Forty years ago, there was a Sunday market on Folkestone seafront, with a fantastic record stall selling second hand LPs, in seemingly new condition, at remarkably low prices. Most Sundays saw me there, the stall being used as a crèche, allowing my other half to browse the rest of the market knowing I’d be safe, and wouldn’t wander off.
It inevitably ended up being rather expensive. As I recall, the stall vanished very suddenly after a year or so, amid rumour that the reason the records were so competitively priced was that they had been sourced from Our Price, out of the back door without the traditional exchange of currency.
My first Bunnymen album, their second, was purchased from this stall, and initially blew me away. The understated start with Show Of Strength, the power of Over The Wall, the ‘hit’ single The Promise ending the first side, with a slight feeling that ‘this has been great, lads, but where’s it going?’ And as the second half of the album continues there’s an air of unrelenting angst and misery, but without it ever sounding either authentic from lived experience, or tongue-in-cheek and playfully over the top. And they’re not terribly good songs, either, completely unmemorable, leaving me wondering if I’ve ever listened to Heaven Up Here past the halfway point, because nothing has stuck. There is absolutely nothing from the second half of this album I feel needs revisiting. And that’s a massive disappointment. I came back to this expecting to be writing a four star review, and if you’ve got this far, you’ll be aware that’s not happening. I’ve always thought this my favourite Bunnymen album (I now realise based on three very good songs), I hope when I’ve listened again to others it isn’t.
UPDATE - In the process of correcting errors / adding links, I felt the need to revisit this album, as I was unduly harsh. In my defence, it was a very early one, and I hadn't yet got the measure of what each rating felt like.
With A Hip and It Was A Pleasure are far stronger than I gave them credit for, but I stick by my opinion that the second half is so much weaker than the first. All My Colours was darkly enjoyable, but there's still little else that makes an impression. There's enough here to merit three stars.
3* - VAR looked at this album again, and decided the 2* review was a 'clear and obvious error'. Excellent first half, fading badly after the break.
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