, intentionally
simple. Its as much a reaction against us as a
reaction against anything else thats going on
because I didnt want to get too precious again.

Some of the songs are a bit wayward but In

Between Days is probably the simplest thing
Ive written since Boys Dont Cry. I did it on
purpose. I thought, Right, I might as well prove
all those bastards wrong. I know its big-headed
but you couldnt really make a record if you
didnt think it was good and theres very few
albums that Ive listened to this year that people
have recommended to me that are comparable.
Lol told me to listen to New Orders album
and I thought, This is a really dull record for
what they can do. For me, their record is 100
times safer than ours.
The Head On The Door is just me being
gloriously happy, probably. After wed nished
touring, I had a sudden surge of thinking that I
wouldnt have to do anything forever and ever
if I didnt want to because wed reached the end
of our contracts and things like that. I had this
sudden sense of being able to do anything.

Smiths new sense of freedom apparently

extends to all matters concerning The Cure, a
radical reversal from his involvement with the
claustrophobically secretive Banshees. Why, it
even extends to videoing the recording of The
Head, a home movie of daft drunkenness and
corny jokes which he hopes to release soon to
really take the myth apart. The funny thing

NME ORIGINALS

83

Heavy Heavy Heavy

MM, 26 October 1985, p28

Thisaintthesummeroflove
Hippies, hippies everywhere. Or are they punks? Or are they
psychedelic hard rockers? Steve Sutherland comes face to face
with The Cult and finds theyre all these things and less

m a nave, romantic kid. Im supposed

to be some middle-class drop-out whos
quite well-educated, but Ive got me ead
up me ass and I just walk around going,
Everythings beautiful.
I think wed better start again
Kids take us on a more serious level than they
do a lot of other bands and a lot of journalists
seem to nd that very annoying. They seem to
think that what we do is shrouded in a mysticism
that we create in order to hide a basic lack of
understanding, but were not that clever. Were
just two lads from the north, right? Were doing
what comes naturally e makes a noise with is
mouth and I play guitar. Thats what we do.
I think wed better start again
Ian Astburys one of those people whos
embroidered his pretty uneventful youth into
a diary of momentous incidents and traumatic
turning points and told it to so many people so
many times that he probably now believes it.
The rst gig I ever done was lmed for TV,
my fth ever gig with Southern Death Cult
was reviewed by the press. Anything Ive done,
people have wanted to know what its all about.
I just nd it so amusing that all these people keep
slagging us off and I couldnt give a shit about it.
People have tried to pound us into the ground
but they just cant get a hold of it.
When Ian Astbury talks, he reminds me
of Nick Rhodes thick but
authoritative, intoning the
most commonplace truism or
embarrassing drivel with such
haughtiness that youd believe he
believes hes imparting some real
pearl of wisdom.
Billy Duffys different but the
same hes condent but sharper,
he listens whereas Ian, for all the community
spiel hes about to unleash, exhibits, in his own
favoured condemnation of others, a very closed
mind. For someone so intent on learning, Ian
never listens, he just stares away into a more
important world of his own and sometimes
deigns to descend to my level to say his peace
piece. Id say he was stoned but
The funniest thing about the music business
is that the people who are most into the
rocknroll clich lifestyle are the ones whose
public image is the least like that. We dont take
drugs, we never have. Thats just a personal way

this band are and I suppose its a paradox. Were

a rock band that wasnt too acceptable a year
and a half ago, it was like putting your head in a
guillotine. The times have changed a bit now.
I think wed better start again.

The Cult are a rock band with accoutrements. A

swagger away from Black Sabbath. Something so
old that theyre new. The rock of ages.
Everything in this world right now is fast,
fast, fast, Ian informs me, ddling with his Led
Zeppelin badge. Fast food, fast TV, fast sex, fast
everything. And people just skim on the surface
all the time and I think a lot of journalists look at
us on the surface and pick up on certain things.
Like the North American Indian thing but that
didnt just happen to me overnight, that was an
experience that happened to me over ve or six
years. And hippies
Ah, hippies. Glad he brought it up. The new
Cult albums called Love and there are some
out there who will tell you its all you need. Not
me. When MM branded Ian as a spitter for Neil
The Hippy, I wasnt exactly blameless. And now
heres this man who claims hes a boy, with hair
halfway down his back, wearing a cowboy hat
with an owls feather in it, snakeskin cowboy
boots with gold points and a Cure badge,
staring into middle space and asking
Whats a hippy? A lot of kids who come

TOM SHEEHAN

We re not that clever. We re just

lads from the north, right? We re
doing what comes naturally

84

NME ORIGINALS

to see us havent even got any conception of

what a hippy is except for maybe a teacher at
school with long hair and a beard. I got called
a hippy by some 14-year-old kids the other
day I wonder where they got it from?
I wonder
Look, what the fuck is a hippy? I think
people see a hippy as some guy with long hair
and glasses with a peace sign and ared trousers
its just an image, like punk.
What does punk mean now? asks Billy, a
less bolshie Idol. Here comes the answer: Its
a deprecating term. Lets go and laugh at the

punks down the Kings Road.

Its that guy in the NatWest advert, says Ian.
The one with the mohican haircut who spits at
people and head-butts walls.
Ians dead proud of having missed punk. He
was in Canada at that time, in the army, and
when he heard the Pistols, of course, it changed
his life. He picked up on the vibe after the event.
I think its really nice, whats happening
now, because its unquantiable. Because so
many things have gone in the past, I think what
we do is an amalgamation of all those different
inuences and its gonna be a lot longer lasting.
A lot of things have been in the negative,

1985
says Billy. Maybe now is the time for well,
the positive. Thats been a terrible word for a few
years, almost frightening, but maybe what were
involved with is the rst thing thats positive.
Every other fashion hippies, acid rock, punk
seemed to be against something. Well, were
not necessarily against in that obvious way.
I think wed better start again

The Cult, live and on record, are the most

po-faced, humourless group its possible to
contemplate. They deny the brighter side of
existence for the sake of their precious image,
complete with pseudo-religious trimmings.
Theres no religion in this country, mourns
poor Ian. Christianity, the spiritual side, is a
very special part of peoples lives, it gives them
strength just to live and the only thing for kids to
look to is the music.
Music matters. A 14-year old kid buys a
Duran Duran record, grows up a little bit, and

sees that Duran Duran arent really saying

what they feel so they go onto something else,
something a little bit heavier, something that
makes a statement. And then they become bored
with that and they end up with us.
What Ians pitching for is progressive rock, the
notion of something more deep and meaningful
than something else. That way self-indulgence
lies. And worse
Were skimming the surface of something
quite spiritual
See what I mean?
We dont really want to quantify it. I nd
it very, very rare to bump into people who are
communicating on the same level because
theyre so hung up on looking cool or hanging
round with the right people. Its so hard to meet
people who are tuned in to something more than
the rational world. Were called hippies because
were into life, right?
Look, theres certain things we just cant
talk about because theres an incredible danger
of being misinterpreted. Its really sad and
unfortunate but thats the way it is.
I think wed better start again

Hippy Cult:
Ian Astbury,
Mark Brzezicki,
Billy Duffy and
Jamie Stewart

MM, 19th October 1985, p38

THE CULT
Love
Beggars Banquet

The only thing

more deplorable
than half-baked
dogma is barely
understood halfbaked dogma
pilfered from a
culture 6,000 miles and 200 years away.
With Love, The Cults second album,
they continue to propagate a half-chewed
bubblegum wrapper of redskin info for people
who think that a Voodoo Chile is a Mexican
Hotpot. They continue to celebrate the ways
of the old people with clamour and clich
wigwams, squaws, moccasins, and ritual
re-branding. The Cult dribble a lot.
If nothing else, Love will prove that the
band have done for rock tribalism what
General Amherst did for the Sioux nation. The
benign general offered the Indians blankets
to keep them warm in winter blankets
impregnated with smallpox bacilli. The
images, lyrics and titles are mainly elemental
the usual earth, re, water pife but the
surprise comes from the cover, which bears a
striking likeness to an old Love cover after a
tortuous journey through an alimentary canal.
Nirvana plunges into a barrage of metal
guitars where risible pastiche masquerades
as rousing chorus. The Indians believed in life
after death not before it!
With each successive funereal beat and
onslaught of Duffys unchained guitar, the Cult
sound more and more like Led Zeppelin.
The chords of Revolution descend, and
their songs go down faster than a lead balloon.
The Cult used to offer excitement not ashes
scraped from yesterdays joss stick. Now they
simply continue to continue.
Hollow Man and Brother Wolf, Sister
Moon (oh brother!) both employ the same
bluesy thump as they stomp through old
hunting grounds like buffalo on Mogadon.
It sounds like a 45 playing at 33. In fact
its 69 playing in 85. All this may sound as
if I detest The Cult but I dont. She Sells
Sanctuary was one of the few pinnacles of this
summers charts but its appearance among
this clutch of witless, listless and soulless
twaddle serves only as a painful reminder of
what The Cult could, and should, be doing.
We deserve more than pathetic hippies
reliving their dream and our nightmare.
Forget Big Country. Forget Gods Zoo. Forget
U2. And most of all forget Bury My Heart At
Wounded Knee.
The Cult should bury their head in shame.
Ted Mico
NME ORIGINALS

85

The Cocteau Twins:

Simon Raymonde,
Liz Frazer and
Robin Guthrie

1985

Worlds
apart
How do you interview The Cocteau Twins? Steve
Sutherland, who considers them to be something like
the voice of God, doesnt know. Well, he sat down and
talked to them for a bit, and this is what happened
The End
In the best of all possible worlds, said Robin,
this wouldnt be happening. Hold it right
there. Ive read this before.
But
No buts. Im determined that this will not be
another Cocteau Twins interview about how
The Cocteau Twins hate interviews because
that, after all, after hours of agonised silence
and blank incomprehension, is all that anyones
ever gleaned from this lot on paper. I wont sit
down and discuss this again. I wont attempt
to defend the rigmarole of the rocknroll
interview, nor will I perpetrate it further.
So what shall I do Robin? What shall I do?
And what will I get? Will I get anything? Or is
there nothing there to get? Nothing at all?
Well, were not divs but people make us out
to be we come over like
Yes I understand that I dont understand.

TOM SHEEHAN

Some justification
The Cocteau Twins make my favourite music
in the whole wide world ever and, on 16 and
22 November, they release two four-track EPs.
I want to talk about them but I know its no
good. They want them well-treated because
they envisage a Cocteau Twins backlash on
the horizon and they dont think its fair. Just
because they dont t in, folks think they refuse
to t in, but its not the same thing at all.
Theres nothing wilful about the Cocteaus
refusal to play along, they just do what they do,
thats all.
Hey, they live on our planet, believe it or
not. They eat, they drink, they see what we see
and hear what we hear. Its just that what they
create when theyre locked away somewhere has
no bearing on any of this whatsoever. My task,
I suppose, is to reconcile this into some sort
of sense but all I can come up with is intricate
babble which, even in the act of praising, seems
to tarnish their pure simplicity.
Ill admit at this point that I was going to wax

all wonderfully lyrical about the new Cocteau

Twins stuff. I was going to construct some
elaborate review of Tiny Dynamite (Pink
Orange Red, Ribbed and Veined, Plain Tiger
and Sultitan Itan), some glowing testimony
to Echoes In A Shallow Bay (Great Spangled
Fritillary, Melonella, Pale Clouded White
and Eggs And Their Shells) but I realised
that all Id be doing would be conjuring
fantasies, evolving mythologies and warping
expectations.
So, at the risk of encouraging accusations
of lethargy and cop-out, I say this: buy these
records, I think theyre brilliant. They exist.
Why am I squirming? Heres my problem:
The Cocteau Twins cant talk about their music
because theres nothing to say and I cant write
about it because, as its instrumental with vocal
impressions, all I can produce is minds-eye
gibberish. And believe you me, Ive said some
pretty embarrassing stuff about this lot in the
past. Stuff, incidentally, that I stick by.
The things youre allowed to write!
Robins smiling. You went and wrote
something about God in one of our reviews.
You said we were the voice of God or something.
I hated that. It gives people the wrong
impression. It gives people your impression.
If I read that, Id think, No fucking way am
I buying that!
And another time you said I hadnt
developed much further than some Banshees
album and that we were too loud. That was
insulting. The idea of three people totally
stationary on stage with no af liation at all to
rocknroll making the loudest fucking noise
youve every heard kind of appeals.
And that thing you said to Robert Smith
about his lipstick! Liz is trembling.
What?
You said Liz Frazer wants to know why
you wear your lipstick like that. That was very
naughty of you Steve, very, very naughty. I was
so embarrassed.
Contrary to common belief, The Cocteau
Twins care. A lot.

MM, 16 November 1985, p24

The unmentionable
mentioned
The Cocteau Twins dont exactly scream at
you to ask them about their sex lives or the
colour of their socks, so it all comes down to
self-justication and that nebulous area where
youve no idea what youre talking about or what
will come out and the smallest detail assumes
the stature of enigma. Or
Robin: Im still completely at a loss to
understand what people want to know. Ill
tell all. We do tell all, thats the thing I cant
understand. What more can I say?

The big question

Why? Why do you sound like The Cocteau
Twins?

Robins big answer

Why not?

They confess
Robin: It almost gets to the stage where you
just want to turn round to somebody and say,
Yeah, Im really magical and mysterious,
thats what I think about myself. Im weird and
obscure and it rubs off on the music
Simon: Yeah, were religious, spiritual
Liz: Would you like some tea or coffee just
now?
Robin: Theres some tins arent there? Ill
have another beer.
Liz: Youll want a fuckin straw with it next
get you pissed quicker.
Robin: Got any gin?
Liz: Um er NO! I distinctly remember
you nishing it off last night. Dont drink
Robin: But Im getting my hair cut tonight.
Liz: Yes, I know. Youll fall asleep and wake
up with a skinhead thatll fuckin sort you out.
Youll never drink again.
NME ORIGINALS

87

Well, what was there left?

The personality angle wasnt
paying dividends because, as
the antithesis of all they are,
it couldnt. The enormous
review wasnt on either
all that verbiage trying to
describe something deantly
inarticulate. No. I was left
with otsam, with various
meets in various places, with
circumstantial evidence.
Whether it comes any closer to
anything, whether it helps,
I dont know. But anyway
Meet one: Liz and Robins
at in Chiswick. Ground oor.
Clean and bare with a Siamese
kitten called Otto (after the
Can I go now?
punk in Repo Man) who bites
Liz thoroughly
and scratches and has never
enjoys another
heard of house-training. No
photo session
books about so no clues there.
A record player. A video. Lots
of videos. A photo of Lillian Gish in the toilet.
The door handle comes off in your hand and
you have to keep the lid down or the cat might
Small, very funny and very, very shy.
fall into the bowl.
At the photo studio, Liz is being made up,
Meet two: Riverside, for That Petrol Emotion.
having her face and hair done. By her side, by
Meet three: the photo session in Covent
the mirror, is a note pad into which she jots
Garden. A small studio and a pint or two in the
every layer of foundation, every tint of eye
pub. (Liz is on cider and Babycham, fact-ends).
shadow for further reference.
Meet four: Simon sees the Banshees at
Thats typical, says Robin. Did you notice
Hammersmith Odeon.
at home by the record player, theres a piece of
Meet ve: the 4AD night at Croydon
paper with instructions on it about how the
Underground theyre very much the visiting
stereo works, step by step. And by the video
stars. Robin hates it.
theres another list of how to work it. And she
wants to learn to drive can you imagine that?
Oh yes, a very Liz thing to do.

Liz Frazer

Robin Guthrie
Fat, funny, delightfully sarcastic, he crimps his
hair to stop it looking pubic.
This thin guy with glasses comes up to him
in the Croydon Underground, brandishing a
poster advertising the 4AD night and asking for
an autograph. Robin looks him up and down,
snorts his disapproval and begins to read it out.
Xymox. Is that us?
No.
Wolfgang Press. Is that us?
Uh no.
Dif Juz. Is that us?
No.
Well then, shouldnt you be going to get
their autographs?
The bloke slinks off, bemused. Robin turns to
me and says: Its bad enough when they want
you to sign Cocteau Twins stuff.
Thats a very Robin thing to do.

Simon Raymonde
Simon was disgusted by the Banshees at
Hammersmith Odeon. He considered them
heavy metal. Worst of all, though, he
considered the encores dishonest.
Thats a very Simon thing to say.

88

NME ORIGINALS

Temptation

If anybody around pop today is enjoying the

fact that language obscures as much (and as
well) as it reveals its intentions, its Liz Frazer.
Her lyrics are noise games, not nonsense
but emotion liberated from clich. When she
sings, my world moves and it means something
beyond and without all the blasted, blighted
baggage of linguistic nostalgia.
She uses words but the words never matter,
their sounds carry the fullest impact, her voice
the most desolate ever recorded cuts the crap
but cant avoid it. We cant handle The Cocteau
Twins, we dont possess the critical apparatus to
do them justice. Its no big deal on their behalf,
no deliberate setting themselves apart from
the mainstream, no arrogant isolationism. Its
simply that the channels we stomp down to beat
pop to a pulp and render it comfortable and
comprehensible dont lead us anywhere near
The Cocteau Twins.
We dont touch them and yet still we try.
In Japan, for instance, theyve published lyric
sheets with all the albums, even renaming
Treasure at whim The Woman Who The
Gods Loved.
Robin: Tell me if any of these words are what
Liz is singing, right? Im not joking. Let us rock
you so/Rock you so good. The wave of the earth
has got me all fooled now. Should have xed it

before it oated away.

Liz: Oh, thats fucking disgusting
disgusting. They must think were a bunch o
perverts or something.
Robin: Take this sh/Harder than roe/
Who sauntered away.
Liz: Jesus!
Robin: Julianne was rst called a genius/
Julianne a genius too/Our song is framed by a
genius/Suddenly she got up and turned it on.
Liz: Denitely a drug-induced hysteria.
Simon: Im a prisoner of the fence.
Robin: I dont mend no fence. Look at the
sleeve notes. It says here that The Cocteau Twins
are three girls, right? And that I sing all the
backing vocals on the LP and that my backing
vocals are psychedelic but never freaky.
Liz: Bloody hell!

Mere mortal concerns

Self-parody?
Robin: It happened to us about a year and a
half ago. It happens to everybody. You cant do
anything about it

I confess
If the process of this interview is to ascertain
some truth, to nudge some reality, to realise
there arent any answers then Ive failed. If the
essence of the piece is to avoid an obsessive
autopsy of The Cocteau Twins problematic
relationship to the interview, Ive let you
down badly. Its here, its inescapable and Im
circling, searching for something I cant dene,
struggling to discover is the big factor or the
conveniently mystical cop-out.
Certainly the people I met and the records
I hear dont match up too well, dont t. Im
speaking of what stubbornly wont be spoken
of and its the best I can do to tell you that of all
the outts Ive ever met the characters of The
Cocteau Twins are the least informative when
applied to their music.
And naturally, in saying that, I open two
options, each equally inappropriate: theyre not
fakers, they wear no masks, they hide nowhere,
nor are they recipients for some mysterious
muse. They dont act as ciphers for some
spiritual genius descending from the either.
The Cocteau Twins just go and do it and if
they dont know, why the hell should I?

In the beginning was

the word
That was the shittiest interview weve ever
done
Its OK.
But we said nothing, we talked about
nothing
Its OK.
But what are you gonna write about?
Oh, Ill make it up. Ill write about you. Ill
think of something.
But that means were in your hands, were at
your mercy
Aha, well the hack always has the last word.
This is it

TOM SHEEHAN

My method

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Morphine Paradise

recaptures the wondrous

hypnotic pop of the Banshees
greatest singles era, that between
Kaleidoscope and A Kiss In the
Dreamhouse.
David Quantick

MM, 16 March 1985, p27

SISTERS OF MERCY
No Time To Cry
(WEA)

First Killing Joke, now Andrew

and his wonderful Sisters.
Whether its a remarkable and
strangely coincidental coming
together of the untouchables
and the pop marketplace or
something a lot more contrived
is hard to say, but who really gives
a tinkers diddly one way or the
other? What counts now is that
this is the Sisters best ever slice
of slime, with Andrew down in
his boots as always but the rest
of the band delivering an edge
that must make this a monster hit
with the previously uncommitted
housewife. Laugh if you want, but
far better Crazy Andrew than 100
cuddly toys.
Barry McIlheney

MM, 1 June 1985, p27

THE CULT
She Sells Sanctuary
(Beggars Banquet)

She sells sanctuary, but will The

Cult sell any more records? Their
record sleeves may be getting
more graphically adventurous
and their name cant get any
shorter but the swirling density
of their pulse-beat stays locked
inside the same blurred groove.
Boy Duffys guitar is edgily set for
the heart of the sun great sitar
impersonations! but The Cult
are struggling. Still, the gothic
millstone might be slipping;
imagine a more sprightly,

90

NME ORIGINALS

psychedelic Killing Joke shorn

of the ton of bricks. By the way,
this is innitely preferable to the
B-side No.13 which attempts to
bring Led Zeppelin into the 1980s.
Silly Cult.
Martin Aston
NME, 16 November 1985, p17

COCTEAU TWINS
Tiny Dynamine
MM, 3 August 1985, p34

NICK CAVE
Tupelo
(Mute)

NME, 27 July 1985, p14

THE CURE
In Between Days
(Fiction)

Three thoughts occur. One: how

does he do it? How on earth does
Smithy keep that face straight
as he unloads these records?
The Top was a schoolboyishly
cruel legs torn slowly from
helpless insects companion to
the Bunnymens contemporary
and equally silly-sod-psychedelic
Ocean Rain, while his butterwouldnt-melt Love Cats routine
was sublime, media-mocking TV.
The man is a comic to be rated
with Keaton.
Two: if I didnt believe New
Order to be as rich as Tsars, Id
advise them to grab this record
and their own Temptation and
Power, Corruption And Lies and
to hotfoot it to the nearest court
of law. The monstrous scale,
nerve and cynicism of Smiths
plagiarism, in a world where most
claim unique creative genius, has,
oddly, to be admired.
Three: either because of, or in
spite of one and two, In Between
Days a sneeringly off-hand
debunking of all that Factorys
nest seek so assiduously to
mystify, is a good 45, easily the
best of the weeks pop crop.
Danny Kelly

There are those who would have

you believe that this decrepit
scuzzball and his infrequent
record releases represent the
zenith of the alternative pop
scene. For years I tried to convince
myself that I didnt loathe the
entire catalogue of this corrupter
of small goths, but I am older
and less charitable now. Boppy
backbeat, though.
Caroline Sullivan

(4AD)

Inside a cover that looks like a

cross between the trip sequence
from 2001 and a camels
afterbirth, those fun-loving
Cocteau Twins bring you a fourtrack selection of dead clever
Liz Fraser vocal gymnastics, a
chorused 12-string guitar sound
thats so rich it could kill a diabetic
at 40 paces and some rather
indifferent lyrics. The closing
Sultitan Itan is a treat for the very
tired to hallucinate to just before
bedtime.
Charles Shaar Murray

MM, 23 November 1985, p30

MM, 1 June 1985, p27

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Cities In Dust
(Wonderland)

I rather lost interest in this lot

after Hyaena yielded one good
single and little else. But Cities In
Dust, a great rush of sound and
a massively condent burst of
pop, suggests a return to form.
Perhaps a bit intense for the
airwaves, and lacking the great
melody of the slightly similar
Fireworks, Cities nevertheless

COCTEAU TWINS
Echoes In A Shallow Bay
(4AD)

The Great Spangled Fritillary

takes its name from a buttery;
Melonella is more upbeat than
the Cocteaus usual music, noisy
almost; Pale Clouded White
feels like youre caught in a warm
snowstorm; and Eggs And Their
Shells is making love on a clifftop
with seabirds ying overhead. Am
I alone in nding them a complete
and utter turn-on?
Kris Kirk

Chapter 8

DEREK RIDGERS

1986

Mission Accomplished
the battle but we didnt see it as a battle as
such more of a publicity stunt.
On hearing of the split and the newlynamed Missions intentions for the future,
WEA promptly showed Wayne and co the
quickest way out of the building.
WEA didnt think I could sing. They
gave us this list of singers they thought
would be good for us Andi Sex Gang,
Gavin from the Virgin Prunes and Sal
Solo. They just didnt have a clue.
We were open to constructive criticism
but Sal bloody Solo is not constructive
criticism, Mick states.
They seem to be playing a different
game to Eldritch taking it out on the
road as opposed to sticking in the studio.
Wayne: Im a very different person
to Eldritch. First and foremost Im more
sociable. The feeling of comradeship
in The Mission is very similar to the
one I had when I was in Dead Or Alive.
Andrew was very hard to work with.
You never got any credit. I mean, he was
a real headfucker.
Dont you ever wish The Mission
were starting out tomorrow just like
every other band, with none of the
expectations and exploits of the past
hanging around your shoulders?
Wayne: No, cos then wed be playing
The Mission: (l to r)
Mick Brown, Craig
the fucking dives of the world. In some
Adams, Wayne
ways its a bit of an albatross but it does
Hussey and Simon
guarantee us an audience. Initially,
Hinkler
itll probably be very similar to that
of the Sisters, but, in time, I think it
MM, 10 May 1986, p14
will widen. Our songs are a lot more
accessible than the Sisters ever were.
Would you say youre writing for others now
then, rather than yourself?
I never used to write for myself. It was always
for Andrew. The criteria we use in The Mission
is that if it sounds good when we play it on an
Do you feel more comfortable in The Mission?
acoustic guitar in my living room then its a good
Nah, he sighs. Some people can feel
song. Thats how our single Serpents Kiss was
comfortable in a ve-star hotel but I cant. Id
written. The majority of the songs weve been
rather be in a hovel cos you can trash it and not
doing in the set so far are my songs that Andrew
do much damage. Its the same thing with The
rejected for the second Sisters album. Its ironic
Mission. I can trash it and not do much damage
cos he actually saw us in Birmingham and told
whereas, with the Sisters, there was a certain
us how good he thought the songs were.
reverence even when I joined the group.
Was he being sarcastic? Or was it from the
bottom of his heart?
Presleys From Hell took shape towards
Wayne: I dont think he has a bottom of his
the end of the Sisters reign Wayne and Craig
heart. Bottom of his hat perhaps.

Snake
charmers

Rising phoenix-like from the ashes of the Sisters, The Mission

watch the dawn come up with a wide-eyed Mat Smith

hey dont make songs like that any more.

Wayne Hussey lurches towards the
stereo, pulls off Roll Away The Stone and
replaces it with Like A Hurricane. Next door
the neighbours pull the bedsheets over their
heads. In an hour their alarm clocks will ring,
signalling the end to another long night.
They came round with an axe the other
night, Wayne chuckles wide-eyed. But I think
we should be safe now.
Before The Mission there were the Sisters, and
there are still a lot of puzzled
Sisters fans. What went wrong?
It was going wrong even
when I joined. I mean, we did
the album hardly talking to
each other. We were rehearsing
the new stuff his new stuff, he
wouldnt touch any of my songs
and it was just crap. Craig had had enough and
walked out. As the studio door slammed Eldritch
clapped his hands together and said Ha! Weve
got rid of the driftwood. I thought, You bastard
and left the next day.
Its sad but we really had no choice. I still
respect him. He probably thinks Im a bastard
well I hope he does anyway, but I know he
respects me as a musician.

