Comsat Angels - Better than Joy Division?

Now who remembers The Sound?

Anyway, Clarke, how dare you go and discover the Comsats without me talking to you first. ;-) Better than Joy Division -- excuse me, NO NO NOT EVEN DON'T EVEN THINK SO WASH YOUR MOUTH OUT. Now having said that, I do think they're quite grand, the first three albums are mega- chill classics while even _Land_, however focused on le mainstream, is most impressive. The nineties stuff I've heard is a mix but still has much good to offer it. Start with _Waiting for A Miracle_, definitely.

Shame about the delay in releasing the Sound back catalog.

You know, Ned, I think maybe I did go a little overboard. ;-) But still, the Comsats are unimpeachable. I'm starting my hunt for 'Fiction' as of right this minute, and if I ever see their other stuff, I'll pick that up as well. You know, I'm kicking myself now, imagining a scenario in which thirteen year-old Clarke passes over all the Comsats' reissues in an unquenchable search for a used copy of 'Gish' (but hey, no shame there). Probably unlikely, though - I don't think those albums ever got distribution in Amurrica.

Latest word on the WB-era Sound reissues is that they are definitely going to happen this fall.

The Sound - as i've said before, some of the re-issues are out already, for some dumb reason they started with the dire "Heads and Hearts", although I've seen "Propaganda", the pre-Jeopardy outtakes/early demos album on the shelves in Sister Ray. The rest will follow later this year or early 2002, the schedule having been interrupted by Adrian's death.

I like Crispy Ambulance, although they didn't release a lot of their best material in their shot lifetime , except on crappy mail-order only cassettes. Some of that stuff is now on CD, which I guess is some of the stuff you have, Ned? "The Plateau Phase" is fairly monumental, IIRC.

?

Someone should right this most tragic wrong.

the sound is amazing. everytime i see "the sounds" or whatever the hell they're called in the S-section i get pissed off.

oh well, so it goes.
m.

I also have a stronger emotional attachment to the Comsats than Joy Division though, so maybe I can't be fair.

I'm not normally into fixating on guitar sounds and that but I think Fellows was a REALLY good guitarist, even though he doesn't seem to have had that much 'proper' technical ability. On a lot of the CA stuff he just recycles the same few little devices like picking out simplistic three note things and varying the intensity at certain points, and it works really well.

The production is good, there's just something about the atmosphere of the songs that I find a bit more reflective and restrained than Joy Division's 'ooh, bleak oppressive intimidating arghgh' stuff. I like that the AMG review goes out of its way to point out that the 'soundscapes are NOT goth' or whatever. Some of the keyboards sound it a bit though.

that's my own impression though.
m.

Sleep No More is probably their most 'studio' album yet it's also the closest they ever got to the live sound of their early years. Live, especially in a smallish room, they were brutal : thunderous drums, subterranean bass and the keyboards and guitar mixed subtlety with sheet-metal noise, which doesn't really come across on recd.

Hahaha...

i listen to CSA alot more than JD - i think i have always preferred them

something i'm not comfortable about feeling but which is an aspect of the comparison: CSA have the advantage of not being warped by such a massive history of appreciation and 'influence' back-annotating them into a particular context/framework that makes it almost an act of cultural reverence (or disdain) to listen to them...maybe half-a-dozen songs aside, i can hardly take joy division seriously by now: they seem so clumsy in their cues and pompous in their connotations of deep-and-meaningful-misery, in a way worse than the glam-sham-pain of later Goth Rock, in the same way that bad po-faced actors actually trying and taking themselves seriously is more cringe-inducing than panto-farce...
but it was partly their very success/efficiency at representing/inspiring that stuff that did this - so it is perhaps dubious and harsh to revisit them with this 'benefit' of hindsight through eyes now clouded with approx 25 yrs of polluting cynicism...

