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Rating: It feels a bit surreal to admire the cover of the Eurythmics' very first album, a sort of fantastical-fairy manifesto with a rudimentary post-futurist style. The garden of delights, the magical grove, with a red-bobbed Lennox in evident erotic ecstasy and a distanced Stewart, unsure of himself, promised great things at the start of a decade already lively and spicy, but unfortunately, the debut of Eurythmics was disappointing and unsuccessful, at least as far as sheer commercial success is concerned. It was only with the subsequent and swift Sweet Dreams that the specter of a definitive abyss was banished forever.
In The Garden was a risky attempt in an Anglo-European context dominated by the nascent avant-garde rock-electronic-proto new wave and bands like Duran Duran trying to commercialize it at best (and also by their new colleagues Depeche Mode, who were temporarily playing with the frivolous synths of Just Can't Get Enough), and the Lennox-Stewart duo, fresh from leaving the Tourists, couldn't help but produce an authentic little gem unfairly ignored and poorly relegated to the niche of possible early Eighties meteors. Drawing from a substantial cauldron simmering with the beauty of Central-Northern European avant-garde (krautrock, alternative rock, Kraftwerkian electronics, along with the last remnants of the more internationalist disco trend), the baby Eurythmics proposed a debut with rare and disarming creative-sonic maturity, an album fully responsible for the pop-artistic heights reached with the masterpieces Sweet Dreams and Touch and yet not renounced with the future series of melodic rock albums.
The tracklist of In The Garden is, therefore, full of pearls and little jewels buried under the unjust avalanche of commercial flops: Belinda is a lively dance-rock track, Take Me To Your Heart delves into an enigmatic perfectly 80s synth-pop, Caveman Head, one of the album's best-crafted and exemplary tracks, descends into a furious electro-punk anthem with strong kraut influences, while Never Gonna Cry Again - the only extract to have achieved even a modest position in the top 100 of His Majesty - introduces an excellent pop-dance flirting with new wave novelty. Furthermore, English Summer stands out for its decisive rock'n'roll-synth idyll, All The Young (People Of Today) even introduces trance avant-gardes then scarcely present in the mainstream banquet, and finally the classic-electronic clash in She's Invisible Now.
Despite the luxuriously fairy-tale-like green of the award-winning Lennox-Stewart firm having been blatantly ignored by the industrial-radio skittishness, the initiation of In The Garden is worthy of high evaluations, even in today's cyclically changing sonic rainbow. If listening to immortal legends like the duo Sweet Dreams-Touch you wonder about the origin of this bounty of the '80s, just a few steps with the time machine of modern playlists will quench your inexhaustible thirst for musical knowledge.
Eurythmics, In The Garden
English Summer - Belinda - Take Me To Your Heart - She's Invisible Now - Your Time Will Come - Caveman Head - Never Gonna Cry Again - All The Young (People Of Today) - Sing-Sing - Revenge.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 English Summer (04:02)
Child in the distance
A memory untamed
Family connections
There's a mess in the kitchen
All messages received
Always a quick reply
The mood the afternoon
Another change of light
There's nothing like an English summer
The telephone is good
So wonderful and true
We need the time to think
Everyone's listening
Another change of light
The underlying truth
Request to pack it in
No solutions
02 Belinda (03:58)
Belinda the rain is falling
Belinda your love is calling
Belinda he'd never leave you
Belinda he won't deceive you
Belinda your mind is dreaming
Belinda it's so misleading
Belinda he'd never leave you
Belinda he won't deceive you
How the rain still falls
Belinda your eyes have spoken
Belinda your heart is broken
Belinda he'd never leave you
Belinda he won't deceive you
Dry your tears...
Close your eyes...
04 She's Invisible Now (03:30)
Takes a step back
From the vacant chair
Looking in the mirror
While she's combing her hair
Wipes the dust from a cup
While she's cleaning up
Wonders very slightly
What she's doing there
A simple reflection
Can be too revealing
Years are for counting
Years are for stealing
She's a mathematician
Calculator
Counting daily
Counting forever...
Cold clean glass and a razor blade
Fly on the table and a passing car
Closes the curtain to keep in the shade
Closes her head and now she's counting down
Dust is collecting
But she doesn't notice
Counting for ever
She's a calculator
No-one can see her
She's invisible now
No-one can see her
And the dust is collecting
06 Caveman Head (03:59)
Feel my body breathing in
Touch the softness of my skin...
I am very beautiful
I can be so beautiful...
I am very beautiful
I could be successful...
My hands are moving
My feet are tied
Watch the way my hair falls down
See the way my hair falls down
I am very beautiful
I can be so beautiful
Touch the softness of my skin
Feel my body breathing in
My hands are moving
My feet are tied
My eyes are closing
My mouth is wide
I will let you touch me
If you want to touch me
09 Sing-Sing (04:05)
Les animaux sont arrivés
Jour par jour se travaille
Dans le train
En auto
Sur les bicyclettes
Les animaux sont arrivés
Jour par jour se travaille
Dans le train
Chaque semaine
Sur les bicyclettes
Dans les rues
C'est partout
Dans les places publiques
Toutes les bêtes de la cité
Toutes les personnes fatiguées
A les maisons retournent
Les métiers c'est terminé
Regardez Regardez
Toutes les personnes fatiguées
Quelle horreur qu'est ce que c'est
C'est la vie juste la vie
Presque la vie
10 Revenge (04:31)
She said revenge can be so sweet
I like to take it when I can
I need to play with the ones I hate
I like to see them suffer
It has to be dangerous
It has to be refined
It has to be skillfull
You need to take your time
She said I take care
Of my resources
You never know
When you might need them
I'm fast and I'm strong
My reflexes are good
It doesn't take long
To achieve my deserved revenge
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