Sisters of Mercy - Classic or Dud

Classic? Yes, natch, etc.

I too saw them on the aborted tour with Public Enemy & Gang of Four at NYC's Radio City Music Hall. Finest moment was when Andrew came back out for the encore wearing a Public Enemy baseball jersey.

The best gig I was never at was the one in the early 1980s where the Sisters of Mercy were supported by an up-and-coming Smiths.

nostalgia - classic, in hindsight - dud

when i wasnt sleeping through the 80s i avoided becoming a goth by whistling 'Delia Sands' by the Brilliant Corners and skipping in my Starbrite pyjamas.

NO NO I MUST BE HARD CHARVER OVERLORD RUFFNECK RIPPINITUP.......

Oh yes, I'll admit, VISION THING was pretty lame but FLOODLAND was epic at its best. Love the bass line from "Lucretia".

ALICE! Don't - give it away!"

I love this band.

xpost

OWNZ

I struggle to forgive Eldritch for three shows now (one with Depeche Mode in 91, Reading Festival with Tony James 92? and one a couple of years ago in Glasgow) for very nearly making me not care about this band any more.

Be honest Alex - if you could stand the best Wayne song against even the worst Benn Gunn era song, who would win? Exactly. (It's also worth noting at least a few of those songs existed as rough versions before Wayne turned up - see also some Mission and Ghost Dance {the only one of the lot to embrace their Glam roots properly} songs having turned up at Sisters soudchecks.)

http://www.denis.co.uk/acatalog/dor-mi-wh-uu-l-0001.jpg

If I posted a note transcription instead, most would shrug. ;-)

that said, they do have some classic jamz.

ihttp://img.photobucket.com/albums/v292/aldo_cowpat/dalek.jpg

OTM re pre-Wayne era Sisters, though there are still a few good tracks to be found during and after Wayne. That version of 'Sugar Baby Love' I grabbed off your slsk roxorz, not so sure about 'He's got the whole world in his hands' though...

To be fair, Mr E does say before it that you'll all hate it.

OK, I may have overstated slightly the shiteness off the Wayne era and beyond, but decent tracks are few and far between. I've never rated Marian, btw.

Eldritch + Steinman should = genius, instead = quite good.

And is the SSV album that bad? I've never managed to find it anywhere.

http://www.thesistersofmercy.com/gen/ressv.htm

Yeah, I'm with Siegbran there -- there were a number of albums that Merciful Release put out in the early nineties that were non-SOM, but none of them seemed to be a guise for the man himself.

In regards to new material and you personally - the last thing I am aware of you ‘releasing’ was some remixes for Die Krupps in 1994. What are you up to lately? Anything new since then - or in the works? Rumour has it that you’ve produced a couple of techno albums under various pseudonyms - any truth to this?

You are very well-informed. That is a rumour I will not deny (although I prefer the description "ambient-pop-industrial-techno hybrid with tunes and intelligence"). Nor would I confirm it if it were true - because rumour has it that I actually performed the albums in question. My contract with East West prevents me from being a featured artist in any other arena, and East West are prepared to spend a lot of money in court to uphold their belief that the contract is still in force. Even if I had a pathological need to openly perform on records, I would need an awful lot of money to assert my freedom. I have neither, so it's not much of an issue.

Actually, East West are preparing to spend a lot of money in court to uphold their belief that I should be forced to make records for them. Most labels give up when the artist has been on strike for four years or so. East West are so desperate that they won't give up ...after seven years. That really is desperate.

That sounds like a "yes, it's true but I can't legally say so" to me.

I want to say this was Hyde Park somewhere?

actually, i think it was the Astoria (Harehills, and a very ballroom type of place), it could have been the gig that was recorded for Death Of Everything
in fact, i do remember going, cos i went with friends.

Dylan sacked on stage on Saturday. Lots of speculation that the end is imminent, and they may not even see out the currently booked shows.

source??

read about the two Roundhouse gigs here - https://www.myheartland.co.uk/viewforum.php?f=37

(specifically, starting on page 6 of the 22nd September show)

thanks!

Dylan's not been seen since Saturday. Sunday & today (forum members are live posting during the Amsterdam show): Ben (guitar & vocals), Chris (nurse/keyboard/drum machine), Andrew (croaking)

Bauhaus::Sisters of Mercy
Frank Sinatra::Nancy Sinatra

Uh, I think you’re going to need to expand a little on that analogy.

I thought it was pretty well self-contained.

So like, Bauhaus are the Sisters' dad, but the Sisters are more underrated and do great duets? Is Terri Nunn Lee Hazlewood?