But anyway -
1st 3 albums by CSA have hardly dated or become amber-fixed in this way - partly because of this lesser attention and copying, but partly because they had a subtler/wider range of tone/sound, and could cover the more complex mixtures possible within the negative emotional range than JD's emphasis on resigned Gloom or restrained Angst gave - they did do that stuff, but they were also capable of representing neurotic/paranoiac aspects of self-doubt...fragile hope and acceptance(though whether driven by desperation or epiphany or those self-deceiving 'that's it' decisions, too soon/difficult to tell)... a kind of almost embarrassed gentle and regretful resignation/longing...a naive/childish disconnected and dispossessed stumbling inability to cope...a wry semi-alienated self-awareness of it all... all added up to a much more multifaceted/multidimensional representation of the swarm of confused emotions that can be present in our discontents

: the extra textural keyboard stuff was very nicely done - occasionally/lightly used instead of heavy chordal-sustain, shimmering around or hovering in the middle-distance, but in conjunction with some more adventurous production it gives alot of their stuff a slightly fever-dream/mirage quality that I don't hear in JD (e.g. there's a nightmarish quality to the spiralling 'don't look now' that i find it hard to imagine coming from JD)

: i find Fellows' guitar playing generally more varied/interesting than Sumner's - quite simple but seems to curl and crumble around the edges sometimes, distorted without sounding like gtr-wanking, mesmerising and...well, not 'tortured', but quite 'distressed' haha

: SF's vocals can sound as emotively anguished and strained as IC's, but in a way that focusses attention on the intention/meaning and not on the delivery problems - IC often sounds like he's about to topple over into Pub-Singer-Stylee bathos

Ned, are these BBC sessions Time Considered As A Helix Of Semi-Precious Stones or something else?

While JD's dramatics can lend themselves to being hard to take seriously -- Grand Guignol versus what Snowy is implying is a more 'realistic' kind of drama (perhaps a poor choice of words) -- I see it as a natural enough extension of a kind of mental state and attitude, where drama can be pumped up to a near-apocalyptic level. But both approaches can appeal when handled the right way.

cos i was an adolescent introvert who could care less about guitar technique.

good god some times I think this is the best band in the world

21 year old Clarke B. was onto something. I listened to Fiction the other night for the first time in a while, and I was utterly floored by it. There is nothing else I've ever heard that sounds like this record. It's just so incredibly subtle, with such richness and indescribable oddness of mood. You can feel them shedding the goth and searching for a way forward, and while the instrumental interplay is as jaw-dropping as it was on the first two records, there's a lightness of touch and increased nuance of expression that really elevates this record. I just kept wondering to myself as I listened, "How did they do this?" Who knows where they would have gone after this had they not made the infamous cash-grab?

Well said, Clarke. I find their first 3 all are astounding and "My Minds Eye" is just a shade lesser but incredibly transportive when I listen to it.

:-) I love any Comsat worship.

Oddly enough, part of what made them stick out on my shopping list is that Mark Kermode bragged that he preferred them to Joy Division.

Bought Sleep No More and it is very good but I just didn't get into it enough for the other albums to be a priority, maybe someday. Wished I liked it more (blasphemy, but sometimes I think this type of postpunk is slightly overrated). Sleep No More was going surprisingly scarce but the others were more available.
My favorite tracks were the title track and "Restless", I just really liked the mood and style of them.

Keep listening to it, it’ll grow on you!!

I'd definitely consider Comsat Angels better than Joy Division, but then I don't really rate JD in my top 50+ post-punk bands.

"After The Rain" has probably stuck with me most over the years:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wU4I7oh17f8

I did give it about 12 listens at least and I really did like it but just not as much as ardent fans.

"Bush Tetras - better than Mission Of Burma?"

"Tygers of Pan Tang - better than Darkthrone?"

I did give it about 12 listens at least and I really did like it but just not as much as ardent fans.

― Robert Adam Gilmour, Saturday, June 29, 2019 3:35 AM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

the thing is that it will keep growing on you

also the albums that border it are p different and also very much worth checking out, you might find something more up your alley there

Okay, I'll keep an eye on them in case they become scarce.

What's the consensus on the post-Polydor albums?

The consensus is that "Land" and "Seven Day Weekend" are attempts at selling out, but I disagree. They're good songs with production that doesn't suit them. "Chasing Shadows" is a lost gem, complete with super-fan Robert Palmer guest vocals (!). They renamed themselves Dream Command and released "Fire On The Moon," which is mostly a turkey but has a few solid tracks. Then they released "My Mind's Eye", which is as worthy as the first three, and then they ended with "The Glamour" which was released in two forms: 13 tracks single disc and 20 track double disc. I'm quite fond of it, it's a shade or two down from "My Mind's Eye" but still mostly great.

The Comsats are one of the mightiest and best bands ever. Those first three records!

If you're a fan of early Comsats (which you absolutely should be), the radio sessions and outtakes from the period are essential.

And, ever since I first heard it, Sleep No More has hit me the same way. There are three dark children of the new wave canon: Closer is the respected elder, Sleep No More is the ignored middle child, and Pornography is the doted on youngest.