After the demise of The Teardrop Explodes, Cope returned to the rehab of his home town, Tamworth and wrote most of the songs for this, his solo album, as well as resurrecting a couple originally intended for the third Teardrop Explodes album, later appearing when Dave Balfe cobbled an album together from demos etc and released it as Everybody Wants To Shag The Teardrop Explodes.
It's also one of those odd albums whose name is that of a song by that artist which doesn't appear on the album. The only other one I could think of was Led Zeppelin's Houses Of The Holy, but there's a website detailing many more.
So what of this set of songs? They're among my favourite of Cope's output, somewhat out of step with the electropop/new romantic sound of the mid 1980s. It's nothing less than short, pop songs, orthodox in structure, with perhaps a more pastoral feel than was fashionable at the time.
Opening song Bandy's First Jump sounds very Teardrop Explodes, not too distant from Reward, and is followed by Metranil Vavin, very minimal on the lost third album, but much rocked up here and a real toe-tapper. Strasbourg is just a lovely little song, then the slower Elegant Chaos with an intro nicked from Love Affair's Everlasting Love, and some wonderful lyrics about mooing like a cow on the grass.
Quizmaster bounces along after a lovely oboe opening, and the first half ends with the wonderful Kolly Kibber's Birthday, a little slice of more electrobased pop, a fast, reflective song with an earworm four chord theme.
The second half sets off with the single, Sunshine Playroom, one of my least favourite songs on here (despite the Hawaii 5-O theme steal in the middle section). It just sounds like he's trying to hard for a hit single (it wasn't) and it doesn't flow like other songs. Head Hang Low is much slower, but still feeling a little ordinary, but things are rescued by the fantastic and raunchy Pussyface, another which appeared Everyone Wants To Shag The Teardrop Explodes, in a much more stripped down version, but this bounces along, driven by a groovy bass line. Greatness And Perfection was another single, a catchy little song, pleasant, but not much more than that. The original album ends with Lunatic And Firepistol, a minimal piece with oboe accompaniment, sparse keyboard, an almost folk song with a low key bonkers finish involving a trumpet.
But as a special 'treat' on the CD there are three more tracks, all additional songs from the Sunshine Playroom single, all of them very definite B sides, and it's clear why they were no more than that.
It's a great debut album, from a true maverick and innovator, and there's a lot more of these to come.
4* - a great album, a lovely piece of English whimsy in the tradition of the Kinks, XTC and Small Faces.
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