Main Menu

Tip jar

If you like CaB and wish to support it, you can use PayPal or KoFi. Thank you, and I hope you continue to enjoy the site - Neil.

Buy Me a Coffee at ko-fi.com

Support CaB

Recent

Welcome to Cook'd and Bomb'd. Please login or sign up.

March 29, 2024, 07:35:53 AM

Login with username, password and session length

Mark Hollis

Started by SpiderChrist, February 25, 2019, 07:03:26 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

purlieu

Quote from: greenman on February 26, 2019, 08:34:33 AM
I do think you see already him being proven correct in that interview when he talks about making music timeless, I'd guess that the last two Talk Talk albums and his solo release seem a good candidate for rock(ish) music that will last long after pop culture references have become irrelevant.
Totally. Much as I love the sound of a lot of '80s production, those last two albums sounded timeless as soon as they were made because they intentionally avoided it. They could have been released on ECM in the '70s, or alongside bands like Traffic; they could come out now and still be regarded as contemporary-sounding masterpieces.

northernrebel

'Today' sounds as 1982 as you can get, but I loved it then and I loved it now. Ditto 'Talk Talk' etc. The early 80s were musically superb though, and he's a good example why.

RIP Mark Hollis.

Head Gardener

He was a great singer and will be sadly missed, but I admit that I heckled Talk Talk when they supported Genesis at the MK Bowl once, they never heard me...

Norton Canes

I remember being on holiday in France one summer, must have been about 1987. We had a day in Le Havre, and while the rest of the family were doing a museum or whatever I went down to the harbour, strolled around for a bit nosing at the boats then met a girl from Reading also escaping the family and we walked around together talking to each other, she was beautiful. We shared a kebab (this was in the days before the proliferation of kebab shops in the UK) and I found a pretty bracelet on the ground, silver with a decorated black stone, which I spontaneously gave to her as a memento. Later we sat on the end of the jetty as the sun set bathing us both in its warm golden glow. We hugged innocently and as if by divine providence the romantic beauty of the moment was made complete when a nearby fisherman's radio started playing Look Away. I'll never forget that day.

Norton Canes

Sorry that was Big Country

Johnboy

it's OK, that was great recollecting

a duncandisorderly

Quote from: Norton Canes on February 26, 2019, 11:50:56 AM
Sorry that was Big Country

fuckin' ruined here. great punchline, that.

Shit Good Nose

Quote from: a duncandisorderly on February 26, 2019, 12:46:32 PM
fuckin' ruined here. great punchline, that.

Yes, I LOLd quite uncontrollably in the office.  Someone asked me what was so funny, and I just said "long story".

king_tubby

QuoteTwo years later, NME's David Quantick wrote of Laughing Stock that "the whole thing is unutterably pretentious and looks over its shoulder hoping that someone will remark on its 'moody brilliance' or some such. It's horrible."

What a dreadful man Quantick is and was.

From here: https://thequietus.com/articles/26107-mark-hollis-talk-talk-obituary

Shit Good Nose

Quote from: king_tubby on February 26, 2019, 02:09:02 PM
What a dreadful man Quantick is and was.

From here: https://thequietus.com/articles/26107-mark-hollis-talk-talk-obituary

Unfair to single out Quantick - LOADS of critics gave it (and Spirit of Eden) a bad review, and some of them said much worse.

Squink

Looked on nme.com to see if the full review was there, couldn't find it, instead a couple of recent posts about Hollis popped up, with photos of him overlayed by ads for the blu-ray release of Ralph Breaks the Internet. It's what he would have wanted.

king_tubby

Quote from: Shit Good Nose on February 26, 2019, 02:53:35 PM
Unfair to single out Quantick - LOADS of critics gave it (and Spirit of Eden) a bad review, and some of them said much worse.

Yeah but this forum HATES Quantick and to be fair the article singled him out too.

poodlefaker

Quantick slated the solo album as well, iirc, although I can't find the review now. There used to be a Mark Hollis fan site that had them all.

sevendaughters

I remember from my Q magazine reading days, when Quantick was probably still a staffer, that they gave the Mark Hollis S/T a very warm 4 star review, one that suggested the writer wanted to go the whole hog but the sub didn't want to be the one to rifle through an angry mailbag of disappointed rockists. that was also where I first came across Talk Talk/Mark Hollis.