The Elvis

It was going wrong in the Sisters even when

I joined. Eldritch was very hard to work with. You
never got any credit. He was a real headfucker

92

NME ORIGINALS

playing various benet gigs in their native Leeds

with Red Lorry Yellow Lorry drummer Mick
Brown. However, it wasnt until they added
ex-Artery guitarist Simon Hinkler and changed
their name to The Sisterhood that the fun and
games really began.
Wayne: It was a brilliant trick. I knew it
would antagonise Andrew and WEA and we also
got a lot of press out of it. I always knew wed lose

The cat comes down from his

perch. The sun ickers in and

TV-ams Gyles seems even more
irritating with the sound turned
down. Jumbled thoughts and
jumbled talk. How can you face
your mother Wayne?
My mum knows what I get up to. I had a
really bad relationship with my parents for a
while. Theyre both devout Mormons. Seriously!
Its stood me in good stead but it doesnt stop me
doing drugs. I like speed my mother knows
that. She knows I like girls and she knows about
my homosexuality. She knows all about it.
Understanding lady, that Mrs Hussey. But
then shed have to be wouldnt she?

CORBIS

1986

MM, 26 July 1986, p28

THE SISTERHOOD
Gift (Merciful Release)
It all looked so obvious. Minimalist
packaging and one of those glossy
black sleeves thats covered with

thumbprints before youve even

got the record out. It all looked like
an attempt to carry on precisely
where The Sisters Of Mercy left off.
So were barely into the rst
track, Jihad, when I think I hear
a Mantronix-style handclap.
Surely not. Mustve put the wrong
record on. No, there it is again,
and over a stomping Eurobeat
that would make the boys from
DAF proud. Things, I think, could
be looking up. None of that silly

singing-into-my-boots
from Andrew Eldritch
that always made the
Sisters slightly comical.
And when he does
sing, on the version
of the single Giving
Ground, it sounds
like Peter Murphy
having a dark moment.
Eventually Im ground under by
a relentless synth beat that crushes
all colour in its path.

What the hell

is this? Check the
credits. Ah, Alan
Vega from Suicide.
It ts. Its the kind
of music youd call
industrial if there was
any industry left in
this country. The kind
of music youll hear
on a train travelling through the
Frankfurt conurbation.
Phil DC
NME ORIGINALS

93

Southern
A
SensitiveDeAth
Guy Cult

If you prick me,

do I not bleed?
I believe you have a song about the British music press entitled Scum. I didnt write it
about the press; I wrote it about you. Nick Cave does not take kindly to criticism, as Mat Snow
discovered when he went along to discuss Caves new album, Kicking Against The Pricks

mong Nick Caves most prized

possessions is a hard-cover green
book stuffed with press cuttings and
private observations written in his
painstakingly spidery hand.
Rather than living out the extremes of our
particular fantasies, most of us rid ourselves of
these desires in other ways beating the wife,
the normal day-to day things. In this particular
book I indulge myself to the limits. I dont have
to show this to anyone; I dont have to worry
about whether my mothers going to read it
I believe it includes a song about the British
music press entitled Scum.
I didnt write it about the press; I wrote it
about you
He icks through the pages, his pink-rimmed
eyes not looking up once to meet mine.
I write hate lyrics really well. Its not every
day you can use them really
This interview is not turning out at
all as Id hoped.
I had hoped for an interview which
would amplify how Nick Caves
preoccupations have been revealingly
side-lit by his new album of cover
versions. Called Kicking Against The Pricks, its
very title alludes not only to the verse from the
Acts of the Apostles but perhaps also to Samuel
Becketts borrowing of the phrase; certainly, a
pun of Caves own devising is intended. And I
suspect I might be one of the pricks.
As he explains in his measured, dictationspeed sigh of a voice, Theres not a great deal
of intellectualisation of the reasons why we did
these particular songs. Were musicians and feel
music more from the heart than the head. Im
not sure whether you can understand that.
Ouch.
When I listen to a song, it strikes my
heart whether its worthwhile or not. Theres
something so basic and so simple it shouldnt
even need to be said.

What, however, constitutes that instinctive

recognition of a songs worth is not so simple.
On his new album there are self-confessed
tributes, like his version of The Hammer Song,
originally by his schoolboy hero Alex Harvey, the
piratical Glaswegian rocker whose Jacques Brelderived theatricality anticipated punk.
Missing from Pricks, however, are songs
Cave loves which have already been fully realised
elsewhere, offering no avenues for further
exploration. Van Morrisons Astral Weeks LP is
a case in point, though Cave reviles all his other
records. Likewise damned is Jimi Hendrix, whose
rendition of Hey Joe Cave regards as an easily
surpassable high point in an unappealing career.
Nick Caves Hey Joe invokes a brooding cosmic
wrath surrounding Joes crime passionel which
echoes the heavenly portents which attended the
birth of the Presley twins in Tupelo.
Kicking Against The Pricks is a richly exciting

whose thoughts in abandoned desolation turn

from regret to grief to vengeance. That the end of
his relationship with his girlfriend of seven years,
Anita Lane, in 1983 has inspired so much of his
subsequent work has never been denied.
From that point, Cave has turned his lifes big
wound into art, and he has also plunged into
that art as a safety-valve. Not for a long time
has a more poignantly tragic gure one whose
downfall springs from an unbalancing ruling
passion starred in rocks obsessively scrutinised
zone where private life and public image overlap.
His gravity of demeanour and much-trailed
afnity with serious literary endeavour not only
mark him out from the frivolities of the pop
industry, but also bestow on him a tradition in
which his torment may nd a home.
Not for Nick Cave the battlements of Elsinore
he stalks instead Americas deep South, a
larger-than-life corrupted Eden of hot blood,
primitive religion, swamplands, scarlet
women, quack sawbones, whisky
preachers, riverboat gamblers, white
trash, slaves and the lynch-mob.
This mythical deep South serves
not only as the landscape for some of
Caves favourite music, but also as a backdrop
sufciently wild to project his tragic image onto
an Oedipus wreck in winklepickers.

Im inconsistent, illogical,
irrational. So fuckin what?

94

NME ORIGINALS

record, not only for the choice of songs and their

singing, but also for the revitalising aplomb and,
where needs be, restraint of their performance
by the Bad Seeds, whose highly talented maestro
Mick Harvey is too little recognised.
Pricks is, in addition, a further instalment in
the remoulding of Nick Cave into one of rocks
most striking and multi-levelled leading players.
For a start, Nick Cave hates the rock world.
He is highly literate about rock and its many
sources, but inclines towards its most earthy
poets of passion, the balladeers and story-tellers.
Johnny Cash and Roy Orbison like him, men
in black gure large in his taste, as do Elvis
Presley and Bob Dylan. Cave has sought among
this canon those themes which most closely
resemble his preoccupation that of a jilted lover

I just

think Mat Snow is an arsehole who said

this, and its not true. I nd it hard to sit down
and talk to someone who gave us a bad review.
Tragic gures are usually proud it goes with
the territory. Petty-mindedness, however, tends
to be comic. So why are neither of us laughing?
What had I done to poison this whole encounter?
In March last year I wrote of an Einstrzende
Neubauten single that it musters the psychological edge disappointingly absent from Nick
Caves forthcoming LP That I have also
heaped extravagant praise upon his work cuts
no ice at all.

BLEDDYN BUTCHER

Nick Cave: declined

to appear in the
new series of How
Clean Is Your House

If someone says something good about me,

theyre doing their job; I have no complaints.
They get no medal, they get their wage. Thats
all. But if they say something bad, then that
really gets on my tits.
Im inconsistent, Im illogical, Im irrational
about it. So fuckin what?
Caves voice barely rises. Hes as laboriously
patient as an iceberg.
Everything thats said against me offends
me, whether its true or not. I cant fathom
these people who unked their arts courses and
became rock journalists and are too ignorant
about music or academic about their thoughts
or have so many hang-ups that they cant bring
themselves to perform. Yet it is these people
whose opinions are lauded as being gospel.

If, with few exceptions, Cave has scant regard

for we back-stabbing scribblers, he doesnt give
a ying fuck for the other four-fths of his
audience, most of whom by my reckoning are
full-time goths, part-time slummers, wallowers
and weirdoes who are there to be fucked up the
dirt-track, metaphorically speaking.
Ive got less and less inclined towards being
some sort of colourful food for a lot of other
people to consume. Writing allows me to be
myself and not have to perform this lthy
function which, no matter what I do, is inherent
in being lead singer for some freak group.
I dont know what the people who come and
see me are like. I dont know what their reasons
for doing anything are. I dont know the reason
for the boy down the front who comes to each

of our shows and screams out, Youre a fucking

arsehole! Pays every night to scream that at the
group, and, if he gets a chance, to punch me. Hes
not there to pick up a girl, thats for sure.
Sometimes during this supremely painful
interview Nick Cave forgets himself and speaks
eloquently and animatedly about something
outside his immediate concerns; the prison
system, for instance, which hes been researching
for a lm project in Australia. When I ask about
God and the afterlife, he becomes more guarded.
All hell say is that he believes evil will not go
unpunished, even if its rewarded on earth.
But soon he reverts to being the sod with a
grudge and thin veneer of forced politeness.
Im just a sensitive guy, he smiles inwardly.
Very inwardly.
NME ORIGINALS

95

Purple Prose

MM, 12 April 1986, p27

NICK CAVE &

THE BAD SEEDS
Kicking Against The Pricks
(Mute)

This record is a kind of essay about

pop. By covering these obscure
pop, country and blues songs, Nick
Cave admits them to his canon and,
in effect, claims that
theyre inhabited by the
same extremes
of obsession,
possession and
abjection that
characterise his
own work.
Cave is writing out
a lineage in which he
is the sole heir, the
only one who still remains close
to the heart of rocknroll.
Kicking Against The Pricks
is critical in another sense too,
marking a key shift in his career.
Caves sense of his own stature has
swollen to the point where he feels
he can reduce his own creative
role to choosing other peoples
material and arranging it: such is the
corrosive originality of his style that
he need only sing a song to make it
his own, to catalyse its latent tragic
qualities. So theres a shift from
poet-visionary of sex and death to
interpreter, from Jim Morrison to
Scott Walker, from bayou howl to a
kind of croon, from self-immolation
to fatigue.
When Cave addresses his own
legend in song the result is some
of his most hilarious work. Like
Avalanche and A Box For Black
Paul, The Folksinger is a fantastical
dramatisation of Caves contempt
for his audience of goths and rock
critics; a Johnny Cash song about
a singer abandoned by his ckle
public, who muses, All the truths
I tried to tell you were as distant to
you as the moon/Born 200 years
too late and 200 years too soon.
A masterstroke that induces real
shame for my having forgotten
about Nick Cave, led him away.
Not withstanding the
ethnomusicological sleevenotes
on The Firstborn Is Dead, a pastiche
of the kind youd nd on a boxed
Harry Belafonte record, this music
isnt really modern folk music. Its
art rock masquerading as folks
tradition, using folks textures of
bitter, broken lives and ghost town
desolation as a contemporary
metaphor for our rootless, faithless
existence.
Like many others, Cave has

96

NME ORIGINALS

been drawn to the

melodrama of country
love songs, their
imagery of religious,
absolute passion.
These songs stories
of calamity, betrayal,
guilt and revenge are
fuel for dissent against
the current mainstream
representation of love
as health and fullment. Cave has
always seen love as problematic and
mysterious, an afiction.
The music here is absolutely
brilliant an unhinged, eerie
simulation of bygone pop on
Sleeping Anleah and Long
Black Veil, a swollen tide of
clangorous, corrugated sound on
All Tomorrows Parties, almost
perfect pop on Somethings Gotten
Hold Of My Heart, with only Caves
burnt-out husk of a voice giving
away that this is really 1986 and the
alternative scene.
Theres enough almost casual
brilliance on Kicking Against
The Pricks to totally justify Nick
Caves bloated sense of his own
importance.
Simon Reynolds

MM, 16 August 1986, p27

THE COCTEAU TWINS

limbo playing in the

isolated peace and
secret splendour of
Victorialand.
Nothing is as it
seems. The covers
weathered and
slightly distressed
style conceals the
haunting umbrella of
perfection that lies within.
This time the Cocteaus quest
for that perfect ethereal serenade
has even meant the album must
be played at 45rpm. The slower
the speed, the coarser the quality,
and the twins awless production
has no room for mistakes only
mystery. Though Victorialand is
not as immediate as Treasure, nor

as ornate as Tiny Dynamine, its

jewels glisten in a sensual languor
of intrigue that outstrips its
predecessors.
Spikes of Robin Guthries
crystalline guitar stake out a fecund
landscape where Liz Frasers
beatic voice is free to swirl and
entwine stroking chords before all
dissolve in the cascading chant of
Lazy Calm. As usual, the Cocteaus
titles swing between the abstract
and the absurd with
songs such as Fluffy
Tufts heralding the
nursery rhyme stroll
of Oomangmak.
The songs chime with
innocence not incense
and it all almost makes
sense. Almost.
But what does it
all mean?
What does it matter the guiding
hand of true genius is at work
here. No clatter of percussion, no
Simon Raymonde, no clutter, and
gargoyles of replica. Its so simple,
and simply unique. From the rst
breathless and elemental touch
of Throughout The Dark Months
Of April And May the duo conjure
wistful spectres of serenity and
submission that cast no shadow.
The balalaika-like refrains of Little
Spacey wings spread wide,
eyes alert, scything thought the
depths of dreamtime, the vocal
hieroglyphics of Whales Tails
triggering a stampede of a heart
that beats in unison with the very
stirrings of the soul.
For a full half-hour, the lush and
the barren thread through the
amorous caress of How To Bring A
Blush To The Snow and the brittle
cataracts of Feel Like Fins before
culminating in the wavering cries of
The Thinner Air.

Victorialand
(4AD)

How time ies when time is time

and again. Another Cocteau Twins
album, another gilded pillar of
excellence, another review of
waxing lyrical ballads.
Nothing is new, but
the news is good the
progression is complete.
Time marches on, and
passes by the elusive
Twins whose work is
neither updated, nor
outdated, but sieves
through another
calendar in another
place. Once more
they are left
out on a limb
playing in

Nick Cave: the

thinking goths
Cliff Richard

1986

How time ies in the face of

beauty. And the music stops, the
clock starts, and all that remains are
fragments of beauty torn from the
paradise of the Gods.
Nothing is new.
All good is renewal.
Ted Mico
MM, 15 November 1986, p29

NICK CAVE &

THE BAD SEEDS
Your Funeral My Trial

PETER ANDERSON/TOM SHEEHAN

(Mute)

There is no land, there is no hope,

there is no glory. There is only the
sight of helpless and hapless people
being dragged screaming into the
cave of perdition to experience the
thrill of horror.
Nick Cave, the patron saint of
burials, is there to make sure there
is no escape from the
quicksand.
Once more he is
heard suffering for
his art and displaying
the art of suffering
twitching with
pain and scratching
his arts. Many have
tried to facsimile St
Nicholas infernal
inferno but only a man who is
reputed to have spent half his
life unconscious, face down in a
public urinal, could convince
people that hell on earth is real.
Only a man sustained by a wincing
self-mutilation could make this
skeleton-strewn underworld a
tantalising sauna.
The funeral procession crackles,
stumbles and ruptures as if led by
the three blind mice pretending
to be the three wise men carrying
smouldering gifts of rampant
paranoia.
Throughout The Trial, Caves
vision of women as either the chaste
or the chased the Virgin Mary, or
a lascivious whore (the two inner
sleeve illustrations) is antiquated,
facile and repellent. Only a man
whose heart and mind have been
severely jilted would devote so
many tortured words to Beatrice,
the unapproachable dream of
womanhood, or Doreen, a cheap
and moist gap to ll up the time.
Yet in Caves purgatory
everything is black and white
without the white. Unlike The
Firstborn and Kicking Against
The Pricks, the Bad Seeds have
stretched and scattered their
lugubrious hacksaw shrapnel so far
it no longer resembles the blues,

Bargelds barbed-wire strings

wrapping around wood blocks
and the galleon drum.
In darkness the sinister
chimes of the fantasy
mannequins of desolation strut
and clutch at the outrages of
Stranger Than Kindness, with
the same mesmeric chain-gang
beat that binds the entrails of
Sad Waters to Caves ferris
wheel of re.
The daylight nally fractures
the cortege of Jacks Shadow,
but the upbeat joy and relief is
short-lived. The sun blinds love,
casts a haunting shadow and
emasculates truth.
It also causes skin cancer
but Cave is not concerned with
such mundane matters not
when theres dead women to
sing about.
He is probably the only man
more openly religious
than Cliff Richard,
demanding and
demeaning belief
by hollering
savage psalms,
empty words
from Leviticus
and dismembered
sermons from
the OT gone OTT.
Nick Cave, hallowed be thy
name. In this gospel love
can only exist in the solstice
of self-deprivation, the ritual of
self-sacrice, and the accidents of
self-indulgence.
Its a small wonder he found the
borrowed time to make his Funeral.
Its nothing short of
a miracle that this
barren and polluted
underworld is so
enticing, forcing a
parody of beauty
from the grotesque.
There is no
salvation, there is
no redemption,
there is only delirium
a mirage that mistakes hell for
paradise.
Yet this paradise in one hell of
a place.
Ted Mico

MM, 15 November 1986, p29

THE MISSION
Gods Own Medicine
(Mercury)

I still believe in God, but God no

longer believes in me.
Frankly Im not surprised. Wayne
Hussey is invariably to be found

The Cocteau Twins:

making journalists
swoon since 1982

in the midst of the most ungodly

activities, revelling, quafng and
throwing up all around town as he
rampages ever onwards in search of
the next likely boiler.
Wayne, it must be
said, is not a man to
hide his libido under
a bushel, and one
can only admire the
recklessness of his
lyrical enthusiasm for
sex, even if he does, now
and then, get a trie too
affectionate. I mean, if
anybody ever dared call
me my blossom or my precious,
Id break their neck. But Wayne is
nothing if not impulsive, and this,
coupled with the sprightly musical
imagination of The Mission, makes
for a remarkably entertaining LP.
I hadnt expected this. In my
previous ignorance, Id think
The Mission, and Id think goth
dark and broody and boring,
boring, boring. In reality, this is a
predominantly dynamic album
which comes to grief on only two
counts the tedious Dance On
Glass, all pattering drums and nonevents, and the infuriating Stay

With Me, a nursery rhyme which

insists on masquerading as a song.
Elsewhere the material is riveting,
colourful and extraordinarily varied.
The bright pop-rock of Severina
and the infectious up-tempos of
Sacrilege and And The Dance Goes
On contrast satisfyingly with the
string-laden, lascivious Garden Of
Delight (Hereafter) or the smoky
Love Me To Death.
But The Mission are at their most
brilliant when theyre at their most
over-the-top. Bridges Burning, with
its shrieks and screams and wails, is
the masterpiece of the album, and
the slower Let Sleeping Dogs Die
is not far behind in terms of
dramatic impact.
The rst time I was really
impressed with The Mission was the
night they became the only Top 30
band in the universe to be turned
away from the Limelight for not
being famous enough.
The second time I was really
impressed by The Mission was
last week, when I nally started to
listen to their music. So Wayne, my
blossom do I qualify for a free
pint now?
Carol Clerk
NME ORIGINALS

97

Sweet Nothings

MM, 1 February 1986, p26

THE SISTERHOOD
Giving Ground
(Merciful Releases)

Cant quite understand whats

going on here. Giving Ground
was apparently written and
produced by Sister Of Mercy
Andrew Eldritch along with the
hideously old Lucas Fox, whom
hairier readers may remember
from the original 1902 Motorhead
line-up. The great man doesnt
actually appear on the track,
however, and its up to someone
called James Ray to inict terror
via the tonsils. It doesnt quite
work and sounds at times a little
like the tune to Lyttons Diary
that is until those Banshees
baselines creep in, then it sounds
like something you get pissed
to in dodgy German discos. The
instrumental version on the B-side
fares a little better and is probably
nice background music for those
nights you have to stay in and
wash the blood off the walls.
Mat Smith

of their wailings have driven me

to drink, and I never once fancied
that I heard through their albums
the veritable Voice Of God. This
single, however, is thrilling, my
favourite since Playground Twist.
Big and brash and clashing, its
many parts combine to form
one spirited, unpredictable yet
wholly co-ordinated outburst
while Siouxsies voice, in condent
control, bounces up and down
and around the repeating
motifs and unexpected twists of
arrangement.
Carol Clerk

NME, 11 October 1986, p12

THE COCTEAU TWINS

Loves Easy Tears (4AD)

Prickly music delivered in a coolly

assured manner. On the one
hand, the simple, dreamlike title
track, on the other a purple End
Of The Day built along satellite
principles, intermingling classy
phases that keep you indoors
for hours. There are pop hernias
aching to burst in All About Eve,
this is only the swelling.
Mick Mercer

NME, 18 October 1986, p17

THE MISSION

MM, 24 May 1986, p31

Stay With Me (Mercury)

THE MISSION
Serpents Kiss
(Chapter 22)

MM, 1 March 1986, p31

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES

Born from the jetsam of The

Sisters Of Mercy, The Missions
signature is all too familiar a
spiders scrawl on the tabernacle
wall. Cosy guitar arpeggios coil
around Wayne Husseys lowslung drone, until suddenly the
darkness shatters and the spectre
of Andrew Eldritchs shades rises
out of the black. The ghost smiles,
shakes his head and slopes off into
oblivion, muttering, The horror
the horror.
Ted Mico

Candyman

PETER ANDERSON

(Wonderland)

98

If I had a penny for every would-be

Siouxsie Ive ever seen on a stage,
Id have enough money to write to
you all personally and tell you to
buy this record. Not that Ive ever
been much of a Banshees fan: a lot

NME ORIGINALS

A blood-curdling 50 seconds of
whip-cracking, saddlesore Tex
Mexabilly. This bucking bronco of
a single shows itself no mercy and
nally runs itself into the ground
with a sparkling accordion solo in
the nal furlong. There are many
ways to describe The Cocteau
Twins, arent there, kids?
Cath Carroll

NME, 31 May 1986, p30

ALL ABOUT EVE

In The Clouds
(Eden)

Goosebumps a go-go on the 12inch version from the fruit cellar

to the crows nest and back again.

MM, 26 July 1986, p26

Pomp rock for night people in

which Wayne Hussey croons
seductive sweet nothings to the
virgin of his choice. Id sooner
cuddle up to a bag of chisels.
Mat Snow

THE MISSION
Garden Of Delight
(Chapter 22)

Predictable stuff from these exSisters Of Mercy, though entirely

lacking in the humour that set
the originals apart, and full of
enough jangly guitar and doomladen vocals to build upon their
recent Serpents Kiss success.
Far more interesting though is
their cover of Neil Youngs Like
A Hurricane, also included here,
with Hussey and co taking the old
rednecks classic and camping it
up to a quite outrageous degree.
I can hardly wait to see Adam
Sweetings face.
Barry McIlheney

The Mission:
lacking in humour
apparently.
Apart from their
hats of course

Chapter 9

DEREK RIDGERS

1987

Waynes WorlD

100

NME ORIGINALS

1987

NME ORIGINALS

101

Metal Machine Music

But rather than try for the high-wire
tension of the original, theyve
reheated it in a supper-lounge suit,
and its charming enough.
Youre Lost Little Girl needs
its Morrison to convince but
John Cales Gun stomps along
righteously and the horns puff it up
for a welcome reincarnation.
Even allowing for the at This
Wheels On Fire and the token of
their glam adolescence (Roxys
Sea Breezes), the Banshees have
here made their rst good LP in ve
years. Whatever thats worth today.
David Swift
NME, 11 April 1987, p35

THE CULT
Electric

NME, 11 July 1987, p33

THE MISSION
The First Chapter
(Phonogram)

Just how serious can The Mission

possibly be? Anyone who can name
songs Naked And Savage and
Serpents Kiss has either got
a severe clich problem
or theyre laughing all
the way to the bank.
This bunch quite
clearly derive from a
post-punk culture, and
yet take a perverse
delight in irting
with that bte noir
of their generation,
mid-70s rock. The Mission quite
self-consciously break all the rules.
Deciding to cover a Neil Young song,
for instance, The Mission have to
choose his single example of that
great dodo, the rock anthem Like
A Hurricane, delivered with a pofaced, blustering sincerity.
The problem is that if its
intended to be a joke, its not really
very funny. The clichs they use
rarely aspire to being anything
other than clichs, and at their
best theyre like consolation prize
winners in a Jim Morrison soundalike competition. At their worst,
they can be a veritable vomitbag
full of bilious pretension. A version
of Patti Smiths Dancing Barefoot
misses the point altogether,
sounding like little boys playing
with naughty drug references,
where the original sounds like a
scarecrow playing with re.

102

NME ORIGINALS

By far the most

entertaining aspect
of this pompously
titled collection is the
sleeve notes, which
refer to blowing
brains out, searing
white-hot guitar noise,
various illegal states of
mind, and, best of all,
a gorgeous happening rocknroll
relationship, whatever that may
be. After reading that lot, the most
amusing thought came to mind.
Hey! What if they mean it, man?
John Munro
NME, 7 March 1987, p26

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Through The Looking Glass
(Polydor)

Look deep into my eyes, little one

trussssssssst me! Yesss, trussst me
when I say this is OK, actually.
Who wouldnt love that sssublime
sssnake from The Jungle Book?
Even he gets a chance on this, the
Banshees collection of favourites
from Ten Years In A Tour Bus.
Siouxsie croons Trust In Me from

the Disney soundtrack but fares

badly when compared with that
pythons creepy delivery.
Its been a long time since the
Banshees have been hypnotic, but
this has its moments. Sadly its not
half the LP that Nick
Cave produced with
Kicking Against The
Pricks, because here
the Banshees are
mostly too respectful
except on Strange
Fruit, which is a
wobbling disaster.
Iggy Pops The
Passenger is one
of the few rock records that could
start a barndance anywhere in the
world. Its a legend, and at least
Siouxsie knows that if youre gonna
mess with this one, mess with it or
leave well alone. So as all concerned
take a ride to see whats theirs, the
horns swoop and it swings along
famously. On Hall of Mirrors,
the Banshees and Kraftwerk are
well-matched because each has a
trademark pulse, and the tune is
made to measure.
Anyone attempting to play out
Televisions seldom-heard debut
Little Johnny Jewel is asking for it.

(Beggars Banquet)

One of the most fascinating things

about the development of music
over the last two years has been the
myriad ways in which heavy metal,
once an idiot in-breed feeding off
its own faeces, has reinvented itself.
Most spectacular is Run DMCs
achievement in selling re-usable
Aerosmith riffs to the hipsters of
the soul patrol, messing up all the
ten-year old cultural boundaries.
But on the traditional side theres
been a swing towards a New York
Dolls-ish sense of glam, while on the
punk, tribal side bands like The Cult
have slipped into the biker/killing
machine imagery of traditional
heavy metal.
No one knows the marketing
potential of the various strains of
new rock better than Rick Rubin
the man who turned the Beastie
Boys from brash punk to brat
metal, the man behind
Slayers speed metal
thrash, producer of Run
DMC and now producer
of The Cult. Yes, it is a
conspiracy.
Rubin seems to have
a perfect grasp on what
the masses of middle
America want, which is,
in fact, not very much,
just something very noisy and
unpretentious. And if mid-America
wants it, it wants it in large enough
numbers to allow you to forget
about the rest of the world.
The question is whether they
will want The Cult, and the answer
is almost certainly yes. Electric is
a perfectly accomplished heavy
metal record, from the bladed
lettering of the cover right down
to the version of Born To Be Wild,
while the tawdry glamour displayed
in the inner sleeve shots is perfectly
designed to meet Bon Jovi halfway.

