The Album Review Club - Week #128 - (page 1587) - Pretty Vicious - The Struts

[Coatigan]

The mega awesome and shite are interchangeable.

 

[journolud]

I never took you for a farter, tbf. I've hosted so many playlists for you now, my Spotify account is very confused on who I am anymore. We need to have a deep talk about how much I now love The Colour of Spring. That is real. Bravo again for that one.

The Colour of Spring and Talk Talk generally are the outstanding "discoveries" for me from this thread for which I'll be eternally grateful to Bimbo. Despite all the exciement though it's not looking likely this will have the same impact.

 

[RobMCFC]

"all the excitement"

Interesting comment - probably not in the same way I am thinking, but it's funny that that phrase came into my mind whilst listening to this album.

 

[threespires]

Great shout this, at last one I can enthuse about :-)

Poison Arrow has suffered a bit from over-exposure to my ears over the decades but the overall standard is so high. Date Stamp, All of My Heart, Tears are not Enough, Look of Love, just so many classics. Anything Horn produced back then was essential listening. The Midas Touch.

I’d actually flag up Mark White as the real unsung genius of the band. He gave up and left Martin on his own a few years back, but he sustained brilliant songwriting for so many years. With their(his) live shows over the years I think he’s relied a bit too much on these songs at the expense of Beauty Stab (my favourite) and the other albums, but I suppose that was the biggest seller.

A genius record.

I used to like watching Bands Reunited :-{ and theirs was one of the ones where they had to do it with additional musicians because only a couple of them were up for it; I think Mark White was one of those people who completely left the music business and had no intention of returning. Martin Fry has always struck me as a thoroughly decent bloke whenever I've seen him interviewed on stuff like that and other things; I think either on that or something else he spoke about how his illness had given him a different perspective. Actually thinking about it logically, it's obvious that ABC must have been pretty big in the US because Bands Reunited was mostly for a US audience I think ?

interesting what you say about focusing heavily on this album in the live shows. Their choices were often quite brave and they seemed to make what they wanted to make rather than what might sell but maybe they were a bit bruised by the way things like Beauty Stab got received. They had this knack of never sounded contemporary or quite in date but it not really mattering cause the songs were good enough. Skyscraping is an album so not of its time I'm surprised it got made at all but there's some tracks I really like on it, mostly the Roxy lite ones.

 

[FogBlueInSanFran]

Pretty sure, should there be a nomination ,Foggy will have a special category called something like 'Dante's 8th Circle'

Weren’t there nine circles? Had Radiohead been around in the time of Dante he’d have created 37 circles.

 

[FogBlueInSanFran]

The mega awesome and shite are interchangeable.

Actually that category should be named Leonard Cohen. That or Bob Dylan’s Voice. Actually wait — Rush. It should be named Rush.

 

[BimboBob]

Interesting comment - probably not in the same way I am thinking, but it's funny that that phrase came into my mind whilst listening to this album.

I would imagine 'all the excitement' was due to a few posters proclaiming this choice as the best ever on the thread...that's what my head is telling me anyway and I'm sticking to it.

 

[threespires]

Weren’t there nine circles? Had Radiohead been around in the time of Dante he’d have created 37 circles.

There were but the 8th circle was for a particular type :-)

 

[Coatigan]

I think it is no surprise that, overdone overcooked throw as much at it 80s bands that despite chucking a whole bunch of stuff into the mix to sound interesting sound like most other 80s bands, are not my thing. First listen was not a comfortable one. The bass is great and should be a redeeming feature, but then it continues to be so repetative and it is all the same pace. Let's see what the next two listens bring.

 

[chesterbells]

I used to like watching Bands Reunited :-{ and theirs was one of the ones where they had to do it with additional musicians because only a couple of them were up for it; I think Mark White was one of those people who completely left the music business and had no intention of returning. Martin Fry has always struck me as a thoroughly decent bloke whenever I've seen him interviewed on stuff like that and other things; I think either on that or something else he spoke about how his illness had given him a different perspective. Actually thinking about it logically, it's obvious that ABC must have been pretty big in the US because Bands Reunited was mostly for a US audience I think ?

interesting what you say about focusing heavily on this album in the live shows. Their choices were often quite brave and they seemed to make what they wanted to make rather than what might sell but maybe they were a bit bruised by the way things like Beauty Stab got received. They had this knack of never sounded contemporary or quite in date but it not really mattering cause the songs were good enough. Skyscraping is an album so not of its time I'm surprised it got made at all but there's some tracks I really like on it, mostly the Roxy lite ones.

Thanks for that, super post.
Yes, I saw that too I think and iirc he was last known working as a psycho-therapist of some sort on Harley Street, though my memory might be playing tricks. I have looked in the past for solo interviews from him, but there’s not much really.

Your comments about Beauty Stab are interesting. Whilst I would still maintain the first album is a 10/10 for me, I really have for a long time now, come to appreciate that second album even more.
The third was a step down for me, but I did enjoy the house music influenced album Up.

I fully agree on Martin Fry, throughly decent fella, and a man with a social conscience. It is incredible he came back from being so very ill back then.