Best Cocteau Twins album

Songs like 'Summer-Blink' are a million miles away from where they started but it feels like a well-earned and reflective respite at the end of a long journey.

The problem I have with Four Calendar Cafe and Milk & Kisses is that they didn't advance beyond the sound of Heaven or Las Vegas. Before that, each album was a progression from the sound of the previous one (admittedly, only a matter of degrees--they were never not going to sound like Cocteau Twins). But after briefly experimenting with some very different approaches on the 1995 Twinlights and Otherness EPs, I was disappointed the following year when Milk & Kisses seemed to reflected none of that.

The Otherness EP is post-peak peak CT, but owe's more to Seefeel's Mark Clifford.

For me, its either Head Over Heels or the EPs from Spangle Maker to

oops... to Love's Easy Tears.

The problem I have with Four Calendar Cafe and Milk & Kisses is that they didn't advance beyond the sound of Heaven or Las Vegas.

I feel exactly the opposite. "Milk & Kisses" really is Cocteau by numbers, but at least the songs are there. I find 4CC kind of boring and uninspired.

never got into four calendar cafe, agree with LeRooLeRoo here. Really been into head over heels / sunburst and snowblind lately. Though I think the version of "sugar hiccup" on BBC session kills the studio flat. BBC sessions is probably one of their best records

Is there an EP's poll?

Hi Jed

Can you pick the best Cocteau Twins EP/single? (poll ends 15/05/07)

love's easy tears is clearly the best tho

Thanks, Ross.

This album poll is impossible though. Depends on whatever CT i'm listening to at the time. Victorialand would probably be my choice. "Sunday" on Valet's album "Nature" totally rips on "Lazy Calm" by CT, recommended if you like that same sublime buzz

I have the suspicion that "Four Calendar Cafe" is not loved as it is the first album where she sings in English, where her lyrics make sense. The mystery is gone, she is just like you and me, no angel and no elf. That's totally ridiculous but the only possible reason I can up with why nobody except me loves that album. "Bluebeard" is such a great tune and the guitar has got that phantastic twangy indierock feel. And the song after is probably the best song in their oeuvre. I wrote it already upthread. It is utter perfection, music to bath in. The next song where she stutters is phantastic again. Are you all deaf? FCC is a pop album but it is of one piece, seriously underestimated. If I want to öisten to ONE album by them these days it is FCC.

can up with = can come up with

There's the problem: twangy indierock feel. For longterm fans, Cocteau Twins always offered otherworldly escapism.

Half Gifts is devastating partly because of its direct intimate lyrics

Cocteau Twins make me happy

If I was going to vote in this poll again, I would vote for Garlands

Milk & Kisses is great, though.

Treasure

Just listened to Garlands, Head Over Heels and Treasure back to back, which I've never done before. It's been many years since I heard these:

Garlands is genuinely unsettling, I still love the dark vibe. It's always been it's own thing.
Head Over Heels is more of a mixed bag than I remembered, the second half really pales in comparison to the first. It's transitional nature is apparent, it retains some of the early darkness while the better tracks let the light in.
Treasure is glorious in its fullness, they've arrived at their signature sound and it all works, even the drum machine.

I think I'll spin the next three in a row now.

One of the most consistent bands of the 80s.

I was one of the Victorialand votes - some of that has to do with how left-field a move it seemed at the time; in my peer group, the Cocteau Twins, from the EPs through Treasure, had rapidly become the "everybody agrees this band is awesome" band -- I remember specific parties with Aikea-Guinea playing on the stereo, the sound stapling itself permanently to the moment & the era. It felt like music that would bind us in the coming years. Victorialand was the first one to come out the year after I graduated high school, and I bought it fresh off the rack -- I knew I had to hear it. To get it home and hear that they'd jettisoned the propulsive, driving percussive sound that informed so much of their preceding year-plus: it felt SO brave & nervy, so confident -- I listened to that album every day for a long time in '86. Get stoned, listen to Victorialand. Feel like committing suicide, listen to Victorialand. Wonder if there's any real future, listen to Victorialand.

It was the perfect album for that time & for me then, it was a world into which I could grant myself entrance where things were beautiful and safe but not so safe that deep sadness and longing weren't also there.

Victorialand is my favorite, as well.

Head Over Heels is more of a mixed bag than I remembered, the second half really pales in comparison to the first.

I mean, the second half contains "In The Gold Dust Rush", "The Tinderbox (Of a Heart)", and "Musette and Drums" which are three of my favorite CT songs ever, though I agree "Multifoiled" and "My Love Paramour" aren't as strong.
I always thought "Multifoiled" sounded like Siouxsie's "Cocoon" from the year before. And there's also The Cure's "Speak My Language" that came out around the same time.