TONY MOTTRAM/RETNA/PATRICK QUIGLY/RETNA

The Mish: billowing

hair and bilious
pretension

1987
Musically it sounds like a trip
through the styles of the 70s, from
sub-T.Rex catchphrasing through
acid-scrambled nonsense (Sitting
on a mountain looking at the sun/
Plastic fantastic lobster telephone)
to full blown Led Zeppelin bombast.
We might wonder just
how serious this can
be when we hear lines
like: Zany antics of
a beat generation/In
their wild search for
kicks. But the kids
with the dollars in
their pockets and
the college radio
station on their
portables wont .
Theres gold in this here swill.
Don Watson

The Nephs Carl

McCoy: sponsored
by Homepride

MM, 30 May 1987, p30

THE CURE
Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me
(Fiction)

Kiss kiss bang bang! Just as Rodins

lovers will forever hold palms to
thighs and the only
good lips will be red
lips, this is a perfect
objective blur, a
subjective sublime.
You nd yourself
swaying, instinctively,
to most of it: echoes of
the known. All I want is
to hold you like a dog:
too furry to be rock, too
tearful to be pop, too reliant on
ice-skating strings to be soul,

The Cures intangibility fades into

esh here and bloodletting is rife.
We have 17 songs, we have two
themes if only and come over
here we have tortured memories
and, believe it or not, we have some
current fun.
When Warhol made The Kiss
another great arrogant accident
the beauty of each
rendezvous couldve
been spoiled by
saturation. Just as on
The Cures magnetic
magnum opus, the
pert irtations or
self-agellations of
each mini-masterpiece
should negate each
other till its just all too
much. But somehow, somewhere,
theres a place in your heart for each.
When Marilyn coos simply
elegant in The Seven Year Itch,
thats ne too, because she has no
name. Robert Smith is only called
Robert Smith, but perhaps this is
why we let him get away with it. We
sympathise, because hes clever
enough not to get too clever. I wish
you were dead and You want to
know why I hate you? he groans.
This is creative visualisation, for
Smith is undoubtedly enjoying life.
So not only can we mope along,
if we wish, we can boogie with
reverential and self-referential
delight to such exquisite
squeals as, That girl was always
falling/Again and again/ And I used
to sometimes try to catch her/But I
never even caught her name.
So its won, its won from the
extended lung twirling intro to
The Kiss such anticipation!
Like unwrapping chocolate!
The consistent death and
pain imagery keeps
us brewing coyly till
How Beautiful You
Are sends everything
Venus-wards. The
Snakepit slithers
with atmosphere
but is usurped by the
strings which
underline Like
Cockatoos.
And if Hot Hot
Hot is imsy
funk, Just Like
Heaven is ribald
pop, as delicious
as a ing behind a
screen. This record
lacks the punch of
The Head On The Door but has
twice the suction.
Still, the search goes on
for The Perfect Girl, and
the conclusion of it all is a

staggeringly original never give in.

Not until several minutes silence
after the event (for thats what
this subversive saintly saccharine
is, really) do we realise that the
answers have all been romanced.
We take one more quick glance at
the clothing strewn on the oor.
Crimson lips. If that was a picture of
entrails, wed nd it revolting. But it
isnt. Its lips, so we
think its chic. The eye
of the beholder is yet
again the sole arbiter.
Theyll be howling
this into the wind 10
years from now, and
if it wasnt a double
album Id have no
hesitation in calling it
album of the year. But
Im hesitating. Which leaves me
no more or less lost than anyone
who irrationally loves the nebulous
aspirations, camp angst and lack of
denition of The Cure. A panacea or
Pantheism? Think Im In Love With A
German Film Star and be damned.
Chris Roberts
MM, 30 May 1987, p34

FIELDS OF THE
NEPHILIM
Dawnrazor
(Situation 2)

Detractors of the Nephilim are often

more inclined towards artier shite
and thereby choose to spare three
seconds peering at the hats and six
months ignoring the music. This is
how people come to miss out on the
rumbling sprees we call Slowkill
or Volcane, ominous preludes to
power both, gnashing teeth hard
enough to desecrate gums, but with
an undeniable grace.
Epiglottal rumpus aside, it is
the guitars which arrest attention
most, sneering and snapping their
way through torrential mixtures of
ridiculously sublime multi-textured
sounds and song. Nephilim stride
out of a gloom of their own setting,
to throttle your record
deck. You want
whipcord choruses,
tensile passages of
anti-inertia? All here.
This band
have constructed
something quite
magnicent in a
dismal time, when
everyone tends to ape
things of indescribable putrescence.
Unlike hip slop like Swans or Young
Gods, some rattlesnakes wag their
tails cos theyre pleased to see you.
Mick Mercer
NME ORIGINALS

103

ello?
Thin White Duck here.
Who?
Andy.

Andy?
Eldritch.
Oh uh hi, Eldritch.
Come for drinks.
When?
Now.
I cant, Im asleep. Its seven in the morning.
Is it? Oh, coffee then.
Later.
Sure. Kensington. My hotel. At 10.
OK Uh, you havent been to sleep yet have
you?
When this week? This month?
After the gig.
Uh no. Went to Dingwalls with Lemmy
and these Hells Angels and
Save it, Eldritch. Save it. See you later.

Ah, those were the days. Cryptic phone calls at

all hours. The Sisters Of Mercy at The Albert
Hall, a heavy dark nectar of irony that looked

certain to choke goth on its own bittersweet

excesses. First And Last And Always, the album
out on Merciful Release through Warners,
and nights sat up in hotels with Eldritch in his
manky leather cowboy hat doing wilful bodily
harm to our fragile metabolisms and rattling
on at mutual cross-purposes; me about love n
life n that; Eldritch, of course, about fencing
and self-defence and the iron bar he carried
up the sleeve of his coat for dextrous use in the
eventuality of attack.
The world was spinning at Eldritchs pace
and it was spinning very, very fast. There were
great conspiracies and greater paranoia. He even
offered to take someone out of my life by giving
them a job on the Sisters road crew for a US
tour a job he could hardly refuse and which he
might well not survive. Some friend. Some hero.
And then well, those postcards. One from
Mexico which read: ELVIS IS DEAD. I know
because he told me. Sorry to break it to you so
bluntly, but you had it coming, hippie. Feed
your head when you can nd it. Von Eldritch
X. There was a PS: Peyote girls go round the
outside, round the outside.

HIS MASTERS

VOICE
Andrew Eldritch, the godfather of goth, is back to lead
his children form the hippy wilderness and to prove
The Sisters of Mercy are first and last and always.
Steve Sutherland gets the message
MM, 5 september 1987, p14

104N MN EM EO ROIRGIIGNIANLASL S
??

1987
There were others from Hamburg, the last of
which was written in Chinese, and I wasnt the
only one who feared for the great mans sanity.
Rumour had it a combination of devastated
health, legal binds and sheer disappointment
that his ex-henchmen had made a go of The
Mission had laid Eldritch near-fatally low. We
presumed the world and Eldritch, to all extents
and purposes, had parted company. Such
miserable unbelievers!

Eldritch is in a photographic studio, glistening

with baby-oil and draped all over Patricia,
formerly of The Gun Club and
now his right-hand man. Hes
here to pose with cigarettes and
prove The Sisters Of Mercy are
still a force to get wrecked with.
He doesnt talk of resurrection,
but of continuation and, as if
to insist megalomania is alive
and well and ready to pistol-whip pop, his new
single is called This Corrosion, lasts 11 minutes,
features a 40-piece choir multi-tracked 10 times
and was produced by Meat Loafs old buddy
and master of the Wagnerian, Jim Steinman.
Im about to ask him why but Im laughing too
much. The Bad News mondo-metal version of
Bohemian Rhapsody has just come on the radio
and Patricia thinks its The Cult!

Where have you been since you last appeared in

the hallowed pages of the Maker?
Well, we went through the corporate wars in
my familiar Jonathan E type role and we did OK.
A lot of untruths have been bandied about, but
unfortunately, the way we won makes it tricky
for us to explain how we won and, therefore,
prove that we did. It was basically over the name
the people that are now The Mission and
myself had an agreement no one would use the
name when the band went its separate ways. But,
after theyd been touting their demos round
getting nowhere under all sorts of other names,

Was it frustrating to see The Mission become

successful in the mean time?
No I mean, they took the interest and
capitalised on that but, musically, not. It was
noticeable for about a year that they couldnt
get press unless they mentioned my name. I saw
interviews with myself so many times by proxy
that got irritating because well, Wayne has a
REMARKABLE way with the truth.
Is there bitterness between you then?
Yeah. Yeah, there is.
Personal or corporate?
Personal.
You suggest theres a
fundamental difference in
ATTITUDE between The Sisters
Of Mercy and The Mission.
Yeah, their ability to bend
over forwards in order to make
progress appals me. The way
theyve bent over contracts and
been appropriately assaulted for it which, again,
is something theyve not really been prepared to
let on about.
Musically, too. I never sang a lyric of
Waynes. I never found one I COULD sing.
History has proved that, when The Sisters
disappeared from public view, was EXACTLY
the time you should have been reaping your
greatest rewards. What, other than legalities,
prompted your inaction?
Well, I wasnt well. Id done three tours that
year and I thought wed come to the end of a
logical course. I titled that Albert Hall gig Wake
about four months before it actually happened,
and the band are probably still wondering why.
I mean, I thought it should still have gone on but
I knew it wasnt going to.
The last time we actually spent any time
together, at the end of the tour before the Albert
Hall, we had some time playing in America and
then we had a week off in Los Angeles.
I went to Mexico for the day and the other
two couldnt think of anything better to do than
go to Disneyland. And when I came back from
Mexico a WEEK later, having got somewhat
uh distracted, I just thought, God, what are
those people whinging about, really? They just
got so feeble.
Then they said, Well, OK, what are we
gonna do for new songs? And I said, How
about this, this and this, and unfortunately,
the rst this I cited had too many chords per
minute and Craig said, If thats the guitar line,
Im not playing it, and walked out. That was
really that.
But Wayne had already become a problem
because he wanted to do more of his songs and
I thought they were particularly vacuous.
I used to have to ght with him to get the
songs to make any sort of grammatical sense,
let alone be sharp with it. I mean, youve gotta
know grammar before you can work away from
it. The guy didnt have a clue hed just string
buzzwords together.
Strangely enough, someone from the Maker
was around Wayne while he was writing recently
and he had a book of aphorisms with all the
mystical-type ones underlined in red.
Thats how most people do it. I cant bring
myself to work that way. Thats what passes

Lets talk over eats Eldritch. Where dyou fancy?

Oh, anywhere but Indian.
Really? I thought youd be a man for a ruby.
No, I refuse to eat anywhere they beat us at
cricket.
Italian then?
Italian.

they began to claim rights to it, which patently

had to be stopped. And, when they wanted to be
called The Sisterhood, there was nothing I could
do but be The Sisterhood before them the only
way to kill that name was to use it, then kill it.
I think that reected rather badly on the name
The Sisters Of Mercy and its probably due for
reinstatement for that reason if no other.
Then there was a little disagreement with
the publishers, RCA Music, over what would
happen to the money. Effectively it all kept us
out of action.

NME ORIGINALS

TOM SHEEHAN

Rumour had it that devastated health, legal

binds and sheer disappointment had laid Eldritch
near-fatally low. Such miserable unbelievers!

105

A New Era Of Cynicism

for revolution these days. Im glad I wasnt
around in 86 because it wasnt just The Mission,
it was a bad year all over and anybody who broke
then will be tainted with it for a long time.
But surely youre responsible. You introduced
a generation of synth-pop fashion fops to the
thrill of anti-fashion, When The Levee Breaks,
outlaw biker chic and drug innuendo and guitars
and ripped jeans and dry ice. Without the Sisters
and the vacuum you created when you went to
ground, there could scarcely have been grebo
and Zodiac Mindwarp.
I dispute that. Thats like saying Christ is
responsible for the Mormons its really not on.
I dont know what you lot were left with.
So whats grebo rock?
You really havent heard of it?
No, is it like Led Zeppelin?
Well yeah fake fantasy stuff.
Oh, without the grunge. Maybe I SHOULD
have taught them outrageousness.
You sound like The Godfather of Goth.
Ha! When we were trying to sell This
Corrosion to Steinman, we said it was like the
high point of a Borgia disco evening and he
went for it. Nobody makes gloriously stupid
records any more.
Queen?
No, theyre embarrassing. Steinman and I are
the only two who share this glorious stupidity.
Dont tell him though. He just thinks Corrosion
is perfectly normal. Other bands have no
perspective on the stupidity of it at all. They say
things like, Oh well, we never claimed we were
original, or, Well, of course rocks stupid, but
its just spiel, just Eldritch lines misunderstood.
This is where the attitude comes in. The
difference between the Sisters and the pretenders
to the throne is an irony-in-overdrive that takes
the piss out of AND celebrates its role models.

In a sense, your attitude was a precursor to

sampling. You were acknowledging Led Zeppelin
before The Beastie Boys USED them. Is their
literal approach even more honest than yours?
I think thats a lower level, a very vulgar
interpretation. The Beastie Boys arent familiar
territory to me. In about two years, Ill cover
When The Levee Breaks and wipe the oor with
The Beastie Boys and wipe the oor with The
Cult because they havent got a grip on what is
great about Led Zeppelin. Its like The Mission
going out and covering Sisters music they make
it sound like bad Echo & The Bunnymen.
I remember I went to see The Alarm when
they were knee-high to Big Country and I
thought, These people have COMPLETELY
misunderstood Mott The Hoople, and its
been happening ever since. Im now used
to people misunderstanding me, though
its weird when you get all these Eldritch
clones out there treading the boards.
Youve never seen Fields Of The
Nephilim?
No, Im told we played with
them once in San Francisco but
I wasnt actually there when they
played.
Patricia: They knew I was there
and, afterwards, they came up and
started talking to people next to me.
I just left. I wasnt even going to speak
to them. I mean, for a moment when
they were on, I turned and thought,
This is familiar, whats THIS?
The only reason that people like
that embarrass me so much is that,
if theyre really that hooked on me,
they must be tasteless. It gets to the
stage where you think, Im not THAT
good and anybody who thinks I am

I hope history proves you right.

I hope so too because I dont think this irony
compounds itself properly unless you do add
an extra layer on the top, unless you do stick
something worthwhile in.
Dont we need a new era of innocence? Dont
we need to UNLEARN progress?
No, we need a new era of cynicism. The
reason the NME, for instance, cant comprehend
this sort of thinking is that they dont have that
cynicism. They still believe that rocknroll is
supposed to be naive and wonderful and, if

I always go away thinking I havent said enough

about post-war dramatic theory, fencing or Chinese
philology, which are the things I really care about
If you do it right, it compounds itself at every
level. Corrosion is an indictment of bombast
there was no other way to do it.
A lot of old Sisters fans are gonna say, Hes
taking the piss.
Of course Im taking the piss its the only
way to be serious about it. Same as it ever was.
So this is crap AND fantastic. Its time we
redened the difference between man and beast.
Its nothing to do with how many legs you walk
on; its everything to do with the possession of
irony. I know people who are animals.
And I had a cat that had a very highly
developed sense of irony.
Corrosion is already being compared to
some pretty God-like things. One of them is the
Stones You Cant Always Get What You Want.
Thats cool.
So its pop about pop.
Thats a very important element, yeah. You
have to acknowledge the medium in the message,
I think, otherwise youre stupid dishonest
or just very naive.

106

NME ORIGINALS

must be an idiot.
Theres an inner integrity and
authority in Corrosion which comes of
pain, grief and suffering. I couldnt do
what The Cult are singing, I couldnt do
what The Beastie Boys are doing, I couldnt
do what Madonna is doing. I could do what
Alice Cooper did but then Im not extrovert
enough. I would have no scruples about
doing it if I were able to.
And if it takes a year ghting
corporate wars in order to be able to do it
with integrity, then Ill do it or not at
all. I dont HAVE to do this.

Dont you have a touching belief that

the role of a recording artist is to be
intelligent and communicative, and isnt
that belief extraordinarily old-fashioned?
Yeah, and self-destructive.
So youre ghting a rearguard action.
Or vanguard, depending on how you
look at it.

Well-oiled sisters:
Andrew Eldritch
and Patricia
Morrison

1987
the expectations. Its a long war but Corrosion
might win one battle and, after all, its the only
war worth ghting.
How much is revenge the motive?
The Gift was the revenge, a weapon very
specically pointed. This is the gloating, much
more widespread, more general.
Why did you go to live in Hamburg?
Its the largest city in the Federal Republic
which is the most powerful country in Europe.
Its just such a wonderfully cool place because its
not populated by cool people like Berlin.
Do you feel badly done by in Britain then?
Yeah. Not so much these days because Ive
got a reasonable amount of goodwill stored up
but one knows its only goodwill as long as you
dont start talking about aesthetics when they ask
you what your favourite colour is.

Have you, in your time away, seen anything

encouraging?
What, to do with music?
To do with anything.
Twenty seconds silence. Then: No.

Nixon and asked him how to survive it.

Eldritch is supposed to be a pretty ruthless
character himself.
Not really, Im a counter-attacker by nature.
Im not a pre-emptive strike man.
Most people in your position, if theyre
interested in maintaining control, tend to
make a point of confounding (Robert Smith)
or conrming (John Lydon) their public image.
You do neither.
Thats where the hardship comes in. Its
a lot of extra work and a lot of extra worry.
Anecdotes? I just dont have them.
Will Corrosion chart?
Im told it will. I dont care. Its a good record
now, itll be a good record in ve years. I dont
care when people buy it though I think its more
accessible to people, it has a more accessible top
layer than the records weve had out in the past.
Thats just a function of the way its recorded,
I dont think its a function of the song.
So the songs a wolf in sheeps clothing. Or
uh a wolf in what? Brontosauruss clothing?
I dunno, Ill cheat and put in something really

Of course Im taking the piss. Its the only way

to be serious about it. Same as it ever was
But nothing discouraging either.
Life went on and I expect it to go on.
Id nd it pretty weird, in fact, if I
had seen any light or darkness.
Control seems important to
you while, all around, others are
relinquishing theirs.
Yeah. But although I put my
sole existence into making
records, I dont need to make
records. I mean, if I hadnt
gone off and been a little
degenerate in the mean time,
I dare say Id have joined the
Diplomatic Corps thats what
Im trained for. Or MI6.
So what dyou think of
Spycatcher?
Thats pretty damn irrelevant
thats really all to do with the
Home Ofce isnt it? I havent read
it but I cant see what the surprise is
all about. Like Nixon what the hell
did they expect? Its just politics.
So was Nixon hard done by or
was he just dumb to get caught?
I thought Nixon was a great
president. He got the Americans
out of Vietnam, he made friends, to
some extent, with the Russians and
he certainly made friends with the
Chinese. He was the best president
in terms of foreign policy that
nation had in a long time
and I thought they were
very stupid to get rid of
him. He was very stupid to make a mess
of covering up Watergate up I mean
Reagan survived Irangate.
Patricia: I was over there when that
happened and, you know, Reagan called

witty and apposite when I write this.

Ha! I think its a shark in wolfs clothing.
That was a pretty duff metaphor to start with
though. Forget about that one
But its devious.
Not deceitfully so. Its just crafty. I hope it
makes sense. I mean, Id like people to go for
everything they can get out of it and all at once
thats what symbolism and obscurism are all
about but I dont expect that. Its the only thing
I get off on though. Its the only thing that would
make me wanna sing the same song two nights
running. Its gotta have that overwhelming
panoply of effects.
What do you read now?
Der Spiegel and The Times Ive started doing
the crossword again. Last month I read Pilgrims
Progress and Beowulf.
Films?
I dont have a television in Hamburg. Thats
one of the reasons for not writing in Leeds
because there Id spend 24 hours well, 25
hours a day by the time Id taken some medicine
watching TV. I was very pleased to be forced
to catch the Rutger Hauer season while we were
in the studio. Patricia was renting anything
with Rutger Hauer in it. Some of them are real
stinkers but hes so funny in The Hitcher its a
brilliant comic performance. Youll love it.
It really makes you wanna go out and do it.
Theres not a lot of lms where the character is
so obviously deranged but, at the same time,
makes it look like such fun that even the sanest
person could imagine doing it. I mean, to go out
and wanna be The Terminator, youve gotta be
a moron basically its great to watch but youd
never do it yourself. This is different.
So what makes you happy Eldritch?
Cats still make me ludicrously happy.
What makes you sad?
Nothing makes me sad because I think
NME ORIGINALS

TOM SHEEHAN

you give them irony, they say, Oh dear, thats

distasteful. Lets forget about it. Lets pretend its
not humorous. Thats very primitive cynicism
born out of a very vulgar and naive ideology.
Has pop music let you down?
No. I know what its capable of because, when
I grew up, it was blatantly capable of it and it
was delivering. Expectations have been lowered
since and deliveries have been faltering. Its just
a question of raising peoples expectations again.
We can do it. Ill make the records if you raise

107

MM, 21 November 1987, p31

THE SISTERS OF MERCY

Floodland
(Merciful Release)

Facing up to the fact that

nothing is new tends
to separate the mice
from the men. Some,
like George Michael,
plagiarise. Others,
Like The Cult, feign
ignorance. Eldritch
mocks, uses choirs and
Coleridge, taunts pop with its elders and
betters.
Floodland is more and less the same
album as First And Last And Always. Its
more in that Eldritchs awareness of mortality
has spread from the knowledge that
nothing is new to the opinion that nothing
is worthwhile; and its less in that being
incapable of contemplating nothing, it reacts
to time running out by amputating all the
curlicues of guitar and replacing them with
stark, essential foundations.
Floodland is an edice to decay in
which Eldritch unleashes all his paranoia
and obsession. The gargantuan Dominion/
Mother Russia nds our hero forsaking that
job in the diplomatic corps and pleading
with Mother Russia to rain down, while
the magnicently minimal This Corrosion
cleaves through its own pompous austerity
to admit I got nothing to say I aint said
before, a revelation which, far from
suggesting a lack of imagination, indicates
a surfeit of it. That admission, alongside
the metallic Luftwaffe slap of Lucretia My
Reection, the breakdown of language
during Floodland II or the (surely) sampled
nuclear depth charge drums from Led
Zeppelins When The Levee Breaks on
Neverland, is a mark of shocking honesty.
When Eldritch sings Seconds to the drop
but it feels like hours the red light starts
winking on the dashboard and we realise
that Driven Like The Snow is Nine While
Nine revisited because he can do nothing
else were all waiting. Dying on records a
dicey business, especially when its world
destruction that nags your every waking
minute because theres nowhere to go
artistically. Facing up to that, Floodland
is a triumph of sorts, neither optimistic
enough to suggest theres a Noahs Ark
nor pessimistic enough to accuse us all of
navigating a ship of fools. It simply says rust
never sleeps and this is what it sounds like.
Great.
Steve Sutherland

108

NME ORIGINALS

there has to be some element of surprise in

order to feel sad.
What else?
Well, Im thinking of learning to drive. The
thing is, whenever I go abroad, I invariably end
up driving and I dont have a licence or anything
which is probably not the thing to do. Then,
you see, what happens after that is I buy a car.
I dont particularly like cars for their own sake
and I dont particularly like driving. I get these
urges. I see these things and I think, What if?
Thats why I dont really enjoy it; because Im
responsible enough not to do what I feel the urge
to do. I dont get the urge to drive fast, I just get
the urge to drive off the road, especially when
theres nothing on either side of me.
Its got nothing to do with suicide; its just
about driving a car off the edge of a cliff.

How would you kill someone?

It would depend whether it was someone
I liked or someone I didnt like.
OK, someone you like.
It depends whether I think theyd appreciate
something spectacular or something just very
sedate. I think if it was someone I really, really
liked and theyd appreciate the spectacular, it
would have to involve an expanse of scenery and
an extraordinarily fast car.
And those you dont like?
Id always want it take longer. Its best to kill
someone they really like, I think.
You suggest in what you just said that you like
and dislike but not love and hate.
Im very wary of it. I have to be very careful
because I think Im probably a bit obsessive by
nature. I had to TOTALLY stop drinking in order
to be able to maintain any business whatever.
I dont gamble. I dont do smack.
And love?
Absolutely not. I only ever really did it once
and I dont think Im likely to do it again.
Because you dont like losing your personality
in someone else or because you dont like
inicting it?
Both. We were just dreadful for each other.
It didnt stop it being brilliant but its
marginally better that it doesnt happen any
more. Thats tough. It still hangs over to the
extent that I couldnt do it again.
What would induce you to lose your self
control, to endanger yourself in passion?
Ive only ever done that when I wasnt
quite on stage Ive done things that
afterwards Ive thought, No! That
was just beyond the pale.
Because you were out
of it?
Because I could,
because I was out
of it and because
I had to. If youre
in front of a crowd, youre in a
position of responsibility and, if theyre waiting
for you to sort out one moron, you have to do it.
I mean, the last time it happened, I spent half an
hour trying to talk the crowd into sorting out
their own problem and then, eventually, I just
dived. It was really sad. I felt very ashamed on
their behalf that they let me do it.
OK, thats it. Was it good for you?

I never know. I always go away thinking,

Well, I havent said enough about postwar dramatic theory or fencing, or Chinese
philology, which are the things that I really care
about. And then someone says, Well? Did you
tell them how great the record is? And I go, Oh,
actually that never occurred to me.
The only conversations I quite get off on
these days are the ones where we discuss how
crap conversation is. Im not socially honed and
I dont feel the need to be. Once you convince
yourself youre the all-time best at it, where dyou
go from there?
How enigmatic.
I dont feel enigmatic. Enigmatic is being
deliberately obscure and Im not. I might
be oblique but thats only because, to me,
obliqueness is a clearer way of expressing
something in its entirety.
Could this be the Oxford University training
the art of leaving oneself least open to attack
or are we talking about truth here?
Truth. I can do the other as well but Im too
out of training and when I was really good at it,
I began to despise myself for it.
So youre talking about a search for
communication?
I really dont know but, apart from the bit
about Roy Kinnear, I stand by everything Ive
ever said to you.
Even the stuff about Norman Wisdom?
Yeah.
Gods will be gods.

PETER ANDERSON

Four Minute WArnings

1987

Hippy hippy shake:

Julianne Regan of
All About Eve and
The Missions Wayne
Hussey

All About Eve/

The
Mission
The Marquee, London
MM, 5 September 1987, p19

JOHN-CHRISTIAN JACQUES/RETNA/TOM SHEEHAN

ith no rock giants, such

as Tommy Steele or
Charlie Drake, to kiss, poor Painey
Wayney turns to his band for his
kicks and everyone goes CRAZY,
except for the beleagured reviewer
and his girlfriend, anxiously timing
the guards patrols around the
perimeter fence. (Any moment
now) Then, bugger me, it isnt as
bad as Id feared. The new songs
may simply be the old songs
(Sacrilege?), may simply be jovial
noise without much in the way of
tungsten tunes, but this tiny tussle
was enjoyable! Standards are
slipping, 1969 is slipped in and the
trivial pursuit is over. The Mish. In
one era and out the other.
The Igloos love it. Then they bay
for the band who can currently
charm anyone. To protect the
innocent I can even reveal that
one of the Stud Brothers recently
confessed a liking for All About

Eve. I dont know why. Must be

the wanker in me coming to the
surface. The alcoholics. The HippyHippy Shake! Glorious pop songs,
bloody pop songs. All About Eve.
Imagine youre around a
campre, my friends, Julianne
suggests, dodging my aming
arrows, because this is Gipsy
Love! And unfortunately it is.
But never mind, there was still a

Sweetness and light. Peace and love.

With a crowd scrap thrown in for good
measure. Some people have no manners
prickly What Kind Of Fool, plus
rampant versions of Our Summer
and Flowers In Our Hair, with
the real live human drummer a
torrential pulsebeat, the guitars

cutting in and out of the commercial

splendour. For Shelter From The
Rain, Wayney accidently stumbles
onto the stage, discovers it isnt the
toilet so has a sing-song. Moving.

