TALK TALK

As meritorious as were their ideas and, one may assume, their motives, TALK TALK crested rather timidly with this final release. The improvement rests chiefly in the presence of 2 masterful cuts, "After the Flood" and "New Grass", both profound in melancholy, with arrestingly soulful vocals, organs, and droning guitars. "New Grass" is nothing short of a minimalist triumph engendered by a deceptively lightweight riff. But elsewhere this is again mostly a vortex of void. However, "Ascension Day" is Hollis' most commendable stab a more grungy gritty feel that fell flat on "Spirit of Eden", and "Runeii" is a decent purely ambient piece on which to end. The album title must be ironic, as there is little to laugh with or at here, but unfortunately therein lies the only consistent feature of yet another intriguing project in which the echo is more memorable than its original note.

The transformation that began with "The Colour of Spring" attains its objective on "Spirit of Eden". Conventional song structures are eschewed in favor of atmospheric extended explorations. Still, the angst ridden choruses achieve continuity with prior releases, particularly well on the only standout track "Eden", and quite poorly on its successor "Desire". From then on it fails to focus interest in any meaningful manner. The opener "The Rainbow" is the only other highlight, with its languid BRUCE COCKBURN styled guitars ("Stealing Fire" era). Ambient music should leave one feeling more than just an awareness that something has ended but we forgot what it was. Thank goodness for the apple.

Whereas a list of prog bands who ultimately veered into overt commercial territory would fill several screens, the analogous compendium of popular bands abandoning commercial aspirations would fit on the tip of my pinkie. In fact I would venture to say that most of us have simply assumed without a first or second thought that this never even happens. That is, unless we are fortunate enough to encounter Exhibit A, the enigmatic consummate 1980s new wave group TALK TALK.

Crafters of the catchy but annoying hit "It's My Life" several years earlier, with "The Colour of Spring" TALK TALK began to transition to an ambient experimental style that they would fully adopt on the following 2 albums. This album is more sophisticated pop than crossover prog, with some of the tired qualities of earlier efforts infusing "Life's What You Make it" and "Give it Up". On the other hand, "I don't Believe in You" and "Living in Another World" generate acoustically layered atmospheres, with stimulating use of guitars and harmonica, and less emphasis on new wave rhythms. But it's really "April 5th" that instantiates the mellifluous mannerisms of this group's later work and heightens the techniques already being plied by DAVID SYLVIAN. Delicate but not withering, the fusion of keys, winds, vocals, and guitars is mesmerizing. One might argue that its effect here is more pronounced simply because of its more bouncy neighbours.

Interim works like this can only be evaluated after the fact, but often become my favorite output by the artist. CLANNAD's "Macalla", ELOY's "Dawn", STRAWBS' "Bursting at the Seams", RENAISSANCE's "A Song for All Seasons", MIKE OLDFIELD's "QE2", HORSLIPS' "The Book of Invasions", MOSTLY AUTUMN's "The Last Bright Light", are among the multitudes. While I don't yet possess the same famiart=ity with the TALK TALK catalogue, the question is always the same...does the turnabout mark the beginning of the end or the breakthrough to new territories? For the answer, let's talk talk later.

Apparently I'm not the only Proghead somewhat blindsided by the inclusion of Talk Talk in these archives. Once upon a time I briefly owned a vinyl copy of their 1982 debut album "The Party's Over", but I dismissed the band long ago as a bunch of post-ROXY MUSIC New Romantic techno-poseurs with more fashion sense than genuine musical style.

That was before the group decided to bite the hand that was feeding them by completely recalibrating their aesthetic compass, in willful defiance of marketplace wisdom and against the better judgment of the bean-counters at EMI Records. Their 1986 album "The Colour of Spring" hinted at the changes ahead, but "Spirit of Eden" was the first, full blossoming of that new musical seed, and the choice of title was appropriate: this was as close to paradise as popular music could get in 1988.

