Sisters of Mercy - Classic or Dud

"Colours" is Alan Vega no?

nb I prefer the Sisterhood version of "Colours" by a mile

also I'm fairly certain novaheat wasn't referring to "Finland Red, Egypt White" (which definitely has drums), I was just posting the lyrics for no particular reason

Confused! Fox is a drummer. James Ray is the main vocalist on Gift. (is Colours Vega? Could be, I don't know)

(even more confused! Fox does read the AK47 manual)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sisterhood

:-/

Colours = Vega
Giving Ground = Ray
I think Rain From Heaven is Vega/Ray/Morrison together

(and Fox doing the spoken part)

I'm still not convinced that it's Vega singing on Gift's Colours.

I've never heard Ray sing like that.

I picked up Gift for 13 bucks at a record store, because it was a Sisters of Mercy thing that I had never seen/heard before (they're one of the few bands where I'll grab singles or random crap from because there's bound to be something awesome on everything they put out). Man, that is a weird little artifact.

I put it on in the car once when I was driving with friends, and they were really confused. The AK-47 song is definitely the winner. Gift is up there with 25... Tab as far as weird contract fillers go.

Gift is fucking awesome and I will hear nothing else. Best Sisters album of them all (if we're not counting the comp of the Merciful release stuff).

Big problem with Gift is the absence of Eldritch on vocals. His delivery is a large part of the reason I love the band so much.

Yeah I was going to say, I just don't think Eldritch sings on Gift at all. I don't think that's actually a problem, though.

This thing with trying to pinpoint Vega on Gift drove me crazy before, though and I'm not about to pull that out and try to figure it out again. I give up.

I think Eldritch didn't want to sing on the album so as not to cause any legal problems with the name dispute or something. That's what he claims, anyway.

Okay, I've listened to Colours again now and I just do not think it's Vega. It's too freaking subtle for him. He's supposed to be doing an Elvis thing, you know. Tone of voice is lower/different, too. Nah, I don't buy it. Not Vega.

Rain From Heaven might be a different story, though. He could be in there somewhere.

Yea, "You Could be the One" is great. It actually sounds like a GnR tune.

I've been arguing for years that Andy should cover "You Could Be Mine".

There's something vaguely threatening about Andrew Eldritch reciting in monotone the dimensions of an aircraft over bland techno music with the drum tracks removed.

OMG I have never heard this, it sounds kind of freaking awesome! Is it?

OMG I have never heard this, it sounds kind of freaking awesome! Is it?

Um. Kind of. The "Screw Shareholder Value" album doesn't sound like a Sisters of Mercy album at all... basically it was some piece of garbage he put out to get out of his record deal. Info here. More <a href="http://www.sisterswiki.org/index.php/Go_Figure_%28album%29";>here</a>. The "Sisters Wiki" page has lyrics for most of the SSV songs, so you can see that the songs "Two in the Nose" and "Bad Vultee" are definitely about airplance, not AK-47's.

Also, his "vocal delivery", if it can be counted as anything more than a disinterested murmur, kind of adds to the overall creepiness value.

That being said, the album does have a weird ambiance about it. It doesn't sound like a Sisters record, it's not that good... but there's something about it I like.

Ah, shit. The proper link is this.

I really want to know who does sing "Colours."

http://www.myheartland.co.uk/viewtopic.php?p=171447#171447
Q).re. "Colours" -what did you think of the Floodland version compared to the Gift version? I prefer the Bunnymen's Colours.
were you narked that Von re-recorded the vocal or pleased when it wasn't as good as the original?
A)It's of no interest to me as I didn't do the vocals on the original

Well it's 1969 okay
got a war across the USA

There's nothing here for me and you
just sitting here with nothing to do

Ha! So I was the last one to post on this thread. How amusing. I find myself listening to and enjoying the material on Some Girls Wander By Mistake now and this is stuff I never really expected to be into anymore since I was a teenager. Not sure why but my forays into Sisterdom since then bore no fruit. I'm rather intrigued with the "Phantom" instrumental for example - and I can't understand why I don't remember that one since I certainly had the vinyl it was on.

Also - I could never quite accept that "Gimme Shelter" was really a Rolling Stones song.

Run around in the radiation

Burn Out In The Acid Rain.

BLACK

SOMEDAY SOMEDAY SOMEDAY DOMINION
SOME SAY PRAYERS SOME SAY PRAYERS

AND I SAY MINE

THERE'S A WHITE HOUSE IN THE MIDDLE OF RUSSIA

I'M LIVING IN FILMS FOR THE SAKE OF RUSSIA
A KINO RUNNER FOR THE DEE DEE ERR

Much as I like songs like "Body Electric" and "Anaconda" and all, I do like being able to audibly hear the Sisters suddenly and totally jell with "Alice."

they never gelled as well as they did on "The Damage Done"

"Home of the Hit Men" or nothing. Okay maybe "Kiss the Carpet (Reprise)"

SEE THOSE BABIES GO GO GO GO GO!!!!!!

