Today (29th July) sees the fortieth anniversary of one of the seminal releases on the Merciful Release label, Salvation’s Girlsoul, the imprint’s first to be simultaneously issued in both 7” and 12” formats. Issued in a stunning white sleeve – a real break with MR tradition – the three tracks were recorded at Kenny Giles’ Bridlington studio and were produced by Andrew Eldritch, who according to the press release pictured which confirms the release date, was also managing the band at the time, using his own name (“Andy Taylor”).
These were not
the only connections to The Sisters of Mercy however, with Doktor Avalanche
moonlighting as Salvation’s drum machine and playing a prominent role on all
three tracks, and lead singer Danny Mass being one of the band’s roadies at the
time (and moving into 7 Village Place when Gary Marx moved out). This was not an uncommon occurrence, with Noel Gallagher having roadied
for Inspiral Carpets perhaps the most famous example.
The three songs
for the Girlsoul EP were recorded during the winter and at minimal cost,
as the band recall on their website that “it was snowing and the band were
skint! Andrew knew that the band didn’t have any money and so, asked to be paid
in kind with West Yorkshire’s finest stimulants. 3 sleepless nights and the Girlsoul
EP was born!”
In Mark Andrews’ seminal biography of The Sisters of Mercy’s early years, Paint My Name In
Black and Gold, Mass (real name Daniel Horigan) recalls that it actually
took two sessions to complete the recording, the first being aborted after the
singer “lost a tooth whilst I was eating a liquorice stick. We had to go back
and complete the vocals after I had a crown.”
I myself was lucky
enough to have the opportunity to interview Danny Mass for the legendary The
Sisters of Mercy online fan group Heartland Forum on the occasion of
Salvation’s thirtieth anniversary gig in 1985, and asked him about the
recording sessions for the Girlsoul release, the first time he had been
in a recording studio. “The studio time was fast and frantic,” he told me. “We didn't
have long and had never been near a studio before. Andrew was keen and
enthusiastic: he knew the desk and we worked well together. I love being in the
studio - it was a great experience and set us on our way.”
Of the three
tracks, the Girlsoul EP’s title track bore the greatest musical
relationship to The Sisters of Mercy’s own output, with a simple, repetitive
guitar riff courtesy of Mike Hayes, and James Kenyon's insistent bassline not unlike Craig Adams’ staccato motif on
the Teachers demo, and of course the omnipresent and unmistakable
presence of drum machine Doktor Avalanche in TR-808 incarnation high in the mix,
although Mass’ vocal tone was lighter and more vulnerable than Eldritch’s own
sonorous baritone.
The TR-808 was an
expensive piece of kit upon its release in the early 1980’s, retailing at £795,
and apart from with The Sisters of Mercy and their acolytes, was also popular
with the hip hop fraternity, meaning that even today a good example will fetch eight
times the original price, with fewer than twelve thousand units having been
originally manufactured.
Eldritch’s
growing skill as a producer, evident also on The Sisters’ own Anaconda
single from the same era, is clear on the lead track, as explained by Heartland
Forum member robertzombie, an expert in needledrop analysis of vinyl records: “Eldritch
gave us a great mix with punch, dynamic range, and a reasonable amount of
depth. The most intriguing aspect of this song is the way in which, on the
12" single, it gets louder and louder as the piece progresses, with each
instrument piling on an additional layer of sinister repetition to draw the
listener in (or perhaps repel them)”.
The immediate
appeal of the title track of EP helped to propel it into the Independent Chart
top thirty upon release, with the three tracks’ very different styles making it
clear that Salvation’s music palette was going to be broader than that of their
MR labelmates. When the songs were finally released by the band themselves on
CD in late 2014, tragically just after the death of original bass player James
“Elmore” Kenyon, along with the shelved Clash of Dreams EP (recorded in 1984, also
produced by Eldritch but never released on Merciful Release in March 1985 as
had been originally intended), I reviewed them in detail:
“The title track was the most immediate, and was deservedly the first of the band's Independent Chart hits, whilst Evelyn has an almost Joy Division back beat. The real treasure, though, is Dust Up … one of the greatest MRs of all time. Danny and the band seem to be playing an obscure OMD b-side in the first couple of minutes whilst Doktor Avalanche rat-tat-tats impatiently on the studio door. The next ten minutes is pure psychedelic goth trance bliss, before the song ends in the same way it started. One can well imagine the band leaving Eldritch in the studio to finish the insipid original whilst they headed to the nearest pub to Ken Giles' studio in Bridlington to make last orders, returning the following morning to find Von slumped over the controls, exhausted by the all-night shift required to make his masterpiece. Possibly.”
The latter
conjecture on my part was of course entirely fantasy, with Danny explaining in
his interview with me the following year the true genesis of the fourteen-minute
epic Dust Up, which certainly betrays a debt to US electro-punk pioneers
Suicide, a major influence on not only Mass and Eldritch but on the whole Leeds
(post-)punk scene: “Dust Up was supposed to be an improvised 'jam' like
an early Velvet Underground kind of 'trip' thing. But recording in a studio
with limited time isn't the best way to do that kind of thing so it was all a
bit too structured (even though it doesn't sound like it) by the time we
finished. It was a good idea but a little naïve on our part.” As further evidence of just how new a project Salvation was at the time, the band didn't make its live debut until 1985!
On the fortieth anniversary of its release, Girlsoul has rightly just been named as one of the “top fifty guaranteed floorfillers” in Uncut Magazine’s rundown of Goth Club Anthems in their “Ultimate Genre Guide: Goth” magazine, helping to cement the band’s reputation as more than just a footnote in the Andrew Eldritch story, whilst the current iteration of the band has just completed a few dates supporting fellow goth-adjacent Leeds legend The Rose of Avalanche. In 2021 the band released an acclaimed live album recorded in St Niklaas in March 2020, which is available (along with Clash of Dreams and other previous releases) on their Bandcamp page.
My thanks for
this post are again due to Danny, QB and other members of the Salvation team
for the 2015 interview and for the inspirational music!
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