Now this definitely warrants a bit of explanation. You see, coming off their commercial success with The Colour Of Spring, Mark Hollis and Talk Talk found themselves with quite a bit more freedom than previous efforts had allowed. Suddenly, the higher ups at EMI actually cared what they wanted and gave them some serious breathing room in the studio. This was (of course) exactly the chance these guys had been waiting for, having been stuck with the New Romantic label throughout their entire career, and it was not to be wasted. They quickly holed up in an old church with a whole orchestra's worth of odd studio musicians and refused to supply a single demo of their progress. Meanwhile, influenced by (among other things) impressionist painting, progressive rock, Astral Weeks-era Van Morrison, and modern classical music, a series of jams around the most skeletal of melodies were recorded along with various strange studio noises and meanderings. Finally, all this was woven together to form one homogeneous sonic tapestry with six segments and not a marketable single in sight. EMI was not pleased. The album bombed. Talk Talk got the ax. And the music? Wonderful.
I've heard that The Colour Of Spring foreshadowed much of Talk Talk's future creative development, and there are certainly some hints of later work to be found in such past excursions. Still, Spirit Of Eden is a totally unprecedented stylistic jump. Their previous efforts had strayed now and then, but there was nothing anywhere near this complex, idiosyncratic, or structurally loose. With the exception of "Desire" none of the compositions here have much in the way of rhythm so much as a steady pulse, usually delivered by the most minimal of percussion: a single, plodding drum beat being played over and over again at mid-tempo or a few regular cymbal shots. Odd instrumental noise drifts in and out of the songs when a recognizable melody is being played, sometimes off rhythm and/or key, yet managing to add all sorts of emotional color. Structured tunes twist into interlocking jams, which then form new structures with their own internal dynamics. Also, any synthesizers left over from their last record (if they exist at all) are carefully muted, and not a hint of rock can be heard (again, "Desire" stands as sole exception). Instead you get some very slow mood pieces with mostly religious themes and remarkable use of silence to keep all that musical embellishment from tripping over itself. The mood, following suit, is contemplative and often sad, Hollis' voice little more than a forlorn wail for the most part. However, it's worthy of note that there are moments of optimism and catharsis in every song; an important element sorely lacking in Laughing Stock three years later.
From the opening segment of "The Rainbow" (about a minute of horns and strings tuning up which fades into distorted brass moans and airy gasps) you know that this is going to be one wild ride. The piece builds about two and a half minutes worth of mounting tension, then lets it all go with a warped, dissonant string arrangement that pulls everything in the exact opposite direction you'd expect it to go. This arrangement actually becomes a sort of chorus to the spare verses, though it never truly feels like one, adding tension rather than supplying release. Then, at about six minutes, the anxiety is broken without warning by, of all things, a distorted harmonica wailing blues inflected lines that bite right into the listener's ear. It's one of three or four absolute standout moments on the record that make these compositions minor masterpieces of catharsis rather than so much ambient drift. "Desire" hits many of the same buttons using those loud-soft dynamic shifts. Sure, it starts off with a slow blur of keyboard, guitar, and strings, but then a HUGE crunchy riff breaks in, harmonicas wail, and elaborate polyrhythms pound every inch of the arrangement into oblivion. The most striking segment, however, sneaks in the second album side: Mark Hollis' ode to heroin addiction, "I Believe In You". While Hollis' voice has wailed pretty sadly before, here he sounds like every lyric is being sobbed and gasped out. The choral arrangement behind and constant chanting of the word "spirit" only add more eerie melancholy, driving home just how stunningly beautiful this piece really is (I've heard it called their best ever and wouldn't deny that based on my experience).
As for the rest it certainly lives up to the standout tracks, though failing to be quite as viscerally powerful. Both "Eden" and "Inheritance" have moments of sonic revelation worthy of note, and anthemic vocals to kill for. "Wealth" closes the album on its weakest note I guess, being such a quiet piece after an album's worth of slow-moving exploration. Yet that's as fitting a closing as could be expected here, considering that the band clearly spent most of Spirit's two year production making sure it was as low key as possible. Even assuming the proper commercial treatment, this might have failed to make money. With the benefit of hindsight, however, it tenatively looks like the band's best and most complete LP. Spirit of Eden is probably just about the only instance in which Hollis got the time and money to flesh out his ideas fully, organizing them into intricate bits of sonic architecture rather than conventional songs or the barren, lengthy jams of Laughing Stock. Fortunately, Talk Talk's stylistic discoveries are now being championed by a new generation of post-rockers, supplying them with lasting cult status and permanently subverting their image as mainstream glam product.