Sweetness and light. Peace and love,

with a crowd scrap thrown in for
good measure. Some people have
no manners.
Warmed up for Reading Festival,
sweating in their delirium, sordid
and sentimental, All About Eve wet
themselves tonight. The crowd
soak it up. I dont know about
you, Julianne gasps, rebellious
banter ying, but this is all a bit too
exciting for me!
Mick Mercer
NME ORIGINALS

109

Kissing
To Be
Clever

1987

This week, The Cure complete a triumphant European tour by playing

three nights at Wembley. Chris Roberts caught up with them on the eve
of their homecoming to discuss lips, hands, legs and boomps-a-daisy
MM, 5 December 1987, p25

he kiss originated when the rst male

reptile licked the rst female reptile,
implying in a subtle, complimentary way
that she was as succulent as the small
reptile he had for dinner the night before.
F Scott Fitzgerald: The Crack-Up

HE KISSES VARIOUS PEOPLE, HE SUPPOSES!

The only person I really kiss is Mary, says
Robert Smith. I kiss Simon from time to time.
Oh, I kiss various people, I suppose. Its just
spontaneous. But theres a history of treacherous
kisses. And lecherous kisses are vile. A drunken
kiss can be one of the worst things in the world.
I used to say my hobbies were drinking and
kissing, in that order, but it wasnt true. I dont
know. I dislike kissing as much as I like it.
Seeing other people kissing is ugh
At one point I almost got phobic about the
mouth being an orice, about actually travelling
into someones mouth. I just liked putting the
mouth on the cover cos its so close-up its kind
of obscene and lewd. It was a
reaction to the way were often
interpreted Im seen as being
really cuddly, and my mouth
and lipstick are supposed to be
so nice. This isnt true; Im as
horrible as anyone. Probably more so than most.
What comes out of peoples mouths is pretty
vile most of the time.
And breath. Breath is revolting. Especially
in Germany.

and Hello, Im a plank (if you are Simon).

Asking the manager to reveal his wedding
tackle. Requesting Thinking Of You by Sister
Sledge from a disc jockey who looks like Roscoe
Tanner. Being staggered that Roberts knows
Born To Be Alive and Lets All Chant were by
Patrick Hernandez and The Michael Zager Band
respectively. Not going out of the hotel because
that would mean instant lethal mobbing.
Getting up late. Going back to bed. Feeling a
bit awkward when little girls burst into tears
upon touching their hair. Drinking. Lol-baiting.
Talking about gore movies. Being chuffed that
Barry Gibb is a Cure fan. Having chewing-gum
on the rider. Drinking some more. Mercilessly,
relentlessly, savagely, baiting Lol. Not dancing.
Tittering. Not having some grand idea about
themselves. Watching shirts shrink. Miming to
Status Quo records. Being gods in France.
Why are The Cure so big, Robert?
I think a lot of it is songs, I really do. Just
having the right song at the right time.
Why are The Cure so big, Simon?
I think its probably Robert.

HE NEVER HAS AN ORIGINAL THOUGHT!

The words to How Beautiful You Are are of
interest to me
The lyric-sheets wrong, innit?
Who proof-read it?
Me.
It suggests that no one ever knows or loves
another. Thats a bit of a rum do, isnt it?
Ah, thats literary theft, from a Baudelaire
short story. I wrote a song round the time of
the Faith album with the idea that, even if
you thought you were very close to someone,
you never really were. That youd always be
disappointed in people. Then someone gave me a
book of Baudelaire, Verlaine and Rimbaud.
I read this story and his narrative idea put it
so much better. Just goes to show I never have
an original thought!
But is your view of communication between
people really that bleak?
Mmm. Still is. I wish it wasnt. But I expect
less of fewer people now. Theres just one or two
people who I rely on not to change. Maybe three.
Its very difcult writing songs which people say
help them and not feeling like youre the centre
of the universe. Its nice to read something that
stirs you to think youre on the periphery. Or
that you dont even exist.
I once met somebody whod interviewed
Patrick White and I felt very peripheral then.
I wished Id met him. But then I was invited
to lunch with Ray Bradbury
and I didnt go: at the last minute
I got scared Id be so useless in
the conversation.
Recommended reading for
incurable Curophiles?
Patrick Whites autobiography, which tells
me how an old person feels when hes old. And
gay. Im terried of old people. And in Ireland
I set myself this reading course to try and
re-educate myself, cos I felt I was becoming
very dull. So I read Beyond Good And Evil
again, and The Myth Of Sisyphus. And Sartres
Road To Freedom trilogy, which Id never read
before. That was brilliant. Really good. And
Confucius
Isnt this all a little naively heavy-going?
No, surprisingly enough you know most of
whats in them. You nd you just know.

Im seen as being cuddly. This isnt

true; Im as horrible as anyone

TOM SHEEHAN

IF HE WAS AT HOME, HED BE IN THE PUB!

We, however, are in Brussels, the capital of
Europe. It is the capital of Europe because
nobody not Rome, not Madrid, not Liverpool,
not nobody could possibly be jealous of
Brussels. Thus peace is assured. Being jealous
of Brussels would be like being jealous of a
watering-can with scaffolding around it.
Were sitting here and its Sunday. But it
could be Tuesday as much as anything. Thats
whats so good about doing this. Id be at the
pub if I was at home anyway, so going on stage
is a bonus.
The Cure on tour is a fascinating
phenomenon it goes through all the rocknroll
motions while somehow maintaining a slight
lmy forceeld between amusing itself and
plummeting into all those Spinal Tap clichs.
Drinking. Saying someone has never touched
a drink in his life. Watching old videos of
Dr Who. Lol-baiting. Arguing about the
merits of compact discs, and how the Luddites
would smash them up. Crimping. Lol-baiting.
Drinking. Phoning home. Anyone-baiting.
Signing autographs. Trying to avoid Michael
Jackson, Marvin Gaye and Van Morrison. Lolbaiting. Saying, Come on, just one more drink

THEY LOOK LIKE ANGELS!

I worry about our attitude because I have to
live with it. Im sure a lot of people dont care
at all what attitude we have, but I have to keep
thinking its important because, if I let that go,
I may as well become a member of Spandau
Ballet or something.
You have to keep a sense of just being
human. Im wearing black for the rst time in
years today. We wear white on stage. We look
like angels.
We talk about mouths, then I suggest that
Robert might feel his audience is too young to
appreciate the complex mesh of love and hate in
the songs
I never feel patronising towards anyone of 15;
I remember still how I experienced things then.
I could never write them down as well as I could
at 25, I didnt have the same grasp of language,
but I felt the same emotions, just as strong, in a
much rougher form. Between 15 and 18 is when
you develop your personality. You go out with
people. You make contact with jealousy and all
the other horrible emotions which I no longer
suffer from.
The songs arent that complicated; only one
or two. And theyre probably so convoluted that
they only really refer to me. Most of the recent
songs have been fairly obvious.
Get it out get it out get it out/Get your fucking
voice out of my head/I never wanted any of this/I
wish you were dead/Dead dead dead The Kiss.

HE ALWAYS FEELS LIKE THEYRE NOT HIS HANDS!

If Robert wasnt a compulsive liar, Id ask him if
he was a compulsive liar.
What hypnotises you? Mesmerises you?
Koyaanisqatsi. The rain on bus journeys.
Through the window. And snow, snows the best
thing in the world. When youre driving through
snow at night and the headlights are on and it
looks like youre going through star tunnels
Oh, lots of things mesmerise me. Good dancers.
I suppose thats the opposite to how I feel
seeing people who are really uid, who look
like they dont exist.
Do you wish you could disown the physical?
Lose your body?
Yeah, a trade-in would be quite good.
Actually no a lot of my experience derived
from how uncomfortable I feel within my own
body anyway, so if I was a disembodied mind,
NME ORIGINALS

111

Messiah Of Angst

HES LOSING HIS CYNICISM!

Thats devils and angels youve mentioned
Most peoples devil is far more pronounced
than their angel. I think the angel probably
visits, while he devil lives there. Although Im
turning around a bit. I used to only be surprised
if people were nice. Now Im surprised if people
are horrible. Im losing my cynicism as I get
older! Its generally easier to be affable and noncommittal than it is to be aggressive and angry.
Although Im very argumentative.
I never think Im wrong. I have a
very strong sense of morality and
a well-dened code of ethics Ive
adhered to through the years.
This derives from my survival
instincts.
Robert has in his time been
described as walking a thin line
between agitation and boredom,
and, among many less abstractly
complimentary things, The
Messiah Of Angst.
I never thought those
descriptions referred to me;
so I didnt have to live with it.
I didnt go home and nd my
mum saying, Hello, Messiah

112

NME ORIGINALS

Of Angst, welcome home Messiah, weve killed

the fatted calf. Ive never spent much time with
people who look up at me, or think Im somehow
different. So when I read these things I either
laugh or just go, Oh, nutty bastards. How could
I have stayed one thing for years anyway? Thatd
be ludicrous. Im not aware of being the me that
does this its weird I cant really grasp hold of
it. Ah, I suppose Ill have to now, wont I?
Does he ever tap himself and nd the hollow
resonance alarming? And is this emptiness, this
still life in mobile homes (thank you, Sylvian),
sadder than any angst?

Ah. Yes. No.

Thats what touring does to me as well. Its
television, tapes, reading, thinking, sitting. And I
know at the start of the chain of actions that Im
gonna feel nothing for, like, the next ve hours.
Im resigned to it till I go to sleep.
Close To Me was about that. Some days you
just know nothings gonna happen. Nothings to
be felt. Its another day gone.
Is it worth being alive on those days?
No He looks up with a puzzled
expression. Not really.
As for that Fight song, all that never give up

I stare into a mirror I hypnotise myself

to see the devil in my face and skull
HE ACTUALLY FELT REALLY DEAD!
Yes I do in fact I feel it to a worrying degree
now. When I went to the South Dublin coast for
two weeks, just before we came on this tour, Id
go out by the sea each morning, and sit down
by the rocks. When I was younger it used to feel
really I dont know, I used to feel inspired.
And this time I actually felt really dead.
Back then, Id feel a sense of innity, Id
feel really small, and helpless, but a part of
something. Id be lled with overwhelming
despair or Id feel deliriously happy, just sitting
looking at the sea. But this time, I didnt feel
anything. Id just sit. And itd just be the sea.
Theres be no communion oh, this isnt
sounding how I mean it
Its sounding like the old grey man on the
Standing On A Beach photographs. Uh
aint that something?
Its just knowing how much I can feel
something no more than anyone else, but
I can be so overwhelmed by things I nd this
worrying. Not to feel anything when I know I
ought to. Im not shocked any more. I just look.
When?
When someone gets knocked over. Or
Christmas. Because you remember how you
used to get excited and you no longer do, and its
worrying because its like youre losing yourself
somehow. Youre becoming thinner. Or maybe
hollower.
And this upsets you?
It doesnt make me feel anything, does it?

tosh in the light of what youve just said,

why bother?
Its about trying to force yourself into some
kind of action, which could lead to experience.
Because there isnt really anything else but
experience. Whether its passive or active.
I used to be able to rely passively on my
environment and the people around me. Now I
think I have got to not necessarily manufacture
experience, but look for things. Im addicted
to feeling extremes.
Taking risks?
Yeah, mental ones.

HES GOT A WEIRD COMPOSITE GIRL!

Whats this penchant youve got for stupidly

gorgeous girls?
Ah yes, I have got a weird composite girl
in mind sometimes, when Im struggling for
ways to eulogise femininity. Its a kind of cross
between Marilyn Monroe, Audrey Hepburn
and Betty Boop.
Must there be a dumbness?
Naivete. A naive, trusting quality, I suppose.
And innocence that isnt really innocence,
because they usually end up getting their own
way. And obviously theres a lot of Mary in there
as well. Thats what I like about her.
Does she ever get jealous?
No! Why should she? Theres no room for
jealousy in the relationship: itd be very tiring.
She may be jealous of the time other people get
from me, with the group existing. Ive known
her since before the group started, so shes always
seen it as an obstacle, whereas usually being in
a group takes on a much more
romantic aspect.
She probably does get jealous
from time to time but just doesnt
tell me cos she knows Id hit her.
Apart from QPR nishing (at
best) eighth in the league, what
does the future hold?
Sometimes I see myself staring
at the sea, writing music for Stanley
Kubricks next lm or something.
Other times I think Ill just be
surrounded by books, reading.
Other times I see myself in
a blank space. Enjoying blankness.
Doing nothing.
The Cure:
myrmidons of
Mmm, sounds good.
miserablism

TOM SHEEHAN

itd take all that away from me.

I always feel like theyre not my hands. Ive
always felt like it my body is a third person.
If I cut my hand I think the band has been
cut, not me. I suppose its an irrational desire
to escape from it to feel that, even if my heart
stopped, I would still be here.
Surely you forget yourself sometimes?
Yeah, after about the seventeenth pint of
Guinness.
Oh, boring what about the sexual act?
Yeah I suppose. Thats pretty mental as well
though. Um late night swimming in dark
waters is a good way. And sleep! And waking up
in the morning when you dont have to get up
immediately I feel comfortable with my body
then, its just a big lump.
This is why I nd it strange that I can go on
stage in front of people and jump about. People
say, Why do you always look down? Im looking
at my feet. They dont do what I want. I dont
know how it is I can play football, really.
What frightens you?
Flying, now. Ive suddenly decided against
it; Ive realised how silly it is. Willingly agreeing
to subject yourself to that torture of throwing
yourself on the mercy of a machine and another
person. Also, I can always see through the oor
on planes. Lack of control I dont like; that
makes me angry. And Im scared of growing old.
And Im scared at my continuing lack of faith in
anything. And Im scared of going blind, cos my
eyesights failing rapidly.
What sights would you miss most?
Everything. Except the colour brown
I could live without that. Most, Id miss the
reection of my own eyes. Yknow when you
stare really close into a mirror?
Is that how you check youre still there?
Yeah. I hypnotise myself to see the devil in
my face and skull. I try not to do that so much
now. It affects my mental stability.

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Too Many Truffles

mellow. Flowers is Glastonbury

1967 and I hate it.
Sam King

NME, 3 January 1987, p30

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
This Wheels On Fire
(Wonderland)

As one whose pre-pubescent

ardour was rst aroused by The
Trinitys kohl-eyed and feather-cut
Julie Driscoll and whose fashion
sense was rst alerted by Brian
Augers Regency cuffs as they
ounced over his Hammond
organ on Top Of The Pops, I can
only applaud Siouxsies latest
excavation of the 1968 songbook.
Far more liberty-taking though
less crystal-ball mysterious than
their reverential Dear Prudence,
Ill be disappointed if this terric
record doesnt blast Siouxsie and
co up the chart pronto.
Mat Snow

NME, 18 April 1987, p23

THE CURE
Why Cant I Be You?
(Fiction)

Still sounding like a haunted

hippie singing through a helium
bubble, Robert Smiths voice
is the only facet of The Cure
which doesnt shout Teen
FUN. Of course Roberts trying
determinedly to sound skittish
and frivolous but, because he
cant even cut it as a bathroom
singer, his voice is still little more
than a reedy, angst-ridden whine.
Otherwise, The Cure are as frothy
as white pop gets these days.
Shameless and cheap enough to
steal Whams Young Guns riff,
this ditty will soon be another Top
Of The Pops cracker.
Donald McRae

question then turns up sheathed

in some revolting medieval
spectacular! Oh God
Consequently the only thing to
do is get your doublet and hose in
a speedy twist over the luscious
malignance within, containing as
it does that greatest of all reliefs,
a chorus. Its a circular temptation
with a smooth guitar sliding shyly
up against the coolest vocals.
Produced by those awfully
nice Mission people it has just
enough thumping power and
glistening strength to ll a nations
jaded ears, syringing out all
that Curiosity Killed The Cat and
Erasure bilge. A well-delineated
giant of a song.
The heat is on
Mick Mercer

ALL ABOUT EVE

(Eden)

Wasteland
(Phonogram)

Preposterous mysticism and

loopy obsession I can just about
take if accompanied by sufcient
bombastic power Im thinking
of Black Sabbath, Killing Joke,
Earth, Wind & Fire. The Mission,
however, sound thin as mist.
Theres too much wisp, not
enough bottom to their sound.
This record is embarrassingly
similar to Porcupine something
which does not make me think
more highly of the Mission, but
rubs off to the detriment of the
Bunnymen. Funny that.
Simon Reynolds

114

NME ORIGINALS

MM, 18 April 1987, p26

ALL ABOUT EVE

Our Summer
(Eden)

When I saw the sleeve of this

single I almost wept. You button
down peoples ears with tales of
glorious contemporary beauty
and the glowing disc of delight in

This Corrosion
(Merciful Release)

Yes, the King of Goth is back!

Heeeeeeeres SPIGGY!!!! Andy
Drac Eldritch (real name Stan
Sunshine) has made a record and
its the lamest thing to crawl out of
Leeds since Norman Hunters last
sparring partner quit town.
Steven Wells

THE CURE
Flowers In Our Hair

THE MISSION

SISTERS OF MERCY

MM, 10 October 1987, p33

MM, 11 July 1987, p26

MM, 10 January 1987, p27

NME, 26 September 1987, p19

Where have all the glowers gone,

Sun Children? cries Julianne.
Sun Children! What planet did
she escape from? Us deprived
city types havent seen the sun
for many a long year. And, in
the depths of our subterranean
pleasure palaces, strapped to
our typewriters, the very last
thing we need is sanctimonious
hippy children fouling up the
carefully controlled atmosphere
of unpalatable nastiness brought
on by too much Swans, Young
Gods and hip hop. Flowers brings
to mind days of contented zitherplaying and complacent middle
class twats sitting in elds being

Just Like Heaven

(Fiction)

Im at a loss as how to greet

and chronicle this important
event, knowing full well that
one facetious crack out of line
could see my Assistant Editor
taking a sudden interest in The
Edgar Broughton Band and
dispatching me with strange zeal
to review their gig at the Crewe
Corn Exchange on Saturday
night. What can I say? Well, at
least it doesnt sound like Dexys
Midnight Runners like the one
before last did. Its a colourful,
uffy, uttery, fussy thing, a
mere transcription of the Down
With Skool! graphic on the front
cover. Unimpeachable, really, but
turns my face green, as if having
consumed too many trufes.
David Stubbs

Chapter 10

DEREK RIDGERS

1988

Fields Of The
Nephilim: our
in the desert

1988

A Fistful Of

DYNAMITE
They rode into town from the wastelands of Stevenage, f ive mean hombres with a burning thirst,
preaching the prairie gospel of Goth. They called themselves Fields Of The Nephilim and the folks
locked up their wives and daughters and got on down. Steve Sutherland joined the posse in Spain
to discover why these dudes are wanted, dead or alive

TOM SHEEHAN

ight, in 1988 theres that chart

crap, theres MMs hip alternatives
to that chart crap and now, out
of nowhere, out of the wastelands, unheralded,
uncelebrated in print or occasionally ridiculed,
theres alternatives to alternatives. These peoples
champions, these great unwashed have become
popular, even adored, without hype or help from
any aspect of the industry. These outsiders have
entered our awareness uninvited; theyve gained
access the hard way, the old-fashioned way.
Theyve played to people and people have repaid
them with astonishing allegiance.
Where have they come from, why have they
come, these hillbillies, these embarrassments,
these blights on the great pop plots and plans?
We writers dont know. We shrink and shudder
at our own unimportance in the whole damn
thing. But you, the readers, you know. You voted
for All About Eve in our Readers Poll and most
of us hacks looked at each other aghast. And you
voted for Fields Of The Nephilim too and we hid
our fright behind our snobbery and one or two
scoffed and a few said, Fields Of Who?
So term came to an end and we broke up for
Christmas and, when we came back, the clever
ones had arrived at a theory to explain away this
troublesome phenomenon. They said the Eves
and the Nephs were mere security blankets,
something for the mascara hairies to suck while
the true monsters/masters of Goth indulged
themselves. They said Eldritch wont tour and
The Cult have sold their souls to the States, so its
little wonder the deserted masses have ocked to
these substitutes.
The Neph Sisters clones, Midnight
Cowboys, surely comedians. Dung-punchers
from Stevenage with shaded eyes on the main
chance. See that gap and stampede straight

through it. Their debut album,

Dawnrazor, topped the 1987
indie chart and yet everything
you or I have ever read about
Fields Of The Nephilim has
found them on the defensive,
denying preconceptions,
defying their many critics
with a dull resolution. This
will not do.
Consequently we took a
red-eye to the sleepy onehorse town of Zaragoza,
Spain, caught them on the
job in Spaghetti Western
country and approached
with caution on our bellies
bearing gifts. We decided
it was time to unburden
ourselves of pretty prejudice
and attempt to get close
enough to brand this critter
through trust and affection
rather than bludgeoning
brute force.

NME, 28 May 1988, p3

Its three in the morning

and everyones pissed.
We lie nowhere, says
Tony Pettit, the big-boned, cheerful bass player
with the gormless, friendly grin who wishes they
hadnt once joked to a journo that what they play
is Spaghetti Metal. We dont t in with any of
your things. I think we are just Fields Of The
Nephilim, I really do.
The Nephs reckon they do what they do
primarily because they enjoy it thats the top
and bottom of the whole damn thing.
What we want to know, then, is whether or not

the joy is qualitative and discriminating? Does

enjoying what theyre doing imply a critique of
their contemporaries?
I dunno, says Carl McCoy, the bellowthroated singer who wears translucent lenses,
once took a pigs head on tour until it started
to sweat and stink in the carrier bag under the
seat in the van and who has just had his bullets
conscated at the airport. Since weve been in
this band weve not been in touch with any
NME ORIGINALS

117

Spaghetti Metal
other new music at all so it
must full something in our
lives which is needed.
Commitment and work is
readily used as an excuse for
their lack of inclination to assess
their surroundings. Perhaps
these blinkers are purely
instinctive. Perhaps, though,
their insularity runs deeper.
We should investigate the
live phenomenon. Why, in an
era when live music is patently
dying, are the Nephs such a live
attraction? What is it about the
live situation which suits them?
You can get a feeling off
Baking with the
one live gig which youll never
Nephs: they supply
the our while the
ever get again. And its the
critics throw eggs
same being in a band as being
in the audience, says Pete Wright,
the skinny guitarist with a bad bout of
u. Earlier I gave him my bottle of cough
medicine, good and speedy Do Dos, and he
poured it into a jug of Sangria and quaffed
the lot. Good stuff.
Ive so often heard a good record and
then been disappointed because the band
couldnt pull it off live, says Paul Wright,
and cement mixers. I think we have quite an
the other guitarist who likes the drink, has
original sound, but one thats natural.
cultivated a sort of Bobby Charlton over-sweep
I think its honest, says Tony. Its an honest
without the bald bit and apparently has a mole
sound because everyones playing exactly what
on his ass like a hairy map of Australia.
we wanna play.
And thats only been recently. Going back a
The Nephs insistence on naturalness leads us
few years, bands used to play live, says Carl.
into an elephants graveyard of opinion its too
ip, too easy. Surely they must have some verbal
in the day, the band are supposed to be
notion of what makes a good record?
soundchecking at the En Bruto Club, Zaragoza
An atmosphere, says Tony. Another big,
a neat little mini-Marquee that holds about 500
meaningless, all-encompassing word.
(80 eventually turn up) where the bands have to
Weve tried empiricism and failed. Time to
get stupid. The Nephs are goths, or they appeal
be off stage by 10pm because an old couple live in
to goths. Given 10 minutes with a new song to
the at upstairs but the equipment, such as it is,
write, they veer towards the darkness rather
isnt ready, so we drive out to the hills in search
than the light.
of some desert photo locations. Winding up a
I dont nd our music particularly dreary,
precarious track we discover an ancient mission
says Paul. We can see we appeal to a gothic
church and a ruin. The sun makes a bid to sink
audience says Carl. Yes, but Im here talking
behind the horizon before the photographer
to ve funny geezers who adore Steve Martin
gets snapping and where are the boys? I peer
and tell some dodgy jokes and yet on record, up
around the other side of the van and there they
there on stage, they become something other,
are, covering each other in our.
something else. How? Why?
You didnt see that, says Tony.
Its a different language, says Carl. Its
I didnt see that.
uent to us and, between us all, we create this
from Stevenage and dressing as cowboys
sound and this atmosphere.
must surely detract from any attempt on their
Yes, but is it important that pop is something
part to be taken seriously.
other? Is that what its for ?
It makes us easy targets, yeah, says Nod.
I dont think Joe Public wants to come and
People probably look at us and think straight
see Joe Public on stage, if thats what you mean,
away that were just another indie band with
says Tony. They want a bit of escapism.
an image, says Carl. And, to be honest, bands
Yes, but the Nephs go beyond this with their
with images have always put me off. But, looking
Morricone worship and their sound symbolic
at us, I can see weve got this image and yet we
of wide open spaces, they surely suggest pop
feel like its different. Every band will probably
can attain the heroic and that, through pop, the
tell you the same that they feel comfortable in
human can become superhuman.
those clothes and thats why they wear them.
Yeah, its approaching epic, says Nod.
I really do though.
Why do they aspire to that?
Is it important for the Nephs to be different,
Once Upon A Time In The West is epic,
to sound original? Indeed, with their deliberately
says Paul.
traditional rock line-up, is it even possible?
Epic, to me, is like a feeling, says Pete. Its
We dont go out of our way to be original,
not something you can put into words.
says Carl, because if we did wed play chainsaws
Cheers.

I imagine it wide and

saturated with atmosphere,
says Carl. When I think of
epic, I think of something
really massive
Like the pyramids of
Egypt, says Paul.
Something aweinspiring, says Carl.
Aha, attaining something
beyond what youd imagine
could attain.
Yeah, says Carl. Its
gotta have some mystery
behind it.
So, instead of being greasemonkeys or dole-boys, the
Nephs, through music, can be
anything they want to be. And
they have chosen their certain
type of music. Why?
That makes it sound
deliberate, but its not really like that,
says Nod, to our unbounded surprise.
Its just evolved, we havent aimed at it.
So what do the Nephs write about?
Everyones got different ideas in this
band, says Carl. I write the lyrics and a
lot of them are my feelings towards my life. Its a
hard thing to talk about.
Try.
Well, I dont sit around for ages with my
thinking cap on. The songs just come really fast.
Where from?
My underpants! This is Paul. Witty bastard.
I dunno I dont write love songs as such.
I sing about things that really fascinate me, says
Carl. Some of them are really odd and bizarre.
If people saw it written down, theyd probably
think, Shit, the geezers on acid, or something.
I dont really want people to know what they
mean to me. A lot of our songs are written so
that people can get their own picture in their
mind. It doesnt bother me whether people know
what Im singing about or not, really, but Im sure
they can sense the feeling of the song.
Theres quite a lot of rebellion in our music,
Carl continues. Weve always been against the
grain. Weve never been accepted, weve never
been hip, weve never tted in.
So what are the Nephs ambitions?
Carl: Id like us to go sown in history, to be
put on a level with some of the older bands that
I admire, like Roxy Music and the Doors. Them
bands are lasting, they still create a feeling.
Paul: On my 34th birthday, Id like to dress
up as a nun.
Tony: Success on our own terms.
Pete: We all want success but I dont think
well cop out for it. We dont do the fucking
crappy Cult syndrome.
What would be the worst thing that could
happen to the Nephs?
Paul: To know exactly what the LPs gonna be
in another years time, because that wouldnt be
inspired, it would be thought out.
Carl: I think if one person left the band, that
would be it. I dont think we could play with any
other musicians.
Paul: The second worst would be meeting
you again, I reckon. Want some of this vodka?

Theres a lot of rebellion in our music.

Weve never been accepted, weve
never been hip, weve never fitted in

Earlier

Coming

118N MN EM EO ROIRGIIGNI ANLASL S

??