I'm with you on "Musette And Drums", an excellent closer, but the others don't do it for me like "When Mama Was Moth" or "Sugar Hiccup". I'm hardly saying they're bad but there's a noticeable drop-off in quality for me.

Another vote for Victorialand. Love the absence of drums

moon and melodies is super underrated. in time tho my heart is with heaven or las vegas, which is probably their most perfect distilled dream pop statement - never fails to brighten up any day

Feel you on M+M. 'Why Do You Love Me' is one of my all-time favorite instrumentals.

It's funny to see old threads like this revived... apparently, I was "over the Cocteaus" in about 2002. Well, they came back. I've been listening to them a lot in the last 2-3 years.

And it's still BBK.

That sounds like 'I'm over my skeleton' to me.

Not a big fan despite loving all the other usual suspects from that scene/era, and only heard half of these I think, but Heaven or Las Vegas would be the easy choice for me. More muscular and groovy than all the other stuff I heard.

I would say the early Heggie stuff was easily the most muscular.

oh totally RAG, "blind dumb deaf"

It's Victorialand but HoLV is stiff competition.

Its nice to see my few old polls I ever did on ILM bobbing back up now and then!

Heaven for me but Victorialand is close.

those two records are always doing battle in my head. depressive me says victorialand, the me that loves great pop says holv

Victorialand always.

BBK forever but I did listen to Head Over Heels for the first time in a few years on a solo wander around Epping Forest, after a lunchtime pint, and it was glorious!

They were always one of those bands where I'd change my mind on which my favourite album was. I think Head Over Heels was my favourite when I first got into them. Heaven Or Las Vegas is far ahead of the others these days. Victorialand in second place.

I think I'd forgotten how cavernous and teenage-intense HoH is; some of Liz's most memorable pre-conlang lyrics too - "There’s only a hair’s breadth between us/Askew as we are", "Paramour/ooze out and away onehow", "In the gold dust rush I only genuflect". No wonder her and Ian McC were such good mates. Sing nonsense as if your life depends on it.

Genuflect is a very bunnymen word, yes. In fact I was after another use of genuflect to complete a trilogy and this will do nicely.

(Ultra Vivid Scene being the other, shut your eyes and genuflect, the avenging angel comes.)

there's also 23 years too late by wire from read and burn 3

ugh

Elizabeth Fraser, the other worldly voice of Cocteau Twins performed a rare gig in London on Monday night. Fraser has been elusive these days, having only performed live a handful of times since the band’s demise over 20 years ago.

http://www.post-punk.com/cocteau-twins-elizabeth-fraser-makes-a-rare-live-performance-in-london/

Society of the Golden Slippers
Like This Page · 19 hrs ·

So, last night we hosted a rare performance from the glorious Liz Fraser who was joined by John Grant for a song. What a privilege! We still can't quite believe it happened! Huge thanks to Elena Tonra (Daughter) and Julia Biel for their gorgeous opening sets. What a night! — with Caroline Cremin.

Did it actually happen? Yes it did. Liz Fraser and John Grant joined us in our intimate salon and sang us to heaven. pic.twitter.com/CIGxne9214

— Golden Slippers (@GoldenSlippers7) September 4, 2018

HOLV seems to be the consensus pick these days, and would probably win if this poll were run again. I dunno, I still think Treasure is their defining moment – the apex of their early pre-Raphaelite leanings.

To me it's always felt HOLV was the consensus pick?

It will never not be Blue Bell Knoll for me, but any of the others can give it a run for its money on a suitable day. Currently rediscovering Victorialand for the tenth time.

some of Liz's most memorable pre-conlang lyrics too - "There’s only a hair’s breadth between us/Askew as we are"

Happened across this at random and omg, I never realised it was "askew" she sang there, I thought it was "obscure as we are". but now it all makes sense!

Theres only a hair's breadth between us, askew as we are
There's only a hair's breath between us, a-strewn as we be

Getting on the web for the first time properly in the summer of '93 (doing a software engineering postgrad thing at Liverpool Uni), I downloaded and *printed out* all kinds of 4AD content. These Cocteau lyrics - whether they're right or not - are fixed in my mind in Courier New monospace on sheets of A4.

Head over Heels was released 40 years ago today (24 October 1983). Still my favourite Cocteau Twins album, just ahead of Heaven or Las Vegas.

https://thequietus.com/articles/13632-cocteau-twins-head-over-heels