 |
| |
|
| |
Album Review
by SashaS
3-10-2002
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
| Soft Cell's 'Cruelty Without Beauty' |
|
Soft Cell: 'Cruelty Without Beauty'
(Cooking Vinyl)
Soft Cell re-groups at the providence’s crossroads
The Cliff’s Law decrees “All groups that break up shall reform 20 years later.” Soft Cell worked under that name last in 1984, meaning they are a few years short of the requirement, which might be a good sign; perhaps, they felt the urgency of unfinished business? Although they collaborated on a couple of things under different guises during the time apart, it is only now Marc Almond and Dave Ball are back together for real.
The huge question is whether they can regain the legendary standard, can they re-induce the magic? Soft Cell try neither but do what they’ve always done, write songs, these two people and see what happens. Plenty does and the new songs are just like fireworks in the night! Huge electronic washes compliment Almond’s vocal that tend to be less dramatic than in the past. And yet, he camps it up no end recalling why they were tagged ‘Suicide-meets-Judy Garland’.
It still is the unmistakable Almond vocal guiding us through seedy and shady world of bizarre, painting scenes of periods when our dark sides are let to emerge in the light-polluted darkness – urbanity stripped off of its civilisation-restraints. Going through his emotional alphabet, acting and reaching internal depths, becoming the characters, backed by warmer, prettier sounds that are rich in tonality whereas once sparseness rung. The feel and the vibe of music easily recall the olden days but it is not a copy, an attempt to recapture l’esprit de tempe, it simply refuses to wallow in its own glorious past.
The subjects are today’s society (‘Desperate’), its decline (‘Monoculture’), mid-age crisis (‘Whatever It Takes’), grotesque and surreal (‘La Grand Guignol’, ‘Caligula Syndrome’), … There is also a cover of a Northern Soul classic, ‘The Night’, a return-nod to the genre that provided them with the greatest single moment, ‘Tainted Love’.
It is hard to imagine now what change Soft Cell brought to the pop world 20 years ago as things have become more liberal and yet, strangely, more orchestrated… Almond & Ball’s disc is like modern-disco music, dark, astute, catchy, thought-provoking… And it is great to see they’ve not become Soft Self. The whole album sounds like an anti-American anaemia…
‘Cruelty Without Beauty’ makes you want to re-try enjoying your destiny…
8/10
Tour dates:
15 October – Barrowlands, Glasgow
16 October – Ambassador, Dublin
25 October – Academy, Manchester
26 October – Barbican Centre, York
27 October – Academy, Birmingham
30 October – Academy, Bristol
31 October – Brixton Academy, London
SashaS
19-10-2002
Soft Cell album ‘Cruelty Without Beauty’ is released 30 Sept. 2002 on Cooking Vinyl
|
|
|