1988

MM, 13 February 1988, p27

ALL ABOUT EVE

All About Eve

TOM SHEEHAN

(Phonogram)

Like modern Pre-Raphaelites, All

About Eve get history wonderfully
wrong, ingenuously ignoring the
cause and effect of past recordings
and accepting the song as an
isolated artefact, unblighted by
any of its authors
stylistic or political
while ye may, youll
misdemeanours. They
surely recognise a
are reclaiming pop for
great chorus when
the young through
you hear one and
rose-coloured specs
All About Eve is
rather than cynicism,
blooming with them.
blissful ignorance
Personal favourites
rather than hip
are Marthas Harbour,
knowledge.
where Julianne is a
Consequently
galley slave to her
All About Eves debut album
lovers wave crashing
sometimes gets it almost too wrong
on the bow, and Never Promise,
to bear. Every Angel, for instance,
where the real world for once chafes
tarnishes epic echoes of Stairway
against their fantasy and threatens
To Heaven and Ennio Morricone
to expose their hopes as lies.
with the melodramatic lilt from
With so many alternatives and
Knights In White Satin; Gypsy
alternatives to alternatives bustling
Dance ddles around its picaresque
for predominance, All About Eve
folly like a blissed-out Barbara
have achieved the impossible and
Dickson; and the latest single, Wild
wedded attitude to accessibility. Fall
Hearted Woman, is twee enough
into their dream and youll awaken
to sidle unnoticed onto any recent
convinced that your innocence can
Fleetwood Mac LP.
be retrieved after all.
But, miraculously, these are the
Steve Sutherland
only errors of judgement on an
otherwise exemplary album.
Wayne Hussey
It would do the Eves discredit
of the Mish: the
to persist in source-spotting
Dr Feelgood of goth
sufce to say theyve listened
a lot to the Cocteaus and the
winnowing version of She
Moves Through The Fair, a
spooky old Fairport Convention
ballad, boldly resembles This
Mortal Coils Song To The Siren.
Juliannes vocals are a triumph
throughout, so touching that we
accept, without irony, the
wide-eyed sentiments of
Flowers In Our Hair.
Its possible, I suppose, to
view All About Eve as a symptom
rather than a cure, to consider
the emotional journey from the
just a kiss away of 70s Stones
to the just a breath away of
In The Clouds as a Pavlovian
reaction to AIDS. And its true
that theres plenty of yearning
here but no consummation.
But its a measure of their
achievement that were wholly
spellbound by the Eves longing
for a return to life the way it was
before the fall.
And even if youre the type
who nds it difcult getting into
the swing gathering rosebuds

MM, 5 March 1988, p41

THE MISSION
Children
(Phonogram)

Its so easy to laugh at The Mission.

The mere mention of Wasteland
is enough to send depressives into
raging guffaws. They are the
Dr Feelgood of goth, a poor mans
Sisters, a rich mans Cult, a blind
mans Nephilim.
At their best, The
Mission are laughable
buffoons, playful
rogues. At worst, the
band are the seismic
belch emitted after
pops banquet. At
all times, however,
they are museum
curators, restoring
the dilapidated foundations of
rock, preserving its heritage,

embroidering its myth.

Its therefore no surprise that
Children is produced by John Paul
Jones and happens to be buoyed
around the Led Zeppelin myth
a legend only revered by those
who cant remember just how
excruciatingly tedious Page and co
could be. Its even less surprising
that Tower Of Strength is a sketchy
facsimile of Kashmir, that Heat
stomps around the hemline of
Heart, while the bilious Childs
Play sounds like an Anglicised,
lobotomised Toto. In short, the
album is every Eskimos wet dream.
The concept behind Children
is the usual guff about a quest for
instinct and innocence hence
snatches of playground screams and
nursery rhymes. Footsteps echo in
the memory as Wayne and his merry
men plough safe pastures with the
usual ourishing arpeggios on the
melodramatic Beyond
The Pale. From here,
the full, glutinous sound
oscillates between
the pomp and glory of
Kingdom Come and
the tranquil 30-second
harpsichord lullaby of
Breath.
The Mission create an
insulated community,
immune to the feckless whims
of pop. They may make the
occasional stab at relevance
the accelerated tumbling
chord slam of Hymn For
America is The Missions
answer to U2s Bullet The Blue
Sky but the band are at their
most effective when at their
most meaningless.
Despite all the dungeons
and dragons imagery, the only
real mystery is how Wayne can
sing this po-faced, pompous
bilge with a straight face.
Their epic vision is limited to
myopic gestures pilfered from
the archives those halcyon
days when people judged
the stature of a band by the
length of the drum solo. Only
once on the whole album
(the astonishingly affecting
Heaven On Earth) do the
grandiose sweeps of guitar
actually sound heroic.
Using relics to create new
relics, The Mission have
probably made the nest
Zeppelin record Led Zeppelin
never made, but one mans
memory lane is another mans
blind alley. Its surely time to
detonate the ruins.
Ted Mico
NNMMEE OORRI IGGI INNAALLSS

119
??

The Garden
With a debut album and a national tour about to explode,
dream lovers All About Eve teach Chris Roberts about
Liz Cocteau, Cilla Black, Pandoras Box, feminism and
anything connected with clouds

eauty And The Beast,

denitely. If it didnt have
such bad implications
which ones which? that could
easily have been the name of the
band. I love the feel of it, yes.
It can still move me to tears if
Im in a certain frame of mind.
It encapsulates everything that
matters in life. Im a sucker for
romance, so I want the beauty
to love the beast. Then when he
turns into a handsome prince at
the end Im very disappointed.
I prefer him as the beast because
hes more hopeless. Its too much
of a happy ending.
That Melody Maker
cartoon about me sitting
outside my house while it
was burning down and I was
looking at the clouds its
not a representation of the way I run my life
but I do get phases of it. And they are what
keeps me sane. Its not insanity. You need
those moments and I wont apologise for them.
And I know it makes for fruitcake accusations,
but they can only be from people who dont
know what its like. I recommend it!
It is the kind of thing you can switch on
and off. You dont have to be through the
gates of madness and trapped in Fairyland
and never come out. You can step in and out
of that little world, and I enjoy being there. Its
just that I used to live there, and now its an
occasional holiday.
Im capable of depth and shallowness,
and recently Ive been living on a shallow,
pleasure-seeking level. My last stint of shallow
has lasted a long time. It never seeps into the
music, that is deep. So I stress Im going to go
through a hermit-hood for a while soon, and
come out renewed. Tim always worries when I
say this: he thinks Im going to get the blanket
out and read Nietzsche again. That doesnt work,
thats too much. Dont worry, its not going to be
one of those grey ones again. Really.

All About Eve took their name from the sharp,

epigrammatic lm, dominated by Bette Davis,

about a scheming starlet who lusts for fame.

No, it doesnt t at all. We shouldve chosen
Camille, perhaps.
All About Eve are a contemporary pop-folkrock group, all the more contemporary for
having rejected all the consumerist trappings
of nowness. Their apparently reactionary
passivity is proving to be the most effective
resistance imaginable to the Reich-like stomp
(not ood, not surge, not sweep) of hip hop,
technology, computers, word processors (what
are they writing? Ready-cooked chickens?) Eddie
Murphy, Oliver Stone, Linda Lusardi, and Lady
Di of The Grinning Walkman.
The Primitives go timeless, The Sugarcubes
go left-handed, while All About Eve go dream
dreamy dream, and suddenly we have a viable
new pop vanguard which isnt exactly what any
of us had in mind, but for which I at least am
very grateful because Im sure as hell going to
pretend it was. I wont waste time now debating
about Eve as a sub-cultural phenomenon.
Innovative theyre not, disarmingly incongruous
they are. Besides, when The Stud Brothers wrote
after Thomas Wolfe that the group strive not
to escape from life but to prevent life escaping
them, they netted, shall we say, a big one, the
pre-emptive bastards.
The only thing thats disappointed me about
All About Eves rise to prominence since the days
I would see them churning out White Horses
down the 100 Club (not so long ago really, but
then a minute is a century in pop, of course),
has been the restraint of their innate mysticism
(for want of a less devalued word). For All About
Eve to really be All About Eve there must be
more haze, enigma, and poeticism, less Missionstyle high jinks, less rock lives n hows your
father, less jovial deation of the beguiling and
the bedazzling.
Julianne, a friend with aesthetic gumption,
used to send me roses and pictures of angels
and birthday cards with Andrew Marvell poems
on (usually because Id asked her to) and thats
the kind of star we need in these charismashunning days.
I never said I was Liz Cocteau. Im not Cilla
Black either. Perhaps I should blush and look at
the oor more to please reviewers. But a fault of
mine is that is nine people say youre great and

1988

Of Eden
one says its shit, and its the one who says its shit
that I focus on and try to convert. I think, Ive
got the nine, I want the tenth.
This is determination, old-fashioned
conviction, rather than greed. Faith.
I never thought it wouldnt happen. It
wasnt ego, it was that I never let it cross my
mind for fear of what on earth I would think
about then. Now things are a lot easier thanks
to the good fairy Phonogram, but well never
become complacent. Were staying rmly in
obsessive perfectionist mode.

Remember that the most beautiful things in

TOM SHEEHAN

the world are the most useless: peacocks and

lilies, for instance. So said John Ruskin, in
The Stones Of Venice in 1851. Given a choice
between a peacock, a lily, and a digital
synchronised oscillator, Id have no need for
batteries. Unless the peacock wanted to carry
a torch.
What about Eve? What sort of person do
you think she was?
Not this scheming temptress she was
supposed to be; I think she probably offered
Adam the apple just out of kindness, as a nice
gesture, and shes been slagged off for it for
centuries. I dont think shes evil, nor do I hold
to the idea that all women are intrinsically evil.
Maybe Im biased because I am one! I know what
Im like; Ive got an evil streak just like anybody
else, regardless of sex.
You always wanted it to sound more
beautiful. Thats the word.
Yes, so we found the courage to do things

Frustrated Vikings
All About Eve recover
from another bout of
burning, shooting,
raping and looting

MM, 20 February 1988, p28

which would either be received as beautiful or

namby-pamby. Without vanity, I think some of
the things we do now are so beautiful I feel in
awe of them. Sometimes I just smile to myself.
If you do believe that any creativity comes from
within, it surprised us that that was what we
were like inside.
You know youre ordinary, but youre
doing something thats out of the ordinary,
adds Julianne. I can stand our music being
worshipped, but not us. Its a scary responsibility.
You often feel youre letting people down if
youre not quite as goddess-like as they expect
you to be.
Are you a tough woman?
I suppose so. No. No I dont like the idea of
being thought of as a hard person.
Where do feminism and you meet?
I dont like it. I really surprised myself when
I fell in love sorry about this, but this is
important. I surprised myself because I thought
I was quite a strong-minded individual but,
erm, I became the girl. I couldve quite easily
sat with a posy in my hand for the entirety of the
relationship. Somebody once said something
to this effect: a man falls in love with a woman
because of the strange mysteries about her, and
then the very fact that he has got her means she
loses those things. Im not talking about the
chase and the kill; she actually becomes quite in
awe of the person just because hes a man.
I havent though this out well enough to
relate it, but I think I only discovered a while
ago that I was a woman! And as to a Woman In
Rock, er, no. When I think of Women In Rock

I think of the gutsy ones like Madonna, who

seem to use and abuse men with all the abandon
of a packet of tissues. Er, that isnt me at all. The
kind of woman I like is one of the lads without
being butch. Like Sandy Denny. Keeping her
femininity, but not a barrier. Using it in the
songwriting rather than the press shots. Which is
using it in a pure way, not a manipulative one.

All About Eve have taken more risks than their

critics tend to realise. What couldve been more
perverse than Flowers In Our Hair (although
it included 1987s prime piece of pungent
philosophy in pop: We only dare to say please
love me/At the seventh glass of wine)? What
couldve been more quietly condent than
revamping In The Clouds (still their nest
cascade of moments) as their rst major
release? And what in the name of Lorraine
Ellison is Wild Hearted Woman doing in
between Johnny Hates Jazz and Was Not Was?
I take great delight in their trembly pauses and
sensurround choruses, emotion recollected in
tranquillity, in Juliannes unerringly silver and
blue voice, in the way they make Trifds and
LL Cool J fans snort belligerently, in the astral
connection between the tantalising halt in In
The Clouds and the way my right leg itches every
time I cross the road ever since it was bashed by a
car, and in seeing a nuance of dawn, and of dusk,
breathe over the hastily arranged lunchtime of
our popular charts.
I also grasp a link between All About Eves
evocations of childhood and nostalgia and the
works of Proust, a stodgily styled but ultimately
wildly romantic visionary. (Though this is
possibly just me going a bit daft.) And isnt there
something gloriously bizarre happening when
Julianne wafes on about positive magic and
Carl Jung on Blue Peter, like the mad Lorelei
of Cherbourg or something? Isnt that just
ne? And for our next guest, Dante Gabriel
Rosetti Isnt that great? Well?
I hope All About Eve dont become just
another commodity. Fleetwood Mac are already
booked into the top shelf for another few
decades; you know how the tune goes. (Futility:
playing the harp before the buffalo old
Burmese proverb.) What I hope, as ever, is that
All About Eve will be all about mermaids and
emeralds and autumn and bleeding hearts and
sunowers and Pegasus and ghosts and falling
for the wicked witch instead of Snow White
and arms that come through walls holding
candlesticks. Plus the peacocks and the lilies.
The subliminal wants the sublime. Fables, please.
Theyre attractive to me, as Im not very keen
on reality or confrontation. My favourites are
the romantic ones where the prince does get
the girl with the very long hair out of the tower.
But also less girlish ones I do like stories about
enormous great Vikings raping and pillaging
and murdering. Perhaps Im a frustrated Viking!
And even the totally unfeasible Pandoras
Box. You know, youre attracted to myths
because you role-play them subconsciously
in your life. The spiky hedgehog thing, thats
one. That can keep it all wrapped up in a nice
little box that gets so full up that when the link
comes open one day its just going to be too
devastating for words.
NME ORIGINALS

121

Pop Valhalla

NME, 3 September 1988, p31

FIELDS OF
THE NEPHILIM
The Nephilim
(Situation Two)

Bob Harris, The Mission, Tottenham

Hotspur surely there is more to
ridicule than Fields Of The Nephilim.
Yet the consensus reaction to this
treasure chest will doubtless be the
same as preceding Neph records:
You must be mad! I am, in fact,
horribly inamed.
Gladly accepting a
Fields record is looked
upon, in many circles, as
the equivalent of asking
for a contagious disease.
But this from dolts too
soft to listen to their
bloody records rst.
Ive been guilty
of it myself, but
strangely my ears have been
bleeding all night to this. If this LPs
not at least good, then my body is
malfunctioning more than I feared.
You have to appreciate how far this
murky bunch of desperadoes have
come in the past four years.
From rags to more rags, from
supporting Chelsea to headlining
tours. The Neph have grafted
without complaint. Theyve won
their spurs and now here they sit
rubbing them clean, polishing their
gritty melodies into a perversely
haunting collection of songs.
It is less Spaghetti Western and
more movie mystery, shivering
and spine-tingling with some tricky
guitar that ddles round while Carl
McCoys throat burns. The gruff
vocals, rather than grating, have a
haunting and eerie edge.
Theyve maintained a brooding
power, but dispensed with
gratuitous gothy anthems. Only
Phobia, like Motorheads Ace Of
Spades in drag, sees their elbows
ying into a frenetic dance routine.
Elsewhere the rumbling
rhythms have an almost sublime
style. Endemoniada has a lightly
atmospheric build-up before
branching out into an excitable
climax while The Watchman
possibly the best track on the album
simmers with tiny explosions
going off in the form of re-cracking
guitar and heated vocals.
Side Two has a mere three
songs on it, but theyre epic in
length. Trampling on incessantly,
Celebrate leads into Love Under
Will with its scything beauty, which
in turn opens the door for Last Exit

122

NME ORIGINALS

Of The Lost, the colossal climax.

It swirls, creating a melodramatic
haze, the real McCoy being replaced
by the Sinatra version, a
mixture of growling
and crooning.
A shock, but
more reassuringly
The Nephilim is
their assertion that
beneath the muck
and the dust there are
aspirations to beauty.
Steve Lamacq

MM, 10 September 1988, p37

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Peepshow
(Polydor)

Its still pretty vague.

Pretty and vague.
Its not about love or
annihilation. Siouxsie
& The Banshees
avoid meaning like
the plague, and this
feline wisdom has
always served them
well. Grace, they understand.
If Peek-A-Boo is hip hop, Im LL
Cool J. The Banshees are strolling
further away than ever from force,
from brutality. Their eleventh album
doesnt set re to my palms, but is
quivers with psalms and it knows
how to breathe while kissing.
As voyeurs, they are more
discreet. Theyve recognised
which oorboards creak and dont
condemn idiosyncrasy. Still the
words are nursery rhymes (nursery
rhymes always involve insidious
violence and strategic cruelty), but
sonically, the blue angels of punk
are sending out splendid sonorous
rafts, touching new glittering
banisters with soluble ngernails.
Theres a kind of gentlemens
agreement to gloss over the nest of
difculties any careful reections
might unearth. The imaginative
sophistry and romanticism of The
Banshees can therefore mean all
things to anybody, embarrassing
the gospel of rationality and

clarifying chaos by paying it

lip service with that gloss. The
Banshees remain coolly dependent
on the slyest of feminine touches.
Peepshow is hesitantly
hypnotic. It seduces you back.
Theyve not come up with any
smashing new tunes, but the
click and tut of Siouxsies tongue
is more intimate, forsaking
aloofness for sincerity.
More than ever, the
composition credits go to Sioux
or Severin individually. Siouxs
Turn To Stone and Rawhead
And Bloodybones are simply
disquieting, Burn-Up is ushed
with Eros. Severins Rhapsody
allows some stirring
melodrama but the innite
pinnacle is
their one
joint effort,
the bravura
hymn The
Last Beat Of
My Heart.
As Martin
McCarricks
accordion
and Budgies
directly intelligent
rhythms underline its
pathos, this elegy is
translated by Sioux
with capital beatitude.
Its the Banshees most
courageous arabesque
in some time. If they
have enough
majesty in their
guts to put it
out as a single
we really will
be witnessing
a renaissance.
The lady is
too vaporous
to vanish. In this
Valhalla, her valour
derides prattle and
subtly strives for
scintillation. You can
see the woods because
Siouxsie:
of a warm breeze. The ice
doesnt do
eld is melting.
hip hop
Chris Roberts

NME, 17 September 1988, p37

COCTEAU TWINS
Blue Bell Knoll
(4AD)

Theres a bit in Trains, Planes And

Automobiles where Steve Martin
and John Candy, thwarted on
their tortuous journey home
for Thanksgiving, are holed up
together in yet another seedy
motel. They have reached a kind
of truce, formed a warm affection
for one another bred from mutual
adversity and theyre slobbering
around in their room, the mini
bar open, travelling the world via
miniatures rum takes them to
Jamaica, vodka to Russia, that sort
of thing. Theyre transported from
their crisis by these little nips of
intoxication. Momentarily, theyre
gone. Blue Bell Knoll reminds me of
this bit over and over. Each sip takes
you someplace utterly else.
It was two and a half years in
the making, two and a half years in
which Robin, Liz and Simon have
made their peace with pop, listened
to a lot of Prince and Madonna
and let themselves go a little. And
theyve inadvertently rediscovered
a path that leads them back into our
consciousness. All of a sudden they
count. Again.
With Blue Bell Knoll, without
wishing to suggest anything so
stupid as the Cocteaus adopting
anything as gauche as a strategy,
they have, to use the modern
terminology, arrived right in our
face. Not since the exalted Head
Over Heels have they so brazenly
toyed with our affections, delighting
in astonishing us by touching pop
base every so often, only to soar
immediately and coquettishly into
earth, air, re, water, any element
they choose, achieving the giddy
heights of pop Valhalla most of us
had given up dreaming about.
Oh, the places it takes us to!
Its like a brochure of ecstasies, a
travelogue of possibilities. AtholBrose is French, a baby
doll bruised nursery
rhyme with a cutting
edge that climbs a stair,
wobbles on a diving
board, and launches
itself, beautifully, into
the ozone above the
Riviera. Suddenly
were tripping at the
cinema, experiencing
one of those lush early 70s Martini
ads, our heartbeats thrumming in
our ears. Cico Buff is like surng
over Herculean orchestration,
Carolyns Fingers is a Benidorm

Nick Cave
at his most
lovable

beauty with a cr-r-risp, cherubic

twitter and an unintentional nod
to Brotherhood Of Mans Angelo.
Ella Megalast Burls Forever (please
dont let the titles put you off) is like
praying in Bermuda shorts and the
chorus goes Tear tear tear tear tear
tear tear tear. Sheer bliss.
There is nothing cold on Blue
Bell Knoll, nothing stark or dark,
save, perhaps, the start of The Itchy
Glowbo Blow, which whisks us into
a labyrinth of potholes but pretty
swiftly hurls us, breathless, up over
the downs like a kite caught up by
the wind. This is a holiday record, a
promise of pleasures unknown.
Suckling The Mender sends me
shrieking to Spain where Liz, fully
adorned in black lace, is performing
a clicking amenco with the most
sensual speech impediment in
the world. Its as if her tongue is
glued to the roof of her mouth with
honey while she spins, ankle deep
in a shallow pool, her toes and lace
caressed by Robins tiger-sh until
he unleashes mosquitoes and she
scampers ashore. And A Kissed Out
Red Floatboat has me on a hill over
a beach, Robins jets scoring the
sky with sonic vapour
trails.
If we werent
already aware of the
Cocteaus brilliance,
we would proclaim
Blue Bell Knoll one of
the greatest records
weve ever heard. Well,
we shouldnt let their
unearthly standards
blind us or deafen us to how utterly
unique they are. This is a triumphant
return. As I think Liz sings over the
coconut shufe of Spooning Good
Singing Gum, Happy Again!

Surely this band is the voice of

Cliff Michelmore. (Is that better
Robin, huh?)
Steve Sutherland
MM, 24 September 1988, p41

NICK CAVE &

THE BAD SEEDS
Tender Prey
(Mute)

As Nick Cave goes further and

further out, his
music comes more
condently in. Nothing
on Tender Prey is
especially esoteric or
inaccessible, but most
of it bristles with vain
beauty and power
and pride.
Singing from
a comfortable
position halfway down the
lions throat (ah, home at last!),
Cave has created easily his most
lovable record to date. It boasts
an astonishing diversity and spits
in the face of most known deities.
Profane, passionate, poignant,
the masochistic leper has given us
one of the landmark albums of the
decade. Nick Caves abused muse
is beginning to sprinkle something
important on his 100 per cent proof
breakfast
Those of you divorced from your
spirit for so long that you havent
yet absorbed Wim Wenders Wings
Of Desire will not be aware of the
expression that overtakes Solveig
Sommartins supernaturally pale
face as she listens to The Carny.
It would be hackneyed if she was
shivering by any other torch, but
Caves voice is somehow bitter
enough to match the homage to the

void that goes on here. Cave sounds

lonelier than a dodo.
Nowhere is this more effective
than on the fractious stateliness
of The Mercy Seat, a matrix so
unbelievably staggering that when
it rst came out I had to allocate
certain times of night at which it
could be played. I mean, you cant
have a peak experience between
getting out of the shower and
running for the bus, its just not on.
The Mercy Seat is both hypnotic
and jarring, rhythmic and loose,
demonic and devout. Its as near to
humming the executioners song as
anyone will ever get.
I love the blind joy and accidental
beauty of cheap pop jamborees
because Staring Death In The Eye
is so very rarely done with any true
courage. Tender Prey nds Cave
in arrogantly romantic top form. By
Harry if he doesnt force the grim
reaper to extra time and then
penalties!
Up Jumped The Devil begins
like a Gaelic pub singalong but rises
through smoke then ames O
My O My what a wretched life /I was
born on the day that my poor mother
died/I was cut from her belly with
Stanley knife/While my daddy did
a jig with the drunk midwife to a
transcendent eddying. New single
Deanna cracks the whip,
The Bad Seeds giving it
that extra jolt.
Watching Alice is a
more restrained piano
sigh, Cave eulogising
his voyeurism as the
lady in question dons
fetish gear. He sing this
with uncharacteristic
compassion.
Now were running through
gutters of blood to the City Of
Refuge, hooks like claws and
imaginations riotous; this is
another barnstormer. Slowly Goes
The Night shufes in on a mock
vaudeville vamp; if youre not
sold on this remarkable records
bloodshot commitment by now
youre an accountant in Telford. As
Ive just used my two-hundredth
superlative adjective of the night Ill
simply wave you towards Sundays
Slave, Sugar Sugar Sugar and
New Morning with a note saying
theyre an esplanade after a maze of
eschatological escalators
If you or I retained any doubts
about Nick Caves artistry, they
should be banished forthwith.
Tender Prey is a classic, a tour
de force. Canonise this resolute
mortal now.
Chris Roberts
NME ORIGINALS

BLEDDYN BUTCHER

1988

123

Black Eyes And Bruises

beginnings or ends, with truth,

Jesus, death, all eventually up
each others arses.
Neither behind nor ahead
of the times, The Mercy Seat
is a magnicent, disgusted,
imaginative leap outside the
times. You need this.
David Stubbs

NME, 6 February 1988, p9

THE MISSION
Tower Of Strength

tragedy of trench foot; soggy old

boots exercising to a hoof-like
jauntiness. Even I know hes better
stuff hidden in that mop of his.
Steve Lamacq

(Phonogram)

Poor Wayne Hussey. All that

time spent waiting his turn in
the Looks Dept and all they gave
him was a mouth like a monkeys
bum. Lets face it, fellow beautiful
people, nobody looks uglier than
Wayne Hussey. On good days he
resembles an unhappy walnut.
At other, sadder, more poignant
moments, Wayne stands accused
of indecent exposure every time
the wind blows his hair off his face.
The Mish are bland, loud,
as old and friendly as your
dad; and unable to count past
ve. Needless to say Tower Of
Strength is as pompous and facile
as everything else The Mission
have produced since having their
ngers prised away from Eldritchs
innitely more stylish skirts.
Mind you, Waynes tribe of blind
groupies will LUUURRRVE it.
Barbara Ellen

NME, 13 February 1988, p15

THE CURE
Hot Hot Hot
(Fiction)

Ye olde Smiths antics are

reminiscent in many ways to the
curious ramblings of Adam Ant.
He treads some desperate, lone
path through inspiration and mire
alike, but occasionally sticks his
head out of a pothole to proclaim
the discovery of gold. The dance
mix of Hot Hot Hot is spuriously
welcoming, but basically a

124

NME ORIGINALS

NME, 23 July 1988, p12

NME, 20 February 1988, p19

SISTERS OF MERCY

Eldritch and his reection essay

the bare bones of a furious,
curious passion. Torment, terror,
tears; black eyes, bruises, some
blood; reckless driving, one way
or another. Isnt it all about this?
Ill never stop listening.
Carmen Keats

Dominion
(WEA)

And from the eagle has landed

to the ego has landed and here
we go with Andrew Eldritch and
Patricia Morrison and The Sisters
Of Mercy, who are probably the
most enigmatic post-goth group
in Britain. Its not mere accident
that Eldritch has shifted his base
to Hamburg. Its a move that taps
into a vein so deep we could even
suggest that the thin white spook
is to contemporary pop what
Wagner was to the composers of
his day. Such a claim would at least
be within the same boundaries
of camp satire that it in and
out of the Floodlands LP and
indeed most of the Sisters work.
Throughout Dominion, Eldritchs
vocals and music roar with
enough condent pomp to silence
any critics whinge in seconds.
If Alvin Stardust had ever read
Byron then he would have cut it to
this day like the Sisters do.
James Brown
MM, 4 June 1988, p32

SISTERS OF MERCY
Lucretia, My Reflection
(WEA)

Like a shrouded owl and a tattered

pussycat sitting claw in paw in a
barge made of weeds, Andrew

ALL ABOUT EVE

Marthas Harbour
(Phonogram)

Dogshit. This drivel was done

better the rst time around, and
it wasnt worth listening to then
either. How a goth band can
become sentimental MOR is no
mystery; a rootless and brainless
music is bound to oat about like
a homeless leech until it nds
something to clamp onto. The
fraudulent fag-end of the hippy
era is therefore a perfect resting
place for the equally brainless All
About Eve.
David Quantick

MM, 11 June 1988, p32

NICK CAVE &

THE BAD SEEDS
The Mercy Seat
(Mute)

A timeless, watery swirl of organs,

a guitar chasing its own tail and
Nick Cave presenting us not
with a moral dilemma, but with
a moral maelstrom. The Mercy
Seat is the electric chair, and
Caves protagonist is caught in
that mortal coil that links the base
with God, by which spiralling logic
every condemned man is a martyr,
nailed up alongside Christ.
This song rotates in your head,
especially as it moves towards
its crescendo as the moment of
truth arrives, heralded by Blixa
Bargelds shock electric bolt of
guitar. This cyclical construction
is a masterstroke as Caves own
value-system is a circuit, without

NME, 23 July 1988, p12

SIOUXSIE &
THE BANSHEES
Peek-A-Boo
(Polydor)

Oriental marching band hip hop

with farting horns and catchy
accordion. If we were served by
a decent pop radio station, PeekA-Boo would be a huge hit. This
record was made by people with a
sense of humour. It was not made
by Goths: phew.
David Quantick

Chapter 11

DEREK RIDGERS

1989

Bad Medicine
By the end of 1987 The Cult had achieved enormous success but were on
the verge of splitting up. Two years on, they return with a new single,
Fire Woman, and a new album, Sonic Temple. Carol Clerk reports on
how Ian Astbury and co survived alcoholism and nervous breakdowns
and rediscovered rocknroll religion
MM, 18 March 1989, p28

1989

o you know the one about the bulls?

asked Billy Duffy, stretching out along
the sofa, cigarette hand trailing on the
carpet beside the ashtray.
The bulls?
There are two bulls sitting on top of a hill,
one old wizened bison and a young bull full
of exuberance. The young bull says, Lets run
down that hill and fuck a couple of those cows.
And the old bison says, Oh no, lets walk down
the hill and fuck all of them.
He smiled signicantly. The Cult, of course,
are the old wizened bison, walking down that
hill with a condence born of sometimes
bitter experience, sure at last of their place in
the present and future, proud to have learned
from the mistakes and traumatic upsets which
accompanied the international success of their
last album, Electric.
While the world may well assume that The
Cult have spent the last couple of years basking
in the glory of the sudden upturn in their
fortunes, soaking up the adulation of audiences
on the world tour that followed Electric, the
reality was rather different.
The gigs were great, by all accounts, but
The Cult, as individuals, were going right off
the rails. For the whole of 87 there were drink
problems, money matters, line-up difculties,
business worries and trouble with the police.
And there was a cloud around the whole sorry
set-up, an all-encompassing numbness induced
by tour-lag.
When they nally woke up sober in 1988, The
Cult were faced with a
damned ne mess to sort
out. That they did so to
their own satisfaction
and went on to record the
LP they describe as the
denitive Cult album is
the source of their newfound self-assurance.
We lost our virginity, announced Ian
Astbury. We really got broken. We got fucked by
an elephant. That 87 tour was like our exorcism.
If you can go through that and still be together
and strong as a group and as a songwriting team,
you can go through everything.