Until my own recent, belated exposure to the album (thanks in large part to its high score on these pages) I always thought DAVID SYLVIAN had patented the formula for this sort of dreamlike ambient pop music. But he obviously wasn't the only artist drawing inspiration from the same deep well in an otherwise shallow musical decade, paving the way for other forward-thinking bands looking to jump off the gravy train (see RADIOHEAD for a more recent example).

The music itself is hard to pin down. The entire album drifts, pulses, dissolves, and flows together without any familiar sense of resolution or structure, interrupted by sporadic, semi-conscious brush strokes of guitar and percussion, all of it held together by the evocative singing of Mark Hollis. "Epic" was how my wife described it during a recent road trip, before ejecting the CD and putting on some Jackson Browne, with a clear sense of relief.

It's hard to resist awarding the album an immediate five stars, especially when considering the scarcity of worthwhile music in the 1980s. A quarter-century later it still sounds ahead of the times, and is still attracting new fans, yours truly included.

The cover art says it all: a goose, a noose, a golden egg. This was a band being groomed for mainstream success, with the look, the sound, and the limited shelf-life of true Top-40 superstars. They had a couple of hits tailor-made for the mid-1980s, but then rebelled against their handlers in order to follow a more private muse, showing enough poise and sensitivity to eventually earn them a page on a web site devoted to the arcane, unfashionable backwaters of Progressive Rock.

The two distinct faces of that split personality are exploited in this equally schizoid compilation, with predictably mixed results. Disc One collects a majority of the band's extended singles and twelve-inch dance mixes (currently listed in the Progarchives database as twelve-foot mixes, heaven help us), while Disc Two is a grab bag of B-side demos and leftovers.

The full package traces a chronological arc around both ends of the band's doppelgänger career. But to an art-rock snob like me only the last half-dozen cuts off the second CD have any real merit, and to get there you'll have to wade through at least a full disc's worth of music designed to send metropolitan party animals into a Dionysian frenzy.

The band's evolution can almost be plotted by the sound of their drumming, from the 4/4 thud of their 1982 debut to the mature refinement of later epiphanies. It's a shame the track selection here is skewed more toward the former, but it really couldn't be helped: these guys were late bloomers, and their good stuff didn't exactly lend itself to the singles market.

I have enormous respect for Talk Talk, and their decision to commit retail suicide for the sake of higher art. That sort of integrity is rare enough in the real world, and almost nonexistent in the music industry. But on the evidence presented here it's a shame they didn't pull that commercial plug a little sooner.

While mostly easygoing and pleasant, this album sits almost on the verge of tedium, even if it mostly flows from one piece to the next. Mark Hollis mumbles the lines in a manic-depressive manner. The first two songs are rather enjoyable, and "Inheritance" is good, but mostly the album plods along in a way that is, for me at least, unappealing. Fans of Kayo Dot or other Toby Driver projects may want to hear moments of this, however.

"The Rainbow" Wailing trumpet and background noises create a moody ambiance. A tight guitar bit enters, like Tex-Mex Telecaster grinding through as an anguished harmonic pierces and warbles through. The vocals are casual. A piano interlude brings the main riff back in with additional lead instruments, like fiddle.

"Eden" Various instruments burst in before the rhythm section begins to add structure. After a raucous guitar, a subdued percussion, bass, piano, and vocal section carries on. The song builds strongly despite the grating guitar, which almost ruins a decent piece of music.

"Desire" High-pitched wind instruments lead into this next tune, dirge-like and solemn with the bass-laden organ dominating. It leads into a simple, repetitive rhythm before the vocalist enters. And then abruptly, the band actually becomes a rock group, if only for a while.

"Inheritance" This tranquil jazz piece is awash with piano, brushes, and upright bass. At halftime, the blowers apparently improvise, performing over basic drumming.

"I Believe in You" Electric guitar textures ease in and out over piano and drums as the vocalist mumbles and moans something. Celestial organ and choir lead into more avant-garde business.

