Miss Y picked up a copy of the Ultimate Collection from a local chazza the other day so I’m listening to it at the moment. It’s genuinely surprising how little impact outside of three or four legitimately huge bangers (Sweet Dreams, Who’s That Girl, There Must Be An Angel, Sisters Are Doing It) any of the other songs are having; I literally cannot remember one song from the next as they breeze past entirely inconsequentially. And this is an act “known” for their singles rather than albums.
Annie Lennox is a phenomenal singer, but it turns out she truly blossomed away from Dave Stewart. Sorry, Dave.
An over-generous 3, and that’s a +1 for the all-timer that is There Must Be An Angel (Playing With My Heart).
They were a childhood car staple but didn’t imprint on me at all, I’m an 80’s pop fan and they leave me quite cold, they can’t hold my interest over a full song, never tried a full album. Here Comes The Rain again is the only song I quite like but even that the chorus is a bit of a drag. I only reserve 1’s for things I really detest so it’s a 2, 1 point each.
Not a fan tbh. A 3 feels slightly generous but that’s what i’ll give them.
Their debut album is an interesting curio though. Has some incredible guest musicians on it (produced by Conny Plank, features Holger Czukay and Jaki Liebzeit from Can, Robert Gorl from DAF, and Clem Burke from Blondie!) and has a couple of decent motorik-dream pop numbers, a bit reminiscent of Stereolab in places.
Big fan of Holgar from Can wandering in halfway through this…
Would never choose to listen to them these days but briefly really liked them. To the extent that I asked for the tape of Be Yourself Tonight for my birthday one year.
Sweet Dreams… is an absolute top tier wierdo synthpop banger the equal of anything from the era. @midnightpunk’s already posted the even better track from that album: Love is a Stranger. There’s something really fascinating about the way they start off with this standard synth riff and the later verse keep veering away from the basic format.
Could certainly name a few tracks I loved from later albums but, to be honest, any time I’ve tried to listen to them this century I’ve been disappointed.
Embarrassingly, long before The Matrix this is what had the young Cosh desperate to be able to afford a leather trenchcoat of his own…