Sonic Temple, the album title, is intended to tell

us something about its entire musical content,
namely that The Cult have effected a marriage of
their two favourite qualities.
From their collaborations with Rick Rubin
on Electric, theyve adopted the policy that its
no sin for a rock band to be heard to be a rock
band. At the same time, theyve built on the bare
bones of Rubins direct approach, rediscovering
the idea of texture and layering, subtlety and yes,
even mysticism, things which date back to their
earlier Love era.
Sonic represents the blatant rock side and
Temple the more cerebral, spiritual overtones,
agreed Astbury.
Sonic Temple also stands for one of his wider
notions. It comes from the second line of one of
the tracks, Medicine Train. It goes, All red up,
a desolation angel shootin from the hip in the sonic
temple. I just had this vision in my minds eye
of the way, especially in the States, the venue has
become more like a temple.
I dont think a lot of young people have
got focused religious beliefs. A rock concert
is one place where people go to relate to other
people, to relate to a band. Its a kind of spiritual
experience. Were not setting ourselves up,
saying were some sort of deity to be revered.
But theres a certain point in the show where
everybody forgets, the rational barriers go down
and its total communication. That religious
aspect is there.
Its attering when people use me and The

tambourines, percussion and a bit of help on the

lyrical arrangements.
Steve Jones went to the States and people
said, What a sell-out, said Ian. They wanted
him to rot in England so they could pick pieces
off the corpse. Build em up and knock em
down. But why? Its kinda sad.
Britain has been something of a culture
shock for The Cult, who are horried anew by
its emphasis on all things hip, on its eagerness
to follow, its snobbery towards rock music, its
charts, its amorphous Euro-pop diarrhoea,
its cynicism and its old boy network the
Claptons, Collins, Dire Straits and Stings.
Its bringing out the worst in us already, said
Astbury. We come home and we slag things off
and people get really up in arms Youre bloody
living over there, and you come back here and
you slag it all off. Im just in a position to be able
to travel. One of my concerns is that the general
public of Britain do not get peeved at The Cult.
Im trying desperately hard to y the ag in the
States, defending British music.
All we did was go where we felt we could do
our thing, said Billy. Were the only ones that
are looking out for us. Its self-preservation.
The Cult are equally enamoured of New York,
immortalised on Sonic Temple with New York
City, brash and up-tempo as bets its subject.
This is one of Astburys more straightforward
documentaries, an account of his rst
memorable visit to the Apple.
It was incredible, he enthused. I was totally
abbergasted. I was an English kid, 22 years of
age, and I got out of the cab,
dumped my things at the
hotel, ran down the street
and banged into this guy
and knocked him ying. As I
helped him up, his sunglasses
fell off and it was Tony Curtis.
The rst American guy I met
in America, Tony Curtis, and
I knocked him ying.
I went into this delicatessen round the corner
and Alan Whicker was in there. I met several
celebrities in the rst 10 minutes.
There was nothing I could really focus on in
that town. I remember I got into a cab and the
fare was $3.75. I gave him four dollars. I said, Its
alright, dont worry about the change. He took
the quarter and threw it at me I dont need
your fucking charity, asshole. I didnt realise you
have to tip them well.
I remember seeing a New York cop with
a New York Yankees baseball cap on, with a
cigarette hanging out of his mouth, and his
police uniform on. I remember when I rst saw
the size of the buildings, Times Square
America, as the bands adopted home, is a
recurring theme in the lyrical content of the new
album. Sweet Soul Sister, a steady, insistent
headbanger laced with a mutation of the
Paranoid riff, explores the Americanisation of
the French in particular and Europe in general.
Its kinda strange, mused Astbury. We
gave America more kind of spiritual things like
depth, experience, culture. And theyre giving
back a hamburger. A hamburger, Guns NRoses,
Budweiser, American football, skateboards and
baseball caps turned backwards.

A rock concert is the place people go to

relate to other people. Its a kind of spiritual
experience. The rational barriers go down

TOM SHEEHAN

Jamie Stewart

, Duffy and Astbury wearing a

disconcerting amount of hair on his face were
in a suite at the Swiss Cottage Holiday Inn
discussing their latest recordings.
First release is the new single, the wild and
bouncy Fire Woman, which is the bearer of
all sorts of glad tidings, very typically The
Cult but, at the same time, a handsome stride
onwards from the deliberately simple aggression
of Electric. The Beggars Banquet press release
informs us that its all about Ians 67 crazed
rehorse lady. It is?
Its about my girlfriend and her ery spirit
and our relationship, he explained. 67 is when
she was born. Also, in the oriental Japanese/
Chinese astrological calendar, shes a horse.
Firehorse only comes up every 30 years or so,
and when it comes up, the orientals go and kill
all their children. There are a lot of abortions in
rehorse year. Its kinda weird

Cult as a backdrop for a lifestyle. I went through

a period when every experience I had each day
could be related to a Rolling Stones song. Thats
kinda cool for The Cult to become that now.
Its really exciting were in the situation to be
ambassadors.
I live my life and I have experiences and write
about them, not just boy-meets-girl but more
undened things that people dont talk about
every day sensitive, spiritual subjects. I see
sensitivity as a strength. Other people see it as
a weakness.
People are so much more concerned with
supercial values these days, rather than
experiencing life and talking about it and
sharing it. I like to conjure up images that
provoke people to use their imagination.

The band

are now based full-time in LA.

Despite their disregard for its superciality
Los Angeles could be put in a plastic bag
and taken away The Cult are inspired by its
cosmopolitan character, its relaxation, its openmindedness towards all forms of rock music.
They also enjoy the like-minded people
they meet there, people like Steve Jones, who
recently invited Astbury to be an odd-job man
on his new album, contributing harmonies,

NME ORIGINALS

127

Creepies From Crawley

NME, 8 APRIL 1989, P32

THE CULT
Sonic Temple
(Beggars Banquet)

Sonic temple: The

Cult as sensitive
all-seeing rock
legends. No,
Gods. Stairway To
Heaven without
a niff of devil
worship or hint of
demonic inspiration. But The
Cults triangle of souls Duffy, Astbury, Stewart
wouldnt illuminate Jimmy Pages left eye.
Sonic Temple is the way theyd like to see
themselves, but the music in reality is little
more than a pastiche. Still, Sonic Temple is a
noble attempt to pair the cerebral side of the
Love album, its feminine nature and haunting
spirituality, with the parched, eshless bones of
Electric. Like Mary Shelley theyre attempting
to recharge an emaciated corpse.
The spirited Fire Woman has already burnt
a hole in the Top 40, Astburys neighing vocals
calling out in tribute to his girlfriend, born in
the Chinese year of the rehorse. A love song
thats as aggressive as you can get before you
run towards the battered wives home.
American Horse is the nearest theyve
come to perfection since Sanctuary. The song
stands, slides and slithers to the conclusion
that the subtle, sensitive spirit which possesses
Astburys lyrics has to overspill into the music,
before the nectar can become as spellbinding
as this. The Cult at their most haunted.
On Edie (Ciao Baby), Astbury sings to
an angel with broken wings with a gothic
reverberance that carries her from freedom
to drug abuse without glorifying her selfdestructive traits. Its as fragile as life itself.
HM compromise leers through the lacy
underskirts of Sweet Soul Sister and reveals
a twisted version of the Paranoid riff. Its still
beautiful though. A spacey pulsing heartbeat
hangs on a single ethereal note, until pierced by
Duffys guitar and drawn out of its body like the
blood of a vampires victim. Perfect.
The focus of Sonic Temple is summed up
in a line from Medicine Train, with the image
of a worshipped artist performing in a venue,
a latter day temple: All red up, a desolation
angel shootin from the hip in the sonic temple.
In The Cults sonic temple they sing of angels,
Gods and re, purifying images of goodness.
All the little ol devils that inhabited Electric
have been exorcised. Now the only thing that
is haunting and holding them back is a lack of
self-condence in some of their older wisdoms.
Why continue plagiarising when they can do
so much better on their own?
Helen Mead

128

NME ORIGINALS

angel, but she gradually lost her power to y. She

lost her freedom through drugs and the abuse
and people using her like a fucking fashion
accessory. She fell from grace. She died.
I felt there was a parallel between her life and
my life. I was a victim. From the day I decided
I wanted to be a punk rocker until I got my
band together, I was having things consistently
thrown in my face. I was very self-destructive
cos I couldnt deal with rejection. I was nearly
murdered in Glasgow. Kids who decided to
dress and express themselves that way had a lot
of guts, cos they had to confront violence every
day. There were people always waiting outside of
concerts to beat other people up.

The Cult are watching the progress of British

artists in America and Yankee reaction to them.
In America, theyre mildly bemused by the
names that are springing forth out
of Britain into popular American
consciousness, said Billy Duffy.
The Pet Shop Boys, Rick
Astley, Samantha Fox and
these from the country that
produced the greatest
rock music ever.
And then youve
got bands who are
regarded as almost
gods in Britain,
said Ian. The
Sugarcubes, The
Mission, The Nephilim,
who come to LA and realise
theyre only starting off.
You get the feeling that
all of those bands think that
all theyve gotta do it is put a
record out and theyre gonna
be megastars in America,
said Duffy. And the reality
hits them like a ton of bricks. If
they had a struggle in Britain,
its 10-fold in America.
You have to go on the road,
said Ian. Weve been on the
road since 1984. Weve had
guns pointed at us, all the way
to playing Long Beach Arena in
front of 12,000 people.
Weve just got our foot in
the door, said Duffy. Its a big
mountain to climb, and were just beginning to
need oxygen at the moment.

I was a victim from the

day I became a punk

The bang on the door

was an interruption, a
hint, a nuisance.
Do you know, said
Jamie as we vacated the
suite, my dad was a violinist with the London
Symphony Orchestra? He played on a whole
series of Classic Rock albums, and the rst
one included Paint It Black and Whole Lotta
Love. At the time I was thrashing around in a
garage trying to be a punk rocker. I didnt have
the connection then. Punk rock was a rebellion
against everything including Led Zeppelin and
classical music. Now I can see the relevance of all
rock music, from when it started to now.

TOM SHEEHAN

When

Bon Jovi/Aerosmith engineer Bob

Rock was called in to produce the new Cult
album, his brief was to take a sonic photograph
of the group. And the photograph he took is
memorable for its lights, its shades, its colours
and its space, enough to accommodate Billy
Duffys increasingly accomplished guitar and
some occasionally extravagant arrangements.
Theres the dramatic sweep of the big slow
number, Edie, with its eight cellists; the
powerful, emphatic Soul Asylum, complete with
its shades of Kashmir.
Everything with that kind of excellent
drum sound and beat is going to be accused
of sounding like Led Zeppelin, huffed Duffy,
clearly anticipating the reference, but still not too
willing to like it.
The tempo was dictated by the way wed
already written the song, the chords
and the melody. Im perfectly
willing to defend it as long as
necessary. Is it in the same
key? No. Same chords?
Very few. The song itself
is so good that if its
gonna get compared to
one of Led Zeppelins
best tunes, I cant
really complain.
It was
completely
uncontrived,
added Astbury.
Its probably the
most romantic song
on the record, even
though we took the
opening line from a
piece in The Times. The
editor wrote this article
about the Stones when
they got arrested in
67. He was saying,
How dare the
establishment use
the Stones as the
focal point for the
drug problems of
the country? And
the headline was
Who Would Break
A Buttery On A
Wheel?
The conversation drifted
around fragile things which are
easily destroyed,
un-macho
things, spiritual
things, and rested
on the topic of the
vulnerable artist.
Its amazing how a lot of beautifully creative
people at some point confront the ak,
remarked Ian. A lot of them falter by the wayside
and die in really horrible circumstances, used up
and spat out so the machine can continue. Thats
what Edie is about and thats Edie Sedgwick,
the denitive poor little rich girl.
She was one of Andy Warhols things, and she
was a victim. She was extremely nave and she
went along with it. I perceived her as a desolation

1989

Y
E
ARS
N
E
T
INLIPSTICK
AND POWDER
NME, 8 April 1989, p15

he Spiderman is recounting
his favourite tale of horror
and woe. Its a long and strange
and infamous story, and I have heard it
many times before, but never like tonight, and
never from the Spiderman himself.
It begins in Blackpool three decades ago
and ends in Baker Street in three hours
time, and thats as much truth as you need
to know. A bizarre stew of lies and dreams,
and as compelling as hypnosis, it has the
most fantastic soundtrack you could want.
And the plot? Thats up to you.
Robert James Smith of The Cure stretches
his eight long great black arms around me and
we begin.
I wanted something like the really bad
Marvel characters with really stupid powers.
Like The Candy Striped Man, who could turn
everything into candy stripes.
Smith is describing The Spiderman and The
Spiderman is describing Smith. Both appear,
as monster and victim, in The Cures haunting
new single Lullaby. Whispered from the
depths of Smiths most tortured memories and
set in the heart of nightmare land, Lullaby,
like all The Cures best works, takes nervous

Lock up your lipstick, The Cure are back.

With a brilliant new single Lullaby and
an LP Disintegration to follow, theyre
on their best form in years. In James
Browns interview, Robert Smith reveals
why he sacked Lol and why The Cure will
never play live again after the next tour

DEREK RIDGERS

The Cure (l to r): Boris

Williams, Robert Smith,
Roger ODonnell, Porl
Thomson, Simon Gallup

tension and fear and dread and treats them to

a coat of musical nery. Cloaked in Eastern
string arrangements and rattlesnake percussion,
Lullaby will do for bedtime stories what Close
To Me did for furniture care. The creepies from
Crawley are well and truly back.

The 80s

have been a memorable lifetime for The

Cure, one of the few interesting bands to start
and nish the decade. Theyve had more line-up

changes than the England squad, but who hasnt?

The Banshees, The Fall and Joy Division/New
Order all have. And as our interview came to
an end Smith told me he had recently asked Lol
Tolhurst, the only other original Cure member
remaining, not to bother being involved any
more but more of that later. With the release of
Disintegration, their eleventh LP, next month,
youll discover that The Cure are being as regal
and chilling as ever.
NME ORIGINALS

129

Shambling Monster
Developing their ability to demolish peoples
expectations, The Cure have spent the last
decade changing from a dark and intense
underground band into a glam but imaginative
Top Of The Pops accessory. Their singles have
been as unpredictable as their LPs are solid, and
Smith himself has become the thinking mans
Sixth Formers crumpet.
Strangely this metamorphosis happened
while Britain experienced the biggest teeny-bop
explosion since the early 70s. The bands web of
success has spread throughout the world. There
have been over eight million
album sales, tours that have
stretched from Australasia to the
Middle East to South America
and back, and theres an evergrowing mass of US support that
was built almost entirely on the

popularity of the videos on the edgling MTV.

The United States have fallen for The Cure in
such a way that of the two million sales of their
last LP Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me, half of them
were American, and Spin magazine recently
included them twice in their Hundred Best
Singles of All Time.
We met a girl in America who was at college
doing her thesis on us, says Smith. She
did things like counted all the references to
drowning in our songs and said, Did you know
youve died 74 times in your songs?

Strangely Smith is just as likely to discuss the

end of The Cure as an actuality.
Each time I think its the last time well do
something its obviously closer to the last time I
will do something. Also things that bother me
seem to crystallise rather than go away.
I think Im back where I started from very
normal, he says. And thats why I think the
group will stop. This tour has become a huge
tour because I wanted to go to places like
Hungary and Bulgaria before we stop. I know
well never do another tour again, Im not even
sure if well play live again. If I
even leave it as an opening we
would turn into The Troggs.
I dont want to turn into a
shambling monster.
From an observers point of
view I can understand why this
will look like an end because
Im so intrinsically linked to The Cure, but in
real life Im not. I dont carry it round with me
during the months away. I dont think, Id better
get The Cure out of the cupboard itll be getting
lonely or rusty.
I resent people who have a patronising
attitude to their audience, keep feeding the same
old shit. I resent people you grow up admiring
who turn out to be the biggest tossers, like
David Bowie. I just wish hed been killed in a car
accident after hed nished Low. No, I shouldnt
say that about anyone.

I resent people you grew up admiring turning

out to be tossers like David Bowie. I just wish
hed been killed in a car accident after Low

Maybe Smith

Smith is jubilant as
he plays A Forest
on stage for the
14,763rd time

130N MN EM EO ROIRGIIGNIANLASL S
??

has a thing about motorway

fatalities: the day before we spoke he had told a
Japanese magazine that Lawrence Tolhurst had
died in a road accident. Robert Smith has never
been one to worry about changing his line-up
but he had also been heard to say that without
Lawrence The Cure wouldnt be The Cure.
Obviously it came as a shock all round when
Smith told the one musician that had stood by
him all the way that it was time to sling his hook.
His position as the victim had become
ludicrous, confesses Smith. He had always
been the safety valve of the group, whenever rows
broke out wed pick on Lol, but it had become
really depressing that the focal point had become
this constant harassment.
I said to him at the start of the recording
that if he didnt assert himself and get involved
then there was no way I could carry on seeing
everyone using him. Also, he was drinking
so much, he was the only one who couldnt
moderate it to any degree. He was out of step
with everything. It had just become detrimental
to everything wed do.
I dont know if youd call it amicable. I think
he was shocked by it, everyone was shocked
that I actually meant it. When we go away hes
not coming with us because its just become so
predictable and detrimental. It would be stupid
to be all jokey two minutes before going on stage
and then go on and try to manufacture that kind
of emotion.
It will be a different tour, more draining
I should think. Therell probably be a lot of
rowing going on; Im looking forward to it. Hell
probably be back by Christmas. Hes getting
married, maybe thats his comeback. I dont
know what hes doing now hes gone all quiet.

1989

Smiths relationship

with his wife Mary is clearly

the most important thing in his life. No matter
how diverse a topic it might be, be it Hendrix,
or Rushdie, or JD Salinger or Midweek Sports
Special, Smith inevitably steers the conversation
around to his marriage.
No one knew the venue, he tells me of his
wedding in a Benedictine monastery. Everyone
had to get on a coach and be taken there in
secret. Some people thought wed gone a bit over
the top but the wedding had nothing to do with
the group and I wanted it emphasised that it was
just about me and Mary. If just one journalist or
one bunch of fans had been there it would have
ruined it for both of us and both sets of parents.
Unsurprisingly, when the wedding photos
were released The Cure looked like Honey
Monsters in suits all collars, creases and
enormous white training shoes.
We had to wait until marriage wouldnt
change anything before we would wed. It was an
old-fashioned romantic thing really. Id always
promised Mary that one day wed get married
properly. She hasnt changed her name and we
dont intend to have
any children, in fact
I often still think of
her as my girlfriend
rather than wife.
The choice
about children, he
continues, is more
up to the girl, I think. Im glad we havent had
children. I couldnt face up to the responsibility.
You lose that freedom of being able to say,
Cmon, were going away for a week tomorrow.
You cant even do that with a pet. Its hard
enough having to think about two people, never
mind three. The songs are my children and the
group are my pets.

but before then? From high-waisters to

jumpsuits to lipsticks to kimonos,
Leigh Bowery must have been groaning
with jealousy.
Today, with his hair teased vertically and
scrawled lipstick, the man has a settled and
identiable image. Stability within insanity,
if such is possible. And the appeal of The
Cure is balanced between their musical
originality and Smiths mystique. Initially
inspired, according to one of the old press
releases, by punk and Penguin Modern
Classics Smith created a sort of English
Literature for Music Lovers and has never
looked back. Nowadays he has few worries
about the role of his band.
The group is there to escape the
oppressiveness, its a way of screaming,
he says. The reason we formed the group
wasnt for all those usual reasons like being
bored. It was so we didnt have to get up at
nine in the morning. So we didnt have to
work for other people. Whereas now I try
hard for The Cure never to be seen to be
involved with banality.
I dont give a shit if Bros sell 20 million
LPs next year; I know that I wont be buying
them so why should I care? I dont really
listen to us, I nd it too difcult. Im still inside
Disintegration. There are songs that I really like
by the group, but its like a diary. It makes me
upset to think its gone.
Despite seeing The Cure as part of the
coloured zone where people go to escape,
Smith has regularly used the group to help raise
money for political and socially concerned
organisations but has never attempted to fuse the
two creatively. The band have performed benets
for Greenpeace, mental health, victimised
homosexuals and CND, yet such causes have
never screamed from the lyric sheets of their LPs.
I like music that has a lack of reality to
its musical content, he admits. The Cures
music doesnt reect the material world in a
very obvious way, which I think is its strength.
I almost feel embarrassed by music that has a
social and political edge because it always seems
so diluted that its utterly pointless.
I suppose it is of some worth if you decided a
certain percentage of your audience are complete
morons and they need to be told certain
elementary things about the world. I dont really
meet that many
people that I could
illuminate on certain
key issues. Ive never
been in touch with
a lot of the normal
world.
I still know a lot
of the people I used to know before The Cure and
theyre doctors and bank ofcials and they like
Dire Straits and I think they feel sorry for me.

STEPHEN SWEET/DEREK RIDGERS

The group is there to escape

the oppressiveness so we dont
have to work for other people

Smith was

born in Blackpool, which explains the

more recent lust for day-glo glamour and tack,

Even though

hes about to roll The Cure out

around the world Going to Budapest might
be a really liberating event Smith discusses
it with a nality. He is also currently pondering
what to do with the solo LP he has recorded,
ready to release.
Each time I do another LP I wonder

MM, 6 May 1989, p34

THE CURE
Disintegration
(Fiction)

Robert Smith
reckons
Disintegration
isnt a miserable
record at all.
Right. Meanwhile
Van Gogh says
Starry Night was
a cartoon, Francis Bacon claims hes a disco
king and Joan of Arc announces she was only
cutting down on heating costs.
Disintegration is about as much fun as
losing a limb. How can a group this distressing
and disturbing be so popular? Surely its not
allowed! Lullaby is much too intricate and
interesting to loll about in the Top Five. Yet
there it is. Inexplicable. Roberts not that
steamily erotic, is he? Is he? Oh.
Youll be lucky to nd a tune on here. Or a
gag. But when you think about it, that last one,
that one about snogging, that was bloody long
and mostly forlorn too. The Cure have almost
invisibly stopped making pop records. This is
exactly what Smith denies it is a return to the
bleak inner landscapes of Pornography and
Faith. The rst line? I think its dark and looks
like rain. The last line? Ill never lose this pain.
Here comes summer.
The words which lumber to mind as you hear
The Cure bottling out of topping themselves
are all the words now devalued and used only
to mock goths: doom, gloom, barren, despair.
Its an utter refusal to ght, to take the bull by
the horns. They have nothing to say except:
please help me I dont understand a thing
about the world oh actually its not important
dont trouble yourself go back to sleep.
Most of the tracks oat sorrowfully into
each other. Pictures Of You is as jaunty as
it ever gets, Prayers For Rain as aggressive,
the title track as witty. Listless rhythms and
rhymes abound, glissando guitars whisper,
Robert mumbles and wonders whether he can
be bothered to plead. The closer, Untitled,
decides: And now the time has gone, another
time undone/Hopelessly ghting the devil
futility/Feeling the monster climb deeper inside
of me gnawing my heart away Pluck it out
boy! Smith mopes. Hell never send a letterbomb when his wounds are easier to lick than
an envelope. Hes a touchstone for millions.
Its decent of him to share all this with us.
Its challenging and claustrophobic, often
poignant, often tedious. Its nearly surprising.
Youve heard of the cowardly lion. Meet the
hesitant dinosaurs.
Chris Roberts
NME ORIGINALS

131

whether its worth releasing it

because I could just do it at home
and keep it for myself. I have the
tapes of the material I was going
to do as a solo record that Ive had
for two and a half years now. It
becomes more and more ridiculous
as to why I should go out and do it
for other people to listen to.
Mind you, when I am singing
in my own studio I invent people
listening, an audience.
Theyre not a set list of
characters some of them are
real and when Im singing
I have them in mind.
For certain types of
song I always have
the same person
in mind.

always nd out what they think and quite often

they dont like the songs.

