Mike76

Recover. What can I say, they are a band that could be described as minor but not too much, in the sense that listening to them gives the feeling of having heard something similar before in terms of atmospheres and sounds, but their skill lies in not making the inspirations too obvious and blending them well into a style that flows smoothly. So much so that, if I were asked who they resemble, I would struggle to answer; perhaps a bit like Siouxsie & The Banshees or Echo & The Bunnymen, but Scars take bits and pieces from here and there without actually resembling anyone. Although they are post-punk, the melodies, in true Scottish fashion, are well present; however, the compositions are often far from the ordinary pop song, such as "Everywhere I Go," which doesn't even have a vocal chorus, or "Obsessions," which starts as a slow, chant-like ballad (and a tad tedious) only to finish with a fast, swirling instrumental outro, or "Your Attention Please," which is even spoken. A really good work, it's a shame they broke up so soon afterward; they were more than promising.

Here I am, I also snubbed Blondie until not long ago with the prejudice that they were too "lightweight." Going back to "Parallel Lines" and this "Plastic Letters," I’ve re-evaluated my judgment. Stein has a great taste for crafting pop melodies, Harry has personality and a voice, and the sound is energetic, influenced by the trends of the time (basically disco, punk, or both) in a way that was far from obvious for that era. And then, if my daughter sings "Heart Of Glass" (without me having anything to do with it), it must mean something.

As a kid in the '80s, I found them disgusting, but then again, I wasn't really into music at the time; it was more a reaction to the hysteria of the girls. By the late '90s, I dug up "Duran Duran" and "Rio," and I found them quite enjoyable, although some time later, listening to the Japan's "Gentlemen Take Polaroids," it became automatic for me to downsize their innovative impact. Nikki Sudden writes in his biography that the Duran created some of the songs that made them famous by plundering the work of the rival punk group Subterranean Hawks; nonetheless, I still enjoy listening to those two albums.

Whether she sang in various registers, in English or in French, minimal no wave, disco-punk, ethno-pop, or anything else, she could always infuse it with her vitality. Enigmatic beauty, it's a pity she died so young.

I was able to follow Richard live in the '90s, and as soon as I got a CD player in 1995, he was the second artist I thought of (the first was The Prodigy with Jilted Generation). However, when it came to "A Selected Ambient Works II," which was already renowned as a masterpiece at the time, I preferred to focus on the then more recent releases of "I Care Because You Do..." and "Classics." The budget was tight, interesting artists' CDs were multiplying, and in the end, I only listened to SAWII for the first time a few years ago.
There are records that mean nothing to the listener, others that seem to say nothing, and others that convey something inexplicable in words; the other day, revisiting this work, I think I finally managed to articulate my feelings: finding oneself in a deep sleep, having grotesque and unsettling dreams, arriving at the edge of complete panic but then at that moment a doubt assails us: "No, it's not real, I'm safely asleep in my bed and this is just a dream!"
Well, this doubt that prevents terror from fully taking shape is the sensation that much of this work conveys to me.

The drama of a man ready to betray the company he works for, deceive his family, and assassinate his own friend and benefactor just to do his "duty."

I ran away first.

Good album, albeit developed with a certain heaviness, somewhat due to its length and somewhat to the "theatrical" nature of the tracks (which is the environment they were written for). The EN nevertheless try to fend off lurking boredom by alternating the warlike and dramatic director (the ones one would expect from a concept about World War I) with more ironic and paradoxical episodes. Among the former, some of the most memorable are the clattering representation of war in "Kriegmaschinerie," the percussive timeline of the Great War in "Der 1.Weltkrieg," and the fallen soldier questioning how he died in "How Did I Die?" Among the latter, the distorted English anthem in "Hymnen," the correspondence between two monarchs in "The Willy-Nicky Telegrams" (the choice of diminutives for their names and the trap-style vocoder for the voices give a childlike and surreal flavor to a dialogue that will seal the fate of millions), and finally in "Der Beginn Des Weltkrieges 1914," we have a kind of Eisturzende version of sound fairy tales (A mille ce n'è....) with Blixa as the showman narrating (to a text by Joseph Plaut) the start of the war as seen by the animals of a farm. For the rest, two recoveries from the repertoire of the first African American regiment in history are interesting only from a historiographical point of view, and the heart of the album ("Achterland" and the three movements of "Lament") unfolds in a sort of ambient that feels a bit too lengthy and static. All in all, an interesting album on par with other EN productions from the 2000s.

An album I listened to late due to its unflattering reputation, instead turned out to be much better than expected. If Vega is always Vega, those who take a step up here are Rev and Ocasek: while the sound of the historic debut was raw but monochromatic, and the second work opened up to more diverse nuances but lost some bite, here the sound of Suicide finds the perfect balance. Of course, the tracks are built a bit on the framework of those from the first two LPs, but here we are facing the Suicide album with the best production, which is no small feat.

Despite being formed in a modern dance style (essentially the same), and having all the ingredients to do well, the album doesn't take off. Perhaps it's the songwriting that's not particularly inspired. In any case, what most penalizes the outcome, in my opinion, is the live-sounding recording. This is definitely their worst effort so far.