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And thus began Talk Talk's exile from the mainstream. Without a recording contract, the boys went label hunting and managed to end up exactly where they belonged least: the jazz wing of Polydor Records a.k.a. Verve. Once again Mark Hollis set out to push the envelope. Once again a series of minimal melodies were composed and a group of musicians gathered to fill them out. In fact, the instruments chosen for Laughing Stock's sessions are nearly indistinguishable from those on Spirit Of Eden. Viola, trumpet, electric organ, harmonica, and double bass are all back filling out much the same role they did before. Problem is that the band's experimental ambitions had grown considerably since their last album. Whereas before they spent months meticulously recording, tweaking, and composing songs that sounded loose and jam-like, here thay actually decided to just record a bunch of jams, regardless of whether the instrumental skill necessary to pull them off was present in the studio. It was a gutsy move to be sure, and one that again proved successful on some levels. You see, I'm pretty sure this is an album whose themes are supposed to reflect Talk Talk's sense of failure. Mark's lyrics are still religious, but much more apocalyptic in nature, focusing on images of sin, loss, and damnation. The music is sparse and dissonant, nearly static for minutes on end. In other words, it's a boring listen, but still manages to evoke emotional turmoil quite well.
Laughing Stock is divided, almost perfectly half-and-half, between two types of music: Can-like jams in which a single riff is stretched out to epic lengths, and spare mood pieces featuring Hollis' voice and guitar over barely-there arrangements. The former tends to produce more coherent results though not always better. On one hand you've got stuff like "After The Flood" with its slithering organ riff and endlessly splashy drumming. This may not work well as a song, but it's such a solid groove that at nine minutes (including some savage guitar feedback in the middle), "Flood" still feels the right length. Oddly, "New Grass" uses a similar sound and still comes off about four minutes too long. That ethereal riff and jazz-waltz rhythm do create a smooth gliding feel within the arrangement, but don't produce enough tension to sustain an epic. "Taphead" is the best mood piece, having very few lyrics (these being among Laughing Stock's grimmest) but enough melodic ideas to be worth paying attention. In particular, the long, dissonant brass middle section is remarkable; starting in atonal trumpet bursts till a bizarre bass motif appears and drums kick in. Also, Hollis wailing "Dust to/ Dust to/ Dust" at the end is truely creepy, no matter how many times you hear it. Of course, neither "Runeii" nor "Myrrhman" manage anything close to the quiet devastation of "Taphead". The former, however, does hold a bit more water due to its nifty guitar tone (Hollis seems to be sliding his fingers between notes to produce a ringing sound) and acts well as a closing invocation. "Myrrhman" is a considerably weaker opener, however, since the guitar here is limited to only a few spare chords, and any supporting instrumentation is totally disorganized. It sounds like a collective jam: snare drums shudder, a few tenative bass notes are plucked, and the occasional trumpet scale rises quietly. This continues for five plus minutes. Maybe extra playing was dubbed on later? Whatever the case, Hollis sounds entirely unaware of the remaining band, and there's not a moment of synergy.
Actually, if I were to describe the emotional impact of this album, depression wouldn't be the only state to figure in: indifference would as well. I mean, you can almost feel how little each band member was connecting at this point from the sheer, murmuring emptiness on display. Their subsequent break-up was a given. Hollis has finally released his first solo album after waiting nearly ten years (he claimed to be learning clarinet in the mean time). As for Laughing Stock, it was dropped after a few months of non-distribution and, like Spirit Of Eden, has since been reinstated by critics and post-rockers as a lost classic of modern music. Whether you believe that or not hinges on how well you take to this particular brand of sonic experimentation. You know where I stand.
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