No seriously though, it's really "Watch" that kills me the most off this CD because that is some SERIOUSLY BADASS PIL-ish Metal Box era BASS. That is about as good as post-punk EVER gets.

Just happy to see the Sisters continue to bask in ILM love.

(Grammatically, that was shite.)

I preferred my mis-hearing of the Floorshow punchline when I was in high school: "see those pagans go go go go go"

I thought that's what it was!

Yeah, me too.

oh, well it's "babies"

my then-girlfriend and I used to discuss the relative merits of what we wished he'd been saying vs. what we were pretty sure he was actually saying

I feel I should quote the entire lyrics of 'You Could be the One'

All God's children give good phone
I called Jesus, he's not home
So I'm so pleased to talk to you
Trees and walks I love them too
Threatened species, they adore me
Flower children never bore me
But all the things you share are
Better left unsaid
When you can give me head
And run your fingers through my hair
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you could be the one, we can meditate
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you could be the one, let's call it fate
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you could be the one, to get your flowers pressed
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you could be the one, just get undressed
Ahhh I'm so glad to find you here
Mystic people, they're so dear
I don't like the rest
Your sign's the best
Whatever it is, I'm most impressed
IIIII don't need to understand
The laying on of hands
I'm in a hurry to get my collar straight
Cause life is short, and I can't wait
So don't worry about the state of this pretty little thing in the armour plate
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you could be the one, we can meditate
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you could be the one, let's call it fate
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you could be the one, to get your flowers pressed
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you could be the one, just get undressed
I'm so pleased that you believe
Now open up a little let the good times in
Mmm we're going for a ride
Destiny can't be denied
But all those precious things are better left unsaid
When you can give me head and run your fingers through my hair
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you could be the one, we can meditate
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you could be the one, let's call it fate
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you could be the one, to get your flowers pressed
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you could be the one, just get undressed
Love...
Is all you need.

Julian M in the Quietus on the early Sisters

while any band that held its guitars below their nipples was immediately decried and denounced as “rockist” by the sad fools too afraid of the ‘gain’ setting on their amps.

umm was rockist term really in use back in the early 80s ?

Very much so. (The whole revival of it as a critical term this decade -- which I think was partially started here, really -- was referring back to its original use then.)

Was it used solely to gauge the relative distance of items to nipples?

The early eighties were a strange time.

How rockist are instruments perpendicular to nips?

http://www.sixtiescity.com/Media/merseybeat.jpg

Best piece of writing on the Sisters I've ever seen, and I can totally endorse the comments on 'anti-rockism' in the early eighties.

Thanks for posting - a pint of snakebite and black for Mr. M!

it's a great piece but doesn't alice/floorshow actually come after the reptile house ep?

According to this, no:

3. Alice b/w Floorshow
a. 7" Merciful Release MR 015 Nov 1982
ROGI:"kenny giles walks on water" "for spiggy-flash that ash"
COVER ART SOURCE:
Henri Matisse's Nude Blue in gold on black.
NOTES:
Produced by John Ashton of the Psychedelic Furs. Entered the
Independent Chart at #26.
PERSONNEL: SIS 1

4. Anaconda b/w Phantom
a. 7" Merciful Release MR 019 Mar 1983
ROGI: "nothing" "spiggy rides again"
COVER ART SOURCE:
Alice Cooper's Billion Dollar Babies in silver on black.
NOTES:
Produced by Andrew Eldritch. Single of the Week in Sounds.
PERSONNEL: SIS 1

5. Alice/Floorshow b/w Phantom/1969
a. 12" Merciful Release MR 021 Mar 1983
ROGI: "im westen nichts neues-jesus loves the sisters" "for
spiggy(foreign field)" "mein irisch kind. wo weilest du?"
COVER ART SOURCE:
Same as the 7".
NOTES:
Alice, Floorshow and 1969 produced by John Ashton. Phantom
produced by Andrew Eldritch. 1969 originally by the Stooges.
Released in response to import copies of the American 12"
showing up in the UK at greatly inflated prices. First part of
the ROGI is the German title of Erich Maria Remarque's 'All
Quiet on the Western Front'. Fourth part is lines 33-34 of T. S.
Eliot's poem, 'the Wasteland'.
PERSONNEL: SIS 1

6. the Reptile House E.P.
Kiss the Carpet/Lights/Valentine/Fix/Burn
a. 12"EP Merciful Release MR 023 May 1983
ROGI: "for spiggy-paint it black"
COVER ART SOURCE:
Taken from a National Geographic magazine.
NOTES:
Produced by Andrew Eldritch. First 5,000 came with a lyric
sheet. Single of the Week in Sounds. Some copies are violet on
crimson instead of pink on black. Not listed is Kiss the Carpet
(reprise), which is the same as the drum intro to Kiss the
Carpet that opens the ep. Original pressings have MR023 on the
spine where 'made in england' is on the repressings.
PERSONNEL: SIS 1

man back in the day we always thought - my girlfriend and I, the secret SoM fanclub of Claremont - that Reptile House sounded so much cruder & earlier than the more accomplished-sounding Alice/Floorshow EP. weird.