A solitary

character who claims to have made

few real friends since hes been in the band,
Robert Smiths past slide into alcohol-orientated
decadence has been well charted. His Im
almost an alcoholic now. I havent had one
night this year when I havent been drunk
has become legendary. Describing that time as
hollow and unmemorable, Smith still drinks
but his excesses are kept more normal now.
More celebratory than a lifestyle.
I wanted to get away from myself as this
morose and deeply tortured person, I found that
really stressful. I was never really very bothered
with that image. Whats frightening is that I nd
it so unimportant and yet people are writing
virtual suicide notes to me. Thats something
Ive never been able to grasp and I think it would

I wanted to get away from myself as

a morose and deeply tortured person
I know that
they eventually
listen to the
records, but
they dont know
Im thinking about
them listening to it
when Im recording it. I

have upset me if I had come to terms with it.

I think a lot of people around me at the time
of Pornography seemed to enjoy seeing me in
that state. Its so much easier and more enjoyable
now than it was ve years ago. I know now that
I could turn round and tell them all to fuck off.
I could do that before but I used to worry about
what wed do next.

If youre

going to be a pop star and wear lipstick

and tarantula crops then its important for the
public image to be seen to be deep, mystical
and attractive. Whether or not he will admit to
having cultivated The Robert Smith Persona
and all the deadly nightshade, suicide notes and
buttery wings that go with it, that image is there
and Robert Smith of The Cure appears to now
cope with it very well.
Detached but addicted, becoming more
sponge-like as I grow older, hes just as ready to
live within a warm and stable set-up as he used
to be ready to live within a wine bottle.
For the future, Robert Smith suggests, like
every other bored musician, that lm scores
might lie ahead. More interestingly he also
claims he would like to divorce himself from
music and go and work in a mental hospital.
For the moment he sees no new bands
jamming a spur up his backside, attempting to
replace The Cure. This he nds both remarkable
and disappointing.
My stuff has always come from lack of faith
in anything, he reckons, yet he takes pleasure
in cooking, the works of Denton Welsh and
Dylan Thomas and his ever-increasing catalogue
of old records.
Is it really possible to be both a pop star and
normal? Or do we have to presume a basic lack
of sanity is required for both?
Robert Smith of The Cure one of the few
remaining everyday nutters capable of crooning
a decent tune.

MM, 19 August 1989, p15

AndThe Ass
SawThe Angel

132

NME ORIGINALS

out. Eucrow survives

to tell us the tale
of the swamp, a
dark and menacing
parable that screams
from the page. Caves
anti-hero believes in
angels but his soul
is one big fuckin
black twisty knot
planted in the backest
backwoods. He lies
on his deathbed and documents
the grim atrocities of his life with an
unfailing eye. Every last abominable
act is recorded, and relished.
Cave is no Cormac McCarthy, but
his pose has a raw-boned quality
to it thats surprisingly effective.

Could you sign it:

To Yummy Bunnikins,
love from Nicky-Poo?
Er, its for my sister

His characters are vile and

misshapen. They cannot
win our sympathy. Yet,
somehow, one suspects that
compassion lurks among
these grim phantoms. And
The Ass returns to haunt
his most remarkable album, 1985s
The Firstborn Is Dead. Theres a
similar sense of desolation, and,
like the album, at times it gets so
insufferable you want to howl with
laughter. Then, all of a sudden,
you are drawn back to the awful

spectacle and, once again this

becomes a disturbing experience
Once more, it seems Cave has
taken his obsessions as far as they
will go. This reads like four years
of madness. Every last thought is
thrown down to shrivel and perish.
Caves dissenters will dismiss it as a
grand folly. But if you take a morose
pleasure in seeing this edge-ofthe-frame man scribbling his own
prescription for the blues, youll nd
some delight in here somewhere.
Jonh Wilde

DEREK RIDGERS/ STEVE DOUBLE

nd The Ass Saw The Angel,

Nick Caves debut novel, has
consumed a large part of his
last four years. He drags us feet-rst
into a dimly-lit ghost town in the
American South, territory previously
excavated by William Faulkner,
Cormac McCarthy and Flannery
OConnor. Here, amid the festering
swamps, grim phantoms and rolling
thunder, we nd Euchrid Eucrow
relating his tale of murder, incest,
betrayal, vengeance and love in
stark jumbled burst of recall.
At the beginning we nd Eucrow
being ripped from his mothers
womb with a broken liquor bottle,
watching his twin brother die. His
brother is the lucky one, as it turns

1989

All About Eve:

tra-la-la and
fol-de-rol

MM, 21 October 1989, p38

ALL ABOUT EVE

Scarlet And Other Stories

TOM SHEEHAN/DEREK RIDGERS

(Mercury)

Twelve months ago All About

Eve seemed happy to travel the
hippy road to salvation, but
theyve consulted the map since
then and aborted the journey.
Its almost impossible
to dream your way
out of trouble these
days and Juliannes
discovered that the
twin foundations of the
Aquarian ethic mindexpanding drugs
and the rural retreat
from Mammon are
hopelessly nostalgic means
to a peaceful end.
In recording this album, All
About Eve found they had no way
forward and no way back. The Kate
Greenaway/Laura Ashley idyll they
seemed to inhabit is ravaged during
Tuesdays Child, which reveals the
darker side of nursery rhymes and
the hidden threat of fairy tales.
Julianne appears to have found
the notion of maturity as fallible
as retracing the umbilical cord,
and the sprightly More Than The
Blues concludes: Are we getting
wiser/Or just getting older/ When we
know the shoulder/Wed most like
to cry on. Love offers little hope
the gorgeously tender rock ballad
December pictures a woman

romancing her
memories but cant
bring itself to chide
her as so many people
end up alone.
Scarlet declares
with poignant
purity that lust is an
unsatisfying exercise
in self-deception while
Hard Spaniard is an embarrassingly
frank catalogue of the events
that befall a girl so desperate for
company she submits to the abuse
of the one-night-stand.
Musically, though, the band are
content to rummage among the
roots of rock. Scarlet sounds
standard, gently melancholy and
occasionally twee
(theres a cute ddle folde-rol in More Than The
Blues) when its really
a very harsh album
indeed. Its ironic that
their coltish beauty
betrays their darker,
deeper intent.
Steve Sutherland

MM, 11 November 1989, p40

THE CREATURES
Boomerang
(Polydor)

When an established group takes

time off for extra-curricular
activity, its usually an attempt
to ee the creative inertia that
sets in mid-career. So when
Siouxsie and Budgie chose to
revive an earlier alter ego/escape
route, The Creatures, you could
be forgiven for taking it as a
sign that the Banshees had
succumbed to an irreversible
enervation. But listening to
Boomerang, my yawn turned
quickly to a jaw dropping in
astonishment.
This is Siouxsies
most inventive and
invigorated music
since A Kiss In The
Dreamhouse.
Whats interesting
about Boomerang
is how Siouxsie has
incorporated her

new holistic, health-conscious,

gyn-ecological concerns within
her established, predatory persona.
Standing There is a feminist
tirade against the ghoulish males
who voyeuristically revel in the
carnage of the bullght; Budgies
stampeding rhythms gloss over
some rather ungainly phrased
polemic (How funny to see/How
path-et-ic/Some grown men/Can
be). Fruitman tries to imagine a
nurturing, kindly, Green-ngered
masculinity thats in touch with
the rhythms of natures ticking.
Even Pluto Drive conceals, within
its asteroid-funk swirl and images
of oceans of methane and petried
grass, a distinctly Green sentiment
(Pluto is an unleaded dream).
Musically, Budgie is the star.
Manchild has Siouxsies voice
swooping through canopies of
chimes and tintinnabulation. You
churns and seethes like the lowriding funk undercarriage of Pull
Up To The Bumper, and Pity
even sees Budgie reinventing the
Jamaican steel drums.
But sometimes the duo veer
dangerously close to camp. I can
do without the Porgy And Bess
pastiche of Killing Time and
Willow. But happily, Boomerang
ends with two songs as lulling
and lovely as Pity. Venus Sands
describes itself perfectly, Siouxsies
voice abandoned and unhinged in
vast empty space. And Morrina is a
shimmering carpet of dew, a Milky
Way awning for Siouxsies reveries.
Its the most serene shes ever
sounded.
Boomerang abounds with
scarcely anticipated brilliance.
Simon Reynolds

Siouxsie and
Budgie:
gyn-ecologists
NME ORIGINALS

133

Merrie England

THE CULT
Fire Woman
(Beggars Banquet)

Ian Astbury reckons that Fire

Woman is about his 67 crazed
rehorse lady. Just what the fuck
that means is anybodys guess,
but there are references to

his lil honey, his lil sister, his lil

baby and a cat on a hot tin shack.
Take your pick. The words are
howled, growled and barked,
each gullible syllable given the full
wolverine works; the beat is bullheaded and Billy Duffys guitar
playing is typically opulent if not
intricate, ever on the brink of FXexaggerated extravagances.
Despite being The Cults
rst release for 18 months,
Fire Woman does not mark
anything of a departure in
approach or execution and it
slips neatly into the pattern
initiated with the Love LP. The
fact that the producer, Bob
Rock, has previously
worked with Aerosmith
and Bon Jovi is the
best indication of their
overriding caution, but this,
however, is not to suggest that
it lacks numerous strengths. Its
certainly their nest effort since
She Sells Sanctuary.
Its also worth noting that while
Automatic Blues, the seven-inch
B-side, sounds exactly like Led
Zeps archaic interpretation of
the blues, Messing The Blues,
the additional track on the
12-inch, is somewhat
refreshing. The music
is entirely acoustic
double bass, slide
guitar, harmonica
and the swipe of
brushes against the
snare and Chuck
Berry, Bo Diddley,
Big Joe Turner
and even Billy
Idol are given
supposedly
improvised
namechecks.
If theyd been
so bold as to
select this song
for the A-side,
theyd have
made Single
Of The Week.
Of course
Im lying.
Push

NME, 15 April 1989, 19

THE CURE
Lullaby
(Fiction)

BE: At the rst play of Lullaby

Guys suspicion visibly withers.
Its a terric single. Sexy, scary,
fascinating, murky and just casual
enough to enjoy its own sense of
ridiculousness. Is Guy a Love-Cat?
GC: When they rst started
they were my favourite group.
Ive always like The Cure, Ive
always like the idea of them. And
listening to Lullaby is brilliant.
The strings are exquisite. Just
beautiful. Utterly beautiful.
Success has affected their music in
the best possible way
Barbara Ellen & Guy Chadwick
(The House Of Love)

NME, 1 July 1989, p10

THE CULT
Edie (Ciao Baby)
(Beggars Banquet)

BE: First it was American Indians,

then Led Zep, now Ian Astbury
has read a Ladybird book on Edie
Sedgwick and this bless him is
the surprisingly tender result.
MMc: Its an amalgam of

MM, 9 December 1989, p32

ALL ABOUT EVE

December
(Mercury)

Cast splendidly adrift in their

ambivalent emotional hayloft, the
Eves, abrim with mordant passion,
ridicule all other festive lth, and,
as usual, the listener immediately
feels at home in the song, even
if miffed by the dcor, knowing
the video has to be a treat. Andy
in the workhouse, hanging up his
stocking, Mark in the outhouse
(luxury), kissing Santa under
the mistletoe, Julianne beaming
inside her speeding sleigh, and
the wretched Tiny Tim, getting
it all horribly wrong, earnestly
setting off to complete his boba-job errands.
Remem-BURR, DecemBURR. A brilliant, almost oash
chorus, owers on Juliannes
strident trellis-work, deep bass
thumbprints abound on the
crisp drum slabs, and the song
ends abruptly after the sort of
gratuitously violent guitar solo
youd expect from a man who
habitually crosses the Astoria
threshold, accompanied by an
18-stone friend, specically to
make rude remarks to security
staff. Rude, Tim?? He has to go
confessional after reading one
page of Viz.
Merrie England everybody!
Mick Mercer

TOM SHEEHAN

MM, 18 March 1989, p32

everything else Ive heard in this

genre of music over the past 15
years so Im afraid I dont quite
understand it. The Cult have
never been dangerous enough to
cross my path, except I remember
once when I was compering The
Tube and they were desperately
pleading for wine back at the
hotel. I thought it was odd how
such big, blustering rocknrollers
should want wine. How poetic as
is, I suppose, this idea of writing a
song about Edie, whose entire life
was a romantic tragedy.
Barbara Ellen & Malcolm McLaren

Chapter 12

DEREK RIDGERS

1990-92

Love Missiles

NME, 3 February 1990, p31

THE MISSION
Carved In Sand
(Phonogram )

136

NME ORIGINALS

Tony James and

Andrew Eldritch:
21st Century boys

Sister Sputnik
MM, 3 February 1990, p3

he Sisters Of Mercy have recruited a new bass

player: Sigue Sigue Sputniks Tony James.
And the announcement of a full Sisters
line-up has fuelled speculation this week
that a long-awaited tour may be in the ofng.
The surprise news came in a statement from the
Sisters management. It stated simply: Andreas
Bruhn has joined The Sisters Of Mercy. Andreas
Bruhn plays electric
guitar. Tony James has
joined The Sisters Of
Mercy. Tony James
plays bass guitar.
Any further enquiries
were met with a tightlipped silence, and no one
will discuss bass player
Patricia Morrisons role within the new band.
Extraordinary though the collaboration
between Andrew Eldritch and Tony James may
appear, the pair have been friends for a long time
and Eldritch was once asked to front Sigue Sigue
Sputnik. They are now believed to be in Norway
working on material for the next Sisters LP.
Ever since the success of This Corrosion, the

Sisters record company, WEA, have been trying to

persuade the band to tour. Eldritch has consistently
refused, with the excuse that too much touring is
bad for your health! There have been no live dates
since the original Sisters line-up split, leaving
Eldritch and Morrison as the nucleus of the band.
Eldritch spent most of last year writing material
in Hamburg and The Only Ones John Perry played
guitar on the demos.
The recruitment
of Tony James would
apparently spell the
end of Sigue Sigue
Sputnik, although their
spokesperson this week
responded with a curt,
No comment.
Except for Ray Matthews recent appearance in
the national press, where he complained of being
broke and working on a building site, the rest of
Sigue Sigue Sputnik have been lying low lately.
Vocalist Martin Degville said this week: Ive
been so busy on a solo project that I cannot
comment on Tony James latest activities.
Watch this space

Eldritch has consistently

refused to tour, with the excuse
that its bad for his health

STEVE DOUBLE

Carved In Sand
catches The Mish
on the crest of
another wave
of phenomenal
ordinariness.
Hung with all the
usual accessories
junk shop
mysticism, Sesame Street metaphor and
nger-dancing chintziness this ten-strong
mountain-mover is a prime cut indeed.
For all the glib criticism ung gaily (and
daily) at The Mish, their noise remains both
graceful and rugged; a well-worn, in-bred
hybrid of pomp rock and Avalon nursery
rhyme. Divorced from Husseys parabolic
prose, yer average Mish song has a tea-andslippers familiarity to it.
Buttery On A Wheel is a superior love
song true, its title is nicked from an old
editorial in The Times, and yes, the idea of
love being as fragile as a buttery wing is
nothing if not shite but Wayne sings it
with such an uninching honesty only a
professional whinge merchant could fail to
be touched by it.
Elsewhere, Grapes Of Wrath pushes its
luck a bit, with its lyric about toiling on the
land and reaping the harvest, but a modest
pearl like Sea Of Love ultimately wins you
over with its beautiful Dear Prudence guitar
upholstery. Deliverance is the albums
obvious keystone a purpose-built epic that
starts like a John Carpenter soundtrack and
ends up delivering the stuff that nationwide Mish-understanding is based on: Give
me/Give me/ Give me/Deliverance.
But Amelia ought to make even the most
ardent Mish-t choke. Attacking the delicate
subject of child abuse with a mallet, Wayne
sings, quite clearly, Daddy says come and sit
on my knee/Daddy loves his little girl. Now
it is obviously a passionate diatribe against
Daddy, but it is also the most ham-sted
attempt at writing a wrong Ive ever heard.
Stick to the farmyard noises in future. The
nal track, Lovely, is an acoustic ramble
recorded in a eld (true!) in which we learn
that Wayne believes in colours, sunshine,
laughter, crying, magic and dreams.
Thats more like it!
Carved In Sand then, is a vast oasis
with a little desert in the middle of it, if
youll forgive the duff metaphor. And
if youre a top Mish fan, you will.
Andrew Collins

1990-1992

NME, 14 April 1990, p33

NICK CAVE AND

THE BAD SEEDS
The Good Son

STEVE DOUBLE/CHRISTINA BIRRER

(Mute)

So this is the new, narcotic-free

Nick Cave. Novelist, poet, lm
star, all cleaned up
with somewhere to
go. In a sense, this is
his very own tribute
album, a nod and a
wink towards that
great chemical dump
in the sky. Where
Hendrix and Joplin
so miserably failed,
Cave somehow
succeeded, although The Good
Son is predictably devoid of selfcongratulatory adulation.
This is where Cave anoints the
sleeve, glaring at a grand piano with
an audience of four enraptured
young girls in a perverse translation
of the Abbey National advert. This
is where the Bad Seeds succumb
to strings and Caves desire for
tradition over idiosyncratic
experimentation. And where
Kicking Against The Pricks was
a timeless covers paradise, this is
where Cave turns the tables and
creates his own potential hand-medown classics.
In Lament, he has created quite
possibly the nest pop song of
the year, wherein false
jaunts swing into a quite
gorgeous chorus: So
dry your eyes/And
turn your head
away, croons Cave,
wandering over
Scott Walkers
memory and
losing himself
in his own
massive,
magnicent
melody. The Ship
Song is similarly
dramatic, one breath away
from being overblown.
Cave, unembarrassed by his
frankness, is oating proudly on
the swelling sophistication.
And tragedy taints every
tear: the family-aimed fury of
the title track is wracked and
sneering; The Weeping
Song is noise torture, an
unforced document
of a dispirited
community;
while The
Hammer

Song allows the Seeds

a rare opportunity
to let loose, Cave
sprawled across distant
twangs while discord
takes a hair-raising hold.
The orchestration is
lush and the songs are
immaculately crafted.
There is hardly a single
bow tie askew throughout the entire
performance. And yes, The Good
Son does threaten self-parody, but
if this is showbiz, Cave is still lurking
in the shadowlands.
Its still more gritty than glitzy
smooth surfaces have a sandpaper
underlay. And the likes of Lucy are
too oored by honesty to fall victim
to contrived campness.
Memories fade, but Caves scars
still linger. Rest (un)easy the good
son is still the black sheep.
Simon Williams

NME, 15 September 1990, p39

THE COCTEAU
TWINS
Heaven Or Las Vegas
(4AD)
Lets get one thing straight.
I am not a fan of The
Cocteau Twins. Music
can be a passionate,
terrifying, mysterious
thing and still feel
cold to the touch but
The Cocteau Twins
have always struck
me as being the very
antithesis of musical
truehearts. Like vinyl
Marie Antoinettes, they have
spent their entire career believing
rather stupidly that your sweet
tooth houses your entire digestive
system and that the fat, squashy
cakes they bake, avoured with rich,
dark chocolate to hide the taste
of bromide, are enough to keep
you going.
Furthermore, after
trivialising lifes absolutes
pain, fear, the death of love
into sprays of Frazers
hieroglyphic warblebaubles, the Twins next
step is always to stand
back from the pretty
wreckage, refusing to
clear up or explain the
mess theyve made.
Our minds are supposed
to do all the talking,
and while it is right and
good that music should be
left open to interpretation, lets
not fool ourselves that anything
other than our own sense of
melodramatic self-importance
is connecting with the selfimportant melodrama in them.
Worse, its all quite
intentional. Exactly the
opposite of their
affectedly queer,
ethereal media
image, The
Cocteau Twins
Liz Frazer:
hieroglyphic
are actually
warble-baubles

Nick Cave:
still the
black sheep

experimentally minded pop

scientists who make white mice
of their listeners, forcing them
into The Subjective
Corner when
communication, not
inscrutability, has
always been the axis
for true genius.
I cannot be so
presumptuous as to
tell you what Heaven
Or Las Vegas is like,
but I can tell you what
I think. Denitely their best since
Treasure, occasionally a hairy
(outsiders?) st does try to thump
long-overdue clarity into the lyrics.
But these moments are few and
far between the rest is standard
Cocteaus fare. Giant steps forward,
fairy steps back, cruelty and passion
homogenised for consumption
inside plastic bubble psyches, and
of course, Frazer dribbling party
streamers, fog and razor-blades
out of her ever-versatile facial
orice. The title track, Cherry
Coloured Funk, Frou Frou Foxes
In The Midsummer Fires and the
single Iceblink Luck benet hugely
from having rock hearts with pop
arteries, and Heaven Or Las Vegas
is a beautiful sounding album. But
its spoilt for me by what I interpret
as a stench of pomp and dishonesty.
So, listen and enjoy by all means,
but play the naughty twins at their
own game. Remain detached, do
not be duped into believing their
music means anything. At the end of
the day The Cocteau Twins are little
more than cold-eyed midwives who
make music for people who wish
theyd never been born.
This mortal coil is not a cosmic
contraceptive device. It is life itself.
When The Cocteau Twins realise
this, they will scream their rst
honest breath. Then the birth rate
for which some already hold them
partly responsible will really soar.
Barbara Ellen
NME ORIGINALS

137

Southern DeAth
Existential
Elvis Cult

he Sisters Of Mercy, Mark Three I guess,

are back, and facing up to reality like
goth always did. The highly confusing
new line-up is Andrew Eldritch, Tony
James (formerly of Generation X and Sigue
Sigue Sputnik), Tim Bricheno (formerly of All
About Eve), and Andreas Bruhn. Theres a new
single called More, co-written by Eldritch and
Jim Steinman, and an imminent album, Vision
Thing. And a tour. The previous ones have been
legendary; one recalls the farewell fog-fest at
the Royal Albert Hall in 1985. And anyone that
covers Hot Chocolates Emma deadpan is cool
as fuck, lets face it.
The records are pretty much what youd
expect, More being a shameless rewrite of
Bowies Cat People, and the album setting
streets of suitably dark and decadent imagery
to every Bowie/Iggy trick in the book.
The Sisters vinyl return is not bad at all in
fact its probably about one-twentieth as good
as Eldritch thinks it is.

His attitudes

and motives are wholly

commendable. Eldritch plays The Star from
dusk to dawn. To interview hes a dream smart,
wry, laconic, erudite, deluded but not deluded,
and just a little bit nasty. He may, however, have
underestimated popular antipathy towards his
new collaborator Mr James. To most, hes that
bloke from the Sputniks who hung out with
Janet Street-Porter.
Its difcult to picture Tony James ascending
enigmatically on a black cloud above Hades,
a veritable horseman of the apocalypse. The
forthcoming shows will require large quantities
of dry ice to make that one wash enough
smoke to hide the portable phone, anyway.
As if to hang himself, Tony James starts on at
me about my review of the last Sputnik album,
tells me Martin Degville is after my blood, all
that sort of stuff. I gaze at him in disbelief how
could any grown man defend that tosh? so
after a 20-minute lecture on the life-afrming

merits of Sigue Sigue (the rst to do this, the

rst to do that, we invented sampling, Prince
said hello to me), he comes round to today.
I tell him I came here as a Sisters person.
I thought that was the game. He agrees to
agree. He reckons the difference between him
and Eldritch is that he reads GQ magazine and
Eldritch doesnt, though they both respect
the erotic potential of gas masks. James guest list
for the Wembley show was so big that another
night was added. This may or may not be a joke.
Tony is actually quite funny. He makes us all
laugh. I just worry that laughing is not entirely
what The Sisters Of Mercy are all about.
What do I do in this band?
James asks. Im in charge of
going out. You see, you can
have the misery and the
pain thats him and the
fun too. Thats my side;
the two co-exist. Weve
known each other years.
It can work.

1959 (a vintage year) and adores cats, women,

drugs, and old Bowie records, we get along like a
fairly warm house. After a few minutes he even
takes his shades off.
Eldo is fantastically, magnicently, withered,
and talks like Michael Caine. So, wheres he been
since the Floodland album?
Hamburg. I like the people. I like the
cigarette machines that work. Where I live
everythings open all night, but not dangerously
so, just civilised. With a little bit of an edge.
Would you get bored if there wasnt an edge?
Yeah, I would. I couldnt live in Holland or
Sweden or any of those places where everybodys

Tim Bricheno reckons he

was always leaning towards
the rockier side of All About
Eve, used to be a Sisters fan,
and never dreamed Id end
up being one of them. Tim
is sweet and ingenuous. Or
maybe hes just as jet-lagged
as everyone else, their plane
back from an LA video
shoot for More having
landed this same day.
Eldritch doesnt know the
meaning of fatigue. Or
rather he possesses such
an abundance of willpower
that he can conquer it with
ease. He soon relaxes his
innate superiority complex.
As the man was born in

EXCESS ALL
Its been two years since Floodland reinstated Eldritch
as the Godfather of Goth. Now hes back with a new
single, a new band and a new album. Chris Roberts
discovers why hes the last great rocknroll star
MM, 6 October 1990, p32

138

NME ORIGINALS

1990-1992
sensible and knows what theyre doing.
What preoccupies you?
Same as everybody else really. Women.
Drugs. Newspapers. My attitudes have shifted
a little. Im drinking again now. I spent a long
time not drinking as a reaction. By the time we
nished touring last time I was doing almost a
litre of gin a day. Im keeping an eye on it this
time cos alcohols not very good for me. It doesnt
turn me into a better person; it just makes me fall
asleep in public more. Or fall over.

Are you giving the punters what they want?

Oh, I hadnt really thought about that. Ive
Sisters Mark Three:
(l to r) Tony James,
Andreas Bruhn,
Andrew Eldritch,
Tim Bricheno

always taken the view that what I want to give

them is what they need. What they want is
neither here nor there. I know whats best. Thats
my job. And my brief. To do what I want.
Is that the role of the rock star?
Its the role of a great one. Thats not to say
that anybody that does it is great.
Do you set out to enlighten, or pervert?
Ive never taken the view that any form of
art is really to tell anybody anything they didnt
know. Particularly in a medium as wonderfully
ludicrous as rocknroll, I dont think you can
convince anybody of anything they didnt think
or know already.

When did you rst think it was ludicrous?

When they rst put me at the front. When
I was the drummer I thought, This is all
right. And then I found myself at the front,
probably because I was one of the worlds worst
drummers, and I thought, Oh dear, this is
pretty uncool. And, er, its still pretty uncool.
You seem to have taken to it like a duck to
water.
No, it terries me. And the more people turn
up the more terried I get. I still go out there
terried. And preferably out of my skull.
But you seem immobile in your calm.
Its like a rabbit in the headlights. Well

Last time we toured I was doing almost

a litre of gin a day. Alcohol doesnt make
me a better person, it just makes me
fall asleep in public more
rabbits probably move, dont they? I dont know
much about nature
Rabbits do freeze in headlights, apparently.
Yeah? OK, like a rabbit in the headlights.
Only thing is, Ive got a steel core and when the
car hits it comes off worse.
This sounds outrageous, but I truly believe
that you can tell how intelligent a woman is by
the ways she moves her hips. I really do think
you can. And I hope theres something about my
hips that screams intelligence at 10,000 people
every time I take the stage.
Like an end of the millennium Elvis?
Uh-huh. Elvis meets Kierkegaard.

AREAS

Do you know, the record company is still

keeping me apart from Ofra Haza. I suspect Ofra
Haza is probably it, Joanna Lumley having made
it past her sell-by date.
Arent women the most beautiful things on
this earth?
No.
Oh. Then what is? (Thinks: if he says cats, Ill
say the albums great.)
I nd cats the most beautiful thing.
The albums great.
You can tell the intelligence of a cat also by
the way it moves. Its the same kind of owing
grace when its just right, but with a kind of
slyness in the great cats.
So does beauty fade with age for you?
Yes but you can still tell it in the eyes. Beauty
changes. It gets rechannelled. I mean if Joanna
Lumley walked through the door now, youd be
outta here in a ash, I can tell you.
I ask the by now immensely likeable Eldritch
if he realises hes missing a Manchester United
game on telly as we speak and he grumbles,
Yeah, thanks to you. His is an innovative and
charming way of winning one over.
Can you have a good time without drugs?
Oh yeah. I have to.
Whats perfect contentment for you?
A quiet room, four blank walls, and a cat.
I could sit happily in that room for a very
long time.
NME ORIGINALS

TOM SHEEHAN

Whats your ideal of beauty?

