NOCTURNE VIDEO - ADVERTS/REVIEWS | ||
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Unknown source 1988 | ||
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The Banshees are presently
warming themselves in the gratifying glow of the best reviews in their
12-year career. Only fair: the newest album Peepshow is up with
their best work and represents a magnificent return to form after a couple
of indifferent seasons. Beware this well-timed video, though:
"live" videos are a poor thing very often, no more rewarding
than getting a smell of a tempting meal without a chance of scoffing
it. Nocturne, filmed at the Albert Hall concerts in late '83, is
mundane stuff.
The problem isn't just that cameras can't catch atmosphere (with the odd exception such as Scorsese's Last Waltz work with The Band), nor that live recordings are nearly always inferior to studio ones. Nor is it simply the lack of visual variation over the course of an hour. Nocturne's prospects are basically blighted by the material. 1983 was not a vintage year in the Banshee's life: knocked off course by their perennial "missing guitarist" difficulties, the band had brought in The Cure's Robert Smith to replace the recently defected John McGeoch, and these tracks, extracted from earlier albums, are played with no great vitality in a show that's given to routine reworking of fast-tiring witchy imagery. Siouxsie vamps her dogged way through Israel, Melt!, Spellbound and nine others, including The Beatles' horror-opera Helter Skelter. Better would come, but not just yet. 2/5 Paul Du Noyer |
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