"Wealth" This amiable piece has organ layers, bass, and an emotional, yet scarcely understandable vocal performance. The organ is the highlight here, plopping in and out in the middle.

Martin Ditchman scrapes a bowl and Talk Talk emerge through the passageways of a complex evolution. From pop to top grade prog rock. They spent a year making this. It sounds like concentrated genius and a protracted sequence of mistakes and retakes in equal measure. Tension and release. There aren't many moments like Mark Feltham's harmonica solo. And Mark's voice? Not quite there to deliver a lyric, let alone a message. More a shimmering, frail instrument drawing us along as the strange journey unfolds. And the mighty Tim Friese-Green, producer, musician, just as much a member of Talk Talk as Eno is of U2. Perhaps more so. Eno merges as one of several, Friese-Green was one of two that sit at the heart of this influential masterpiece.

If you listen to this and you don't get it, google bands and musos who hold Talk Talk, and this album in particular, as an important influence. Then listen again.

This debut album is probably one of the least proggy albums in the Archives. Yes, this is 'New Romantic' synth pop of the early 80's, comparable to bands like Ultravox, ABC or early Simple Minds. They did have a sound of their own within the genre, though surely it would be less so if they wouldn't have had the personal voice of Mark Hollis, but unfortunately their gradual progress to be something else, leading all the way to Post-Rock pioneer albums of Spirit of Eden and Laughing Stock (1988, 1990) didn't quite start here yet. The sound is outdated in a typical manner for the era; flat, hollow and plastic.

The mood of the album is in minor key (the later term shoegazing fits well), and if we exclude the uptempo single songs 'Talk Talk' or 'Today', some songs do have an atmosphere not so radically different of TALK TALK's better output, but the realization of those - admittedly few - good ideas is not very succesful. Why they chose to play rather typical-sounding synth pop, did they want so much to be part of the musical fashion of the day, following in the steps of Duran Duran etc? Also the band photos of those times suggest that they did.

I had this vinyl in '87 for a short time (it was my third purchase of TALK TALK) and haven't been missing it at all. At least a couple of songs I have forgotten completely, but there's one song I've happily conquered back (from a compilation) that was my favourite from this album already then: 'Have You Heard the News?' It has a sad, strong mood and even the sneaking synth melody works effectively. But the whole album hasn't sood the test of time that well. Unless you really want to have each of their albums (there are not so many after all) you can safely ignore this one.

I was surprised to see this band on Prog Archives since I was only familiar with them as a pop band from the 80s, similar to Thompson Twins, The The, and all those other T-T bands of the era. It is always good to see a band (or the artist who dominates it) evolve over time. That said, I am not thrilled with the results, although it may seem otherwise on the surface. The album features good production values, interesting arrangements, and non-traditional structures. Still, where the songs are not dull and dreary they are cacophonic and noisy, with little in between that catches my interests. The drums in particular are grating to my ears. If I found the songs themselves more appealing I could overlook a lot of the problems here, but truth is I do not. The songs are long, drawn out, and go nowhere. On the plus side, this recording seems to be one of the forerunners of Post/Math Rock, which demonstrates they were doing something original. It is just not something I enjoy listening to and I am happy to pass this one on to someone who would be more appreciative.

On Laughing Stock, even the jazz influences which provided some sort of cohesion and reference point on Spirit of Eden begin to break down, and Talk Talk's role as the sires of post- rock is even more evident, with long brooding sections resembling territory which would later be explored by the likes of Tortoise and Godspeed You Black Emperor. I'm inclined to agree with Phil Brown, engineer on the project, when he describes it as being "dark and claustrophobic"; I'd also say this is a mild step down from Spirit of Eden, because whilst the band have tapped into a powerful and unique sound, they also don't quite seem to be comfortable with it and aren't entirely sure what to do with it. Not surprising, of course - an entire subgenre of artists haven't yet exhausted the possibilities opened up here - but it does lead to a less cohesive work than its predecessor.