Damn, now i really want to hear Frank Sinatra singing Bela Lugosi

The Sisters had a fruitful collaboration with Jim Steinman, so maybe the analogy works?

I want to be a part of it, undead undead

Hahaha!

I can imagine Andrew Eldritch singing "Some Velvet Morning" but only the Lee Hazlewood parts

Bought a ticket for a September show, hope this tour doesn't self-destruct before then.

Reviews of the show in SF last year were the worst things I’ve ever heard, good luck

Got tickets for Radio City but fully expecting it to be awful and just going for nostalgia’s sake. Last time I saw them was maybe 2006ish and it was already getting iffy.

they were pretty fun when I saw them last year but honestly you could have just shown up for the encore and gotten everything you needed (Lucretia/Temple/Corrosion)... this year they're playing Austin the same night as Johnny Marr/James... sorry Sisters!

What I heard from their "new" songs sounded pretty good - wish they could do a Peel session and just them get them quickly recorded

they've been playing "Giving Ground".. what a great fucking song

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6_iisDAhq8

Reviews I read of last year’s shows said it was hard to hear Eldritch, which maybe isn’t a surprise. Even on the albums his vox are a little buried, and if he’s lost vocal strength that’ll make it worse. But I figure it’ll be fun just to watch him glower.

he actually reminded me of Mark E. Smith, pacing around on stage messing around with instruments

From the reissued vinyl thread:

Vinyl came back from the dead – and so did the bootleggers: inside the booming business of knock-off records

BPI’s press department sends me a top 10 list of the artists whose bootleg and counterfeit albums have been most frequently removed from online platforms (or “delisted”). The No 1 position, somewhat surprisingly, is held by the veteran goth outfit the Sisters of Mercy, with 695 delistings. Then comes David Bowie, the Rolling Stones, Joy Division and Pink Floyd – followed by the Cure, the Clash, Led Zeppelin, Motörhead and Iron Maiden.

I saw them last week, with some trepidation from mixed live reviews, and I thought it was a blast. Eldritch’s vox were a little buried and mumble, but he could project when he wanted to. The band rocked, the two guitarists sounded great and were all about striking cartoon-goth rock-god poses in silhouette. I like Eldritch’s aesthetic commitment to the bit.

Only disappointment set-wise was no “Vision Thing,” but overall I had a great time.

Yeah I went to see them last year with the same trepidation and they were much better than expected — though from what I’ve read I was at one of the few shows of that tour where Andrew’s vocals were actually audible in the mix. The current U.S. tour has been getting great reviews and I’m bummed I wasn’t able to make it this time around. I do wish they’d go back to a live bass player, and it’d be really nice if they recorded some of the dozens of songs they’ve written in the last 25 years or so!

Is there a popular go-to bootleg for those songs?

Is there an acknowledged reason he won't record these songs?

he's just full of shit & afraid to commit.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sisters_of_Mercy#Possible_fourth_studio_album

(if you're reading this, Von, you have my approval to use that as the album title)

A lot of them are compiled in this YouTube playlist:
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLHopZYxy8YZEBV7l4CzjBVFTNa543EgLI

And there’s a guy who’s been recording pretty decent studio versions of all of them (along with a few covers of older released material mixed in) and posting to Spotify and Apple Music. Search for artist Tobias Forsner. His vocal delivery suffers in comparison to Andrew’s in his prime, but you get a good sense of what the songs could sound like.

(xxp)

Thanks

a new album...

The Sisters Of Mercy cancel concert at this year’s Brutal Assault to move up the recording schedule for their new album
https://www.side-line.com/the-sisters-of-mercy-new-album-2026/

talk about your signs of the apocalypse

There's your Chinese democracy.

i'll believe it when it's in my ears!

35+ years between records might be a new record?

he's just trying to show up Betty Boo

I love that their website has fundamentally never changed since it was mentioned in the original post upthread.

xxxxp after 26 years it's more like North Korean Democracy.

who will release a new album first:

Björk

Kate Bush

Sky Ferreira

MBV

Sisters of Mercy

35+ years between records might be a new record?

― Jordan s/t (Jordan), Tuesday, 24 March 2026 19:59 (fifteen minutes ago)

The Sisters are close, but ABBA managed 40 years between The Visitors and Voyage.

Shirley Collins was 40 years as well iirc

Dean Glitter has the record according to Wikipedia, 57 years between first and second albums

Linda Perhacs managed 44 years between Parallelograms and The Soul of All Natural Things

Well dang, I thought Vashti Bunyan might be the longest.

I'll bet money that the D'Angelo album comes out before this though.

Like others, I'll believe it when I see it.