139

Dogs On Heat

NME, 27 OCTOBER 1990, p40

THE SISTERS
OF MERCY
Vision Thing
(Merciful Release)

There was nowhere to go after

Floodland. Eldritch stood on the
brink of the void, posing an ever
more crushing question: what to
do when youve
grasped the glory of
the global death kick
and the holocaust just
dont come?
So Eldritch did a
whole lot of nothing.
He hung around
Hamburg and
laughed his hollow
self hoarse at the
black joke hed played upon himself
until, well, nally he had to do
something. So he did what the rest
of us do. He plunged headlong into
lifes little pleasures sex, drugs and
rocknroll all the sideshows that,
whether we care to admit it or not,
we employ to distract us from our
inevitable end.
And guess what? When the
smoke cleared and the sweat dried
and Eldritch stood there blasted
and brazen and sore to his soul,
he realised something that raised
a pulse in his dead creativity. He
realised that all our little pleasures
fuck us up too.
At last Eldritch had stumbled
upon the rudimentary impulses
of rock, something his intelligence
had shielded him from before
betrayal and revenge in all their
devious guises.
So Vision Thing is a beauty of
vindictive bile, a self-inicted bruise.
Its a paradigm of self-delusion,
Eldritch apparently under the
impression that, if he adopts a cruel,
devil-may-care attitude, that bitter
power will serve as a temporary
salvation, a vacation from the
doubts that gnaw at his vanity. Its
probably the best he could hope for.
I think it is quite magnicent.
With a truly epic petulance,
Eldritch has cast himself in a series of
imaginary movies so audacious, one
can do nothing but crack a grin and
salute him. Twenty-ve whores in
the room next door thats the way
it starts! The Sisters characteristic
brooding is blasted to shreds by
a riff ransacked from Eldritchs
favourite comic book heroes, The
Screaming Blue Messiahs, and
kamikaze driven into a collision of
sweet ass and brutal assassination
by ex-Only One John Perry.

140

NME ORIGINALS

Cut to the perv

parlour game
Ribbons, in which
Eldritch, a victim
of his own desires,
is taunted for his
weakness by the god
of his disgust. Love is a
many splintered thing,
he puns, smug bastard,
and men with more
sin than sense nod knowingly. If
Detonation Boulevard is more Billy
Idol napalm thrill than Iggy Pop
art nihilism, When You Dont See
Me is a wicked conceit. Get real,
he advises the babe hes using,
Get another. This macho Eldritch
is one wounded beast and, when
he makes emotional demands in
More, the single Steinman spiced
up with wailing chicks, its as if his
spite is leading some poor stray
into committed suffering. If I cant
escape the pain, he seems to be
saying, it amuses me to pass it on.
My favourite fantasy Mr E is
Doctor Jeep, where, across a riff
like an accelerating Harley, our
wretched matinee idol St Vitus
dances through a rush of TVOD,
the inanity, the corruption, the
hypocrisy, the lies all embraced
as evidence amassed in his case
against the world. Its ridiculously
petulant, of course, puerile even,
but what great rocknroll aint?
Eldritch wants us to think hes
beyond worrying its his greatest
con yet. Hes calling the trials
and tribulations down upon his
head because it makes him feel
alive. Thats why hes hauled out
Tony James, a gure unfairly but
hopelessly ridiculed by many. Its
Andys big Fuck you.
Even when he gets vulnerable
in I Was Wrong and ushers us
into a bar-room confessional, he
draws us in just close enough to
slip a metaphoric blade down his
sleeve and deliver devastation. I
can love my fellow man, he says in
an awful whisper, But Im damned
if Ill love yours. His quick wit even
betrays the crisis of heartbreak and
Something Fast, a melancholy
anthem to the elixir of hedonism, is

a fragile masterpiece of
staged suffering. Ive
seen the best of men
go past, he sings in a
pained contradiction
of resignation and
melodrama, I dont
wanna be the last.
Its harrowing and
hilarious and, behind
the theatricality, more honest
than he ever hopes well know.
Steve Sutherland

NME, 27 OCTOBER 1990, p36

THE MISSION
Grains Of Sand
(Mercury)

Much as I love Wayne Hussey

because he is perhaps the very
last great rocknroll romantic, its
only fair to advise the discerning
consumer that Grains Of Sand
is neither a uent nor cohesive
Mission release.

The album is mid-priced, and

made up of outtakes from the
original Carved In Sand sessions.
Several of its tracks have already
been released as B-sides.
Grains Of Sand really does
expose The Missions most hopeless
and hilarious moments that the
band have been quite careful to sift
from all previous album releases.
It is, however, worth a bluey
simply on the strength of Track Five,
Side One written
in brass and ivory for
a music hall chorus
line, Mr Pleasant is
the Missions most
magnicently ludicrous
moment ever.
Another priceless
track is Heaven Sends
You in which we nd
Wayne ponticating
over the female orgasm: Ill run
my tongue between your legs/Ill
kiss you, kiss you, kiss you on your
sex/And Ill take, take, take you in my
mouth/Ill kiss you until heaven sends
you. Phew! Erm, shuddering stuff,
readers, honestly!
The lows are Waynes crap
acoustic Lennonism Love and the
dour, pompous Sweet Smile Of A
Mystery, featuring what appears to
be a London Philharmonic wheelthrough. Both tracks should never
have been allowed any form of
public access.
Mary Anne Hobbs

The Cult: Ian Astbury

rocks the gay Native
American Nazi look.
Again

1990-1992

NME, 21 September 1991, p32

THE CULT
Ceremony

PETER ANDERSON/TOM SHEEHAN

(Beggars Banquet)

Its comforting to know that here we

are, its 1991 and The Cult still arent
afraid to rock. There are no shifting
sands of ambiguity with these guys
you know where you stand with
Duffy and Astbury, and its on very
solid ground. Theyre very, very
good indeed at being a rocknroll
band (and hey dont forget, its just
a job). Unlike Guns NRoses, they
dont let it get out of control. The
Cult play it straight by the rules.
Ceremony/Rocknroll music got
you good now people just about
says it all. And thats Track One, Side
One. Cue Astbury giving it plenty
of yaayah and baybee, Duffy
carving up the fretboard, and you
can rest assured that
you aint gonna get
lumbered with any
dodgy covers of old
Wings tunes here.
You get all the Red
Indian vibe of course
but we can live with
that, eh, me braves?
Because this might
seem piss-easy, but
its a craft, this Cult thing. Astburys
impossible dreamer on the wild
plains where the eagle ies is
tethered to Planet Earth by Duffys
driving riffs, harnessing him to the
rock beast that earns them a living
before he oats into Navajo heaven.
Non-rock fans like The Cult
because their noise is what they
imagine rock should sound like
bad motor-scooter guitar frenzy
tempered with nifty picking, fullthroated wails, alternating with
touches of melodic delicacy and
quasi-mystical lyrical tosh. Just
like in Wild Hearted Son, in fact.
The best rawk doesnt experiment
or venture into self-indulgence. It
constantly reinvents itself, even
if it dances on the knife-edge of
pastiche. Its a gut centred, visceral
thing. And Billy and Ian know that.
The endless bleak vistas of
the epic White lend themselves
immediately to extended workouts, false endings, tempo changes
and all, Astbury (almost) rapping
his holistic message, We have lost
touch with our spiritual nature/ Cos
we are wrapped up in too much shit.
No macho strutting here these are
positivity fops in corduroy kecks.
Full Tilt kicks in Stones-style
just so we dont forget why were
here, and proceeds to go metal

bonkers. The light and

shade is provided by Ians
autobiographical Heart Of
Soul, and Indian even has
a cello part, preparing the
way for the unexpectedly
gossamer territory of
Sweet Salvation (Ians
tribute to his latest ame)
and the restrained nale,
Wonderland.
Despite the fact that
Astbury does sound
unnervingly like Freddie
Mercury in his more ridiculous
moments, Ceremony delivers
what it promises riffs, noise,
hollering, but also deftness,
delicacy, a haunting quality.
The important thing is that it is
not bombastic or portentous
it has a sense of humour
without spilling over into
parody, and they are pleased
to be haunted by the
ghost of Led Zep.
The Cult are a
very, very good
rock band indeed.
They are also
very, very funny.
Cue Ian: This hip
young dude stood
passionately/
Succumbing to the
he-dog sound of the mystifying
beat combo/That breaks down
your door (Wonderland).
Hilarious yes, but this dog, he
is on heat.
Betty Page

NME, 13 June 1992, p31

THE MISSION
Masque
(Phonogram)

Ah, The Mission. The goths goths.

What in the name of God are The
Mission for? Like, in a world where
the bands who are supposed to be
good at pomp rock step up to the
mic, U2 are shite at it, what hope
is there for The Mish, who have
never been good at anything other
than operating dry ice machines
and wearing hats? The
middle ground below
the Bono space station
of loud but mysterious
toss and somewhere
above Fields Of
The Nephilim is a
nancially protable
but artistically glum
place.
Still, The Mission
forge on, caring less than one jot
about the critics and making records

The Mish: keep

the masks on
in future, if you
dont mind

which unite whole tribes of people

into a happy mass of sweating
apathy. This time around, theyve
released Masque, their alleged
dance album. The Missions idea
of a dance album is not like yours
or mine, largely because you cant
dance to half of it at all and the
other half consists of stomping goth
anthems with drums, which you
can dance to, but not in the popular
techno sense of the word. Which is
ne, but strange.
Masque opens with Never
Again and Shades Of Green, both
thumping dance-rock things that
sound a little like an elephantine
EMF. It goes on to crash
through horror Cure
goth waltzes like The
Spider And The Fly
and classy Wayne-isms
like From One Jesus To
Another, which asks
the question: Jesus
walked on the water/But
did he walk on the air?
Theres a barmy crooning
song with a Kinks-style beat called
She Conjures Me Wings, which

is The Mish at an OAPs tea dance,

attempting the goff cha-cha. It is
cute and very frightening.
Which is different, but many small
things are different about Masque.
Everything may be infused with the
patent Hussey screaming passion
about anything that comes into his
head, but Masque is imaginative
in a Mish kind of way. And at least
one song is cracking; the charming
Like A Child Again, in which
Wayne loses his fear of the dark and
gambols like a spring lamb through
elds of melody.
So perhaps Masque is the sound
of The Mission lightening up and
throwing open the curtains in the
dusty ballrooms of their soul.
In three albums time, The
Mission will be dressed as clowns,
ghting a beaming war against
the sore-encrusted leviathan of
PompBono as U2 suck the living
brains out of small children. For
now, however, they are still The
Mission as we know and sort of love
them, only with a few new ideas and
a sequencer. Hurrah for that.
David Quantick
NME ORIGINALS

141

The

Mansion Family
NME, 18 April 1992, p24

Between thinking of buying small Cornish villages and uncharted Islands, The Cure have
recorded their ninth album in all its sticky-up-haired glory. Reformed goth Andrew Collins
is granted an audience with the worlds most lucrative pantomime

1990-1992

he embers of six months crackle in

the replace. A ne old chessboard
sits unattended. The tang of freshly
percolated coffee mingles with the
comforting funk of Irish wolfhound and oak.
The grandfather clock is stuck permanently at
12. The ghostly sound of piano keys being jabbed
lters through into the empty snooker room.
On the sideboard sits a bottle of Sandemans
port, a single daffodil, a discarded archery arrow
and a garish tube of Living Nightmare Glow-InThe-Dark Make-Up. Someone upstairs is playing
Loveless by My Bloody Valentine.
We are in the heart of verdant Oxfordshire.
The clock might, if it was working, strike four.
So, who lives in a house like this?
Its The Cure or, as Roger Daltrey had it on
last years Brits, when he presented their Best
British Group award The Kyoo-aarhh!
The Manor studio, at Shipton-on-Cherwell,
owned by Richard Branson (as hinted at by the
embarrassing hippy mural of Phil Collins, Mike
Oldeld, Feargal Sharkey and Peter Gabriel
halfway up the stairs) costs around 6,000 a
week to rent. But The Kyoo-aarrhh can weather
that. They are, after all, the most popular and
successful cult band in the world.
And this, for the time being, is their house.
There is a rumour going about the place that
a) Branson is thinking of selling up; and b) The
Cure are thinking of buying. This would be
good. Robert Smith and his quaintly dishevelled,
forever-adolescent thirtysomething pals should
live together in the same elegant country
mansion with tons of wolfhounds and chess and
grouse-shooting.
You wish.

The 1980s: now there was a funny decade for

actually seen the world; teen angst gone mad.

But goth music was lling the Albert Hall by
1986, in the stark, skeletal form of The Sisters Of
Mercy. Many of the goth bands gave the genre a
bad name, though some of them extracted high
drama, cut-price kicks and even some humour
from the goth manifesto of unforgiving railroad
rhythms, guitar histrionics, Hammer imagery
and lost chords.
But it was The Cure, from Crawley in Sussex,
who took it out of the belfry and into the front
room. It was Robert Smith whose own particular
brand of back-combed foppishness found a place
in the glossy pop papers.
The Cure grew into a goth hit machine (19 to
date), an international phenomenon and, yep,
the most successful alternative band that ever
shufed disconsolately about the earth. Their
only contender in the prot-margin stakes at
record company Polydor is James Last. And he
makes two albums a year.
To deftly write goth off as a peculiarly
80s phenomenon is to deny the existence of
hundreds of black-clad, aromatic, asexual
gormtroopers who huddle in coffee shops and
refectories and branches of the Body Shop
up and down the land to this day. The goth is
(despite appearances) alive and unwell.
All About Eve are not a goth band. Nor are
The Sisters of Mercy. At least, thats what they
say. Being a goth means, well, never having
to say youre a goth. Goths think lazy music
journalists invented the term. They did.
The question is, will The Cure admit to
being a goth band? Are they embarrassed that
they invented or at the very least popularised,
legitimised, patented goth?
Robert: Do you think we did really? When
we were making Pornography there wasnt any
such a thing as goth, we were just miserable, not
like goth with the our and the hats, all that.
Ive never actually liked goth bands. Ive always
despised The Sisters Of Mercy.
Why?
Cos the musics shit.
I always use gel, not hairspray. Its called KMS

our old pal pop music. The Smiths, Madness,

New Order, The Human League, Frankie Goes
To Hollywood, ABC, Public Enemy, The Stone
Roses, The Jesus & Mary Chain, Margaret
Thatcher, acid house. You were there. But
something else happened between the years
1980 and 1989, and it was somewhere between
a fashion movement and a creeping
mould on the underside of post-punk
Britain. It was gothic rock, or goth,
so called because it investigated the
grandiose and the macabre, the dark
and the doomy.
From out of the
disenfranchised sneer of
punk it came, a more verbose,
decorative incarnation which
borrowed its greasepaint and
nery from glam rock, and
its morose indulgence from
European metal machine
music. David Bowie, Edgar
Allen Poe, Morticia Addams
and Frank-N-Furter went to
the carnival and someone
turned the lights out.
Your goth was an
apolitical animal, nocturnal,
introspective, tribal, almost
Hey, great hair!
hermaphrodite. The goth
The jobs yours:
was also about 19, worldPerry Bamonte
(second right) joins
weary without having

and it comes with hexagons on. I backcomb it a

lot too. I did use mousse for a while, but it used to
drip onto my nose when I was on stage.
Robert Smith, Just 17, August 1985

Face it,

The Cures ludicrous look has been their

fortune. Robert Smith, in his over-generous
uffy sweater, wrinkled black drainpipes and the
undone trainers of a much larger man, crowned
with that award-winning ha-ha-ha-have-youhad-an-electric-shock hairdo, is, whether he
likes it or not, a modern-day icon.
On the day I meet up with The Cure at Chez
Dick, they look very much like The Cure. Smith
may have trimmed his head-topiary recently, and
the blind mans lipstick is absent, but he is still a
satisfying caricature of himself.
Large, bird-like bassist Simon Gallup claims
that all ve of them happened to wear black
because, Its the most practical colour, you dont
have to wash it till you smell, but this is clearly
a reex cover-up (and a typical dose of laddish
hygiene bravado to boot).
If The Cure changed, thousands of sprayed
teenagers the world over would feel cheated
and betrayed. The Cure are loved and invested
in and stuck onto walls because since their
commercial watershed in 1984 they NEVER
CHANGE.
Wish despite the bands protestations
is another Cure record. This is no put-down.
Another Cure record is a good thing. If Wish
were a lm, it wouldnt win any individual
Oscars, but would probably scoop one of those
Lifetime Achievement Awards. Thats the sort
of album it is. In short, masterful slowie Trust
on Side Two made me want to weep in an
underpass, and the single High miraculously
cured my u when they put it in the ofce.
Disintegration, The Cures last LP in 1989,
sold in excess of three million copies worldwide.
So why make another record?
Why did we make the last one? asks Robert,
rhetorically.
Is there any thing else you can get? Any more
fame, any more satisfaction, any more cash?
Its not about continual gain.
We dont think, Its about time The
Cure made another album, if we
make one more the bank balance
gets a bit bigger. I look forward to
our new records. There are very few
things that you genuinely look
forward to hearing.
The Cure are still going
because they tend not to shed
their audience. You can always
spot an older Cure fan theyve
grown out of having the funny
sticky-up hair.
The band themselves pull it
off because they are The Cure.
Its harder to have funny, sticky-up
hair when youre 30 and living in
the real world.
Robert: I havent got funny
sticky-up hair.
Its quite funny.
Theres a lot weirder-looking
people older than us walking
around in Oxford. They shout

PAUL COX/ DEREK RIDGERS

Ive never actually liked goth

bands, cos the musics shit

Bobs happy band

NME ORIGINALS

143

Lets Get Happy

NME, 18 April 1992, p26

THE CURE
Wish
(Fiction)

144

NME ORIGINALS

things out to you!

Simon: But they are social mists.
Robert: On the whole, yes.

The Cure look healthy. Why?

Robert: You shouldve seen us in all our cycling
kit round September time, that wouldve blown all
the myths.
Yep. The Cure have been mountain-biking
around Oxfordshire while at The Manor, a regular
six-mile circuit to their fave pub and back. How,
exactly, did they get back from the pub?
Slowly.
Ha ha.
The Cure are funny. Prone to lucrative
miserablism, sure, and we love them for that, but
as ve people, they can be summed up by the
scraps of paper stuck to the studio wall. There are
snippets of Emily Dickinson, true, but these are
very much outnumbered by childish cartoons
of The Cures driver and odd-job man, Bruno,
drawn by the band and usually portraying him as a
balloon-like perv with a ten-foot knob.
Thats the duality of The Cure. A colleague
of mine who wouldnt piss on The Cures music
during a water-shortage admits that we need them
because they are stars and artists (ie amboyant,
visual, pretentious, enigmatic, all that good
and forgotten stuff that pop stars used to be
contractually obliged to bring along). Meanwhile,
the new breed of indie star is utterly bereft of the
pizazz and danger and mystery which The Cure
old-fashionedly prescribe to.
Ah, but we were like that when we rst started,
reasons Robert. I can see why a lot of groups do it
we actually did it ourselves, that non-image. By
the time of the Kiss Me album, itd reached the
other extreme,
wed become a
pantomime act.
But we dont look
like this now and
then, and like
something else when were not doing this. Unlike
you, I would go shopping with my hair up, and I
could have my hair like that at home.
Anyway, we had some quite bright cycling
outts! See and be seen!
Was your hair up when you went cycling?
Thats actually the reason why I cut it all off.
We used to come home from the pub on this tow
path, and there was a low hanging bit, and I came

off twice, because it went into my hair. So I cut it

off. Ive cut it off three times in the last ve years,
each time for a different reason. Cycling is the most
absurd so far.

The Cure

have a licence to print money. They could

stick out any old toss at this stage, put a squiggly
drawing on the front and call it Spiders In My
Eyes and the cash would roll in. Surely there is a
scal reason for them being here
Robert: The only thing Ive wanted to buy on
any grand scale in the last few years was an island
in the middle of the Channel which came up for
sale. There was a big concrete fortress on it,
built during the war, it was fucking excellent.
But it was four and a half million pounds or
something. Its not on the maps or anything, cos
it was a secret.
A village once went up for sale in Cornwall for
a pitiful amount of money, and we toyed with the
idea of buying that. That would take the unreality
to an extreme. Wed put road blocks up and
diversion signs.

I would love it if everyone was forced to listen to

at least one Cure record, says Robert.
Which one?
It depends whether it was
to upset them or not.
One of each.
Disintegration, and Friday Im In Love.
The clock, were it working, would strike ve.
My 60 minutes of The Cure are up. I pack The Cure
interview away into my little black army surplus
bag (a legacy, I dare say), and ask Robert why they
should go on the cover of New Gothic Express.
Sometimes I think, Why should we be on
the cover when
theres other
groups who are
getting their rst
chance, or their
only chance to be
on the cover? But then I think, Why shouldnt we
be on the cover? We make a fucking sight better
records than at least 40 of the groups who are on
the cover.
Hurrah! The next journo in line is wearing a
suit, I inform them.
That means well all stand up when he leaves.
Unlike you. Ha ha ha ha!
Cheers.

By the time of Kiss Me ,

we were a pantomime act

DEREK RIDGERS

In some ways, The

Cure embody
everything
appalling about
rock music. They
make sulky, selsh
singles about how
great it is being a kitten and
then follow them with maudlin albums
about how everything is dark and the
crows are pecking at ones gangrenous
eyes. But here is Wish and once again
The Cure are forgiven, the bastards.
Wish makes you talk about how
Smith is a master of rock writing and
an eclectic pop talent. The 12 songs
here are, almost without exception,
bold displays of genius. Every kind of
Cure music is in here, done better than
ever. We get: cute songs about kittens!
Raving death and gloom rock anthems!
Noodling dance pop! New Order ripoffs! Beatle rip-offs! Jovial optimism!
Major glumathons! And lots more.
We begin with the astonishing Open,
which has a guitar part that sounds like
the Hello, hello bit off Teen Spirit and
rocks like six tons of iron, and we end
with, erm, End, which actually sounds
like Nirvana themselves attempting to
play Are Friends Electric? backwards.
Along the way, Bob goes for jangle
pop with Friday Im In Love, vomitously
sings sticky as lips and licky as chips on
High and even says Fuck on the nearly
twee Wendytime.
The charming Doing The Unstuck
is full of such jaunty aphorisms as Its
a perfect day for making out and Its
never too late to get up and go and Bob
even feels compelled to sing LETS GET
HAPPY! occasionally. Conversely, the
slow and haunting Trust is a dignied
plea for love wherein Smith solemnly
sings, There is no one left in the world
who I can turn to/You are the only one.
Wish is an album in the old-fashioned
sense of loads of songs that dont sound
much like each other, but do sound like
theyve all got some kind of sensibility
in common. It has an enormous amount
of quite justied faith in itself, and best
of all, where it has no tunes, it has a
monstrous amount of noise.
Once again we have to conclude that
there is no one like The Cure. And Wish
may even be their best album.
David Quantick

1990-1992

NME, 13 January 1990, p15

THE MISSION
Butterfly On A Wheel
(Myth)

Puke universe! The buttery

on a wheel reference is taken
from a 60s Times editorial which
asked whether it was worth using
the full force of law every time
a pop star was caught taking
drugs. Of course it is! Wipe out
the drug supply and you wipe out
the music. The Mish, however,
demand more direct action. I
want you all to put on balaclavas
tonight, sneak into your local
record shop and smash with
hammers every copy of this record
you can nd.
Steven Wells

MM, 22 September 1990, p35

THE CURE
Never Enough
(Fiction)

Profoundly baggacious, Never

Enough trips and ops around
the room like an army of wazzy
rejects gone AWOL. Fuzztone
Roses guitar and lobotomised
Mondays bass, topped off with
Robert Smiths overripe hiccups,
stutters and whoops. Arguments
about whos ripping who off end
here,as do questions about the
extent to which Smiths tongue
is penetrating his cheek. Because
Enough is enough. A hit.
Paul Lester

needs protecting from the strain

of spontaneous effusions, like
a heart weakened by too much
smoking. Its as if Nick Cave is no
longer up to being direct with us.
Hence the formalities, the archaic
restraint of The Weeping Song
Over a trolling, downcast
shanty backbeat, Cave and
Bargeld engage in a Theres A
Hole In My Bucket-type dialogue
in which all the world weeps for
our sad lot. Touching if youre
willing to go along with the
courtly rituals that lead you to the
heart of the song. Unfortunately
the word that springs to mind
when considering listening to
new Nick Cave records is should
rather than want.
Nick Cave sounds like a man
who will never scream again.
David Stubbs

MM, 13 October 1990, p40

SISTERS OF MERCY
More
(Merciful Release)

I dont mean to be a killjoy. I do

realise that Andrew Eldritch is the
funniest cartoon character this
side of Bart Simpson and Barts
big brother Billy Idol. But I have a
horrible suspicion that there are
people over the age of 12 who
take this laughable nonsense
seriously, and thats truly sad.
More is the usual dull, gruff,
absurdly pompous rumble
punctuated with plastic soul wails
about needing love as if Eldritch
didnt adore himself with more
than enough torrid passion to
make any other lover redundant.
Dave Jennings

NME, 1 September 1990, p16

COCTEAU TWINS

NME, 20 October 1990, p22

Iceblink Luck
(4AD)

Thankfully the Cocteaus have

discarded the Noddy and
Tinkerbell indulge in sensual
massage approach that so
exasperated semi-fans like me
who always wanted Liz Frazer to
kick vocal ass a little.
JC: Thats quite good for them.
BD: The Cocteau Twins have
never given a fuck about whats
happening around them. They just
get on and do what they do and
they seem to the getting better at
it. Attitude matters just as much as
the music in most cases.
Barbara Ellen with Bill
Drummond & Jimmy Cauty (KLF)

MM, 15 September 1990, p34

NICK CAVE &

THE BAD SEEDS
The Weeping Song
(Mute)

This is a weeping song/A song

in which to weep. These days,
Nick Cave songs are epic, stagey,
deliberately contrived as if, after
all those years of lthy, shrieking
catharsis his battered spirit

NME, 23 May 1992, p17

THE CURE

THE CURE

Close To Me

Friday Im In Love

(Fiction)

(Fiction)

From the heavy metal brain

surgery of Never Enough we
op back in time to 85s Close To
Me, a preview for Bob and cos
Mixed Up album, with that Paul
Oakenfold doing the remixing
here. The panting, snufing,
claustrophobic original remains
pretty much intact (although I
dont remember the daffy, jazz
sax solo) and Oakenfold wodges
on a fairly standard shufe dance
rhythm. Not one of the triumphs
of dance/rock interbreeding.
Roger Morton

Another Cure single. Usual

Cure tune, always liked it. It is
remarkable only in that Robert
makes no reference to either cats
or Japanese babies, but Cure fans
will be reassured by the fact that
Robert goes Dooby dooby doo
at least four times and sings at
one point about spinning around
like a sheep. And he doesnt take
drugs like the crappy Mancy Shite
Wankers and those other rubbish
bands. He also goes Owy owy
ooooh! Thats my favourite bit.
Steven Wells

NME ORIGINALS

145

Let Sleeping Dogs Die?

Queens of noise:
Originals Editor Steve
Sutherland with Wayne
Hussey of The Mission at
the Metal Gurus video
shoot, London, 1990

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