Love the last three albums, but I'll be gauche and admit that "It's My Life" (the song) is still my favorite. Hell of a performance here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rbwz532EQw8

Glebe

Was very sad to find this out. I'm afraid I only really knew the hits, 'Life's What You Make It' and 'It's My Life', but my word, what cracking tunes they was. It guess it's a good time to check out the rest of the music behind those beautiful album covers.

the hum

Talk Talk entered my mind and my psyche at around the age of 6 or 7 courtesy of a live recording my brother had taped, presumably from Radio 1, and never let go. That tape as far as I know has long since succumbed to the ravages of time, but I've long wondered specifically what gig it was from. It's definitely not London 1986, but was very similar setlist-wise and in vibe to the Montreaux gig (and indeed it might well have been it), but I recall it sounding much more expansive and reverb-y (i.e. a bigger venue seemingly). Anyone who could possibly enlighten me on this I'd be forever grateful to.

To my shame I'm actually not well versed at all with the last two albums, in truth feeling a bit intimidated by them, but I will properly remedy that now. The peak for me though is their live sound on the Colour of Spring tour, particularly their adaptations of the It's My Life material into a live setting. How I would love to have seen them in their prime.

iamcoop

The book "Spirit of Talk Talk" is worthwhile getting hold of if you're interested in reading a bit more about the albums. Obviously there's no input from Hollis whatsoever, but there's some stuff from some other key players that were around and some beautiful reprints of the artwork. It's not that cheap so probably won't be of interest to the casual fan but I picked up a new copy for about thirty quid and it's a lovely thing to have as much as an interesting read.


purlieu

I got that Spirit of Talk Talk book for my birthday a few years ago and can confirm it's a thing of beauty. I had a long browse through it last night.

Shit Good Nose

Quote from: Pearly-Dewdrops Drops on February 26, 2019, 04:25:21 PM
Love the last three albums, but I'll be gauche and admit that "It's My Life" (the song) is still my favorite. Hell of a performance here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rbwz532EQw8

Shouldn't worry about that, it is a great song.  Besides, I love all the TT albums as well as Hollis' solo album, but I'd be lying if I said Life's What You Make It isn't my favourite TT song.  Everything about it is fucking brill.

Phil_A

Quote from: sevendaughters on February 26, 2019, 04:08:53 PM
I remember from my Q magazine reading days, when Quantick was probably still a staffer, that they gave the Mark Hollis S/T a very warm 4 star review, one that suggested the writer wanted to go the whole hog but the sub didn't want to be the one to rifle through an angry mailbag of disappointed rockists. that was also where I first came across Talk Talk/Mark Hollis.

I remember that issue, there was a very nice featured interview with Hollis as well.

Squink

Quote from: Shit Good Nose on February 26, 2019, 07:33:27 PM
Shouldn't worry about that, it is a great song.  Besides, I love all the TT albums as well as Hollis' solo album, but I'd be lying if I said Life's What You Make It isn't my favourite TT song.  Everything about it is fucking brill.

Colour of Spring is my favourite album by them. I do like the last two and the Hollis album, but CoS is the one I return to most often. Also, I marginally prefer Laughing Stock to Spirit of Eden. The ideas seem to cohere a bit more than its predecessor.

the hum

#53
Quote from: Shit Good Nose on February 26, 2019, 07:33:27 PM
Shouldn't worry about that, it is a great song.  Besides, I love all the TT albums as well as Hollis' solo album, but I'd be lying if I said Life's What You Make It isn't my favourite TT song.  Everything about it is fucking brill.

Indeed, there's a received narrative about the first three albums that I've always found a bit irksome. I find Colour of Spring to be perfect in just about every respect, yet every critic worth their salt seem to consider it good, but merely the build up to something more incredible. With It's My Life it's even worse. Yes it has it's weak points, but it's overall a beautifully crafted and textually rich pop record (and relatively warm sounding too, given in 1984 we were approaching peak digitised production). And yet critical consensus seems to dismiss it almost totally (I also don't consider it a New Romantic record by any stretch. It just doesn't fit.) Even allowing for my own lack of proper exploration of the final two albums, putting them in sharp contrast against the first three and then dismissing the latter seems unfair.

Edit to add, I have quite similar sentiments on Colour of Spring about Killing Joke's "Brighter than a Thousand Suns" (released the same year), in that it has quite an "obvious" contemporary production which nonetheless compliments rather than smothers the songs. Critical consensus might suggest this leads to an album which is neither one thing or the other (and in the case of KJ at least I believe the band members are lukewarm on this album), but I think the meeting of minds between producer and band works perfectly.

holyzombiejesus

I remember the video for Life's What You Make It being reviewed on Swap Shop (or whatever BBC had on at the time) and a nature presenter (Tony Soper) was sniffy about it as the animals weren't filmed in their natural habitat.

Peter Tork and Talk Tork.

purlieu

It's My Life is my second favourite of theirs behind Laughing Stock. 'It's You' is bloody incredible.

Enzo

My favourite tribute so far


phantom_power

How did Charlotte Church become one of the best celebs around? She has no right to be this awesome

rue the polywhirl

Her PR crew have nice, eclectic taste in critically acclaimed, cred-boosting indie?