|
|
I was initially
appalled to discover it was my lot to review The Banshees again.
When I chose to review their LP from which this comes and said I
didn't care for it much and carefully explained why I got slagged - even
from NME's editor - for being merciless. Merciless? What are
The Banshees? The frigging Royal Family of pop? Reading
Siouxsie's recent NME interview worried me far more. I thought,
this is a woman that needs a holiday from the music industry - where had
her sense of humour gone? How could so unique a woman end up as
pretentious as the very bands her and Severin have spent 12 years
hurling abuse at?
But, like a slap
in the chops, comes the B-side of this single: 'El Dia DE Los
Muertos'. It's wicked, wonderful and - to me anyway - hysterically
funny. The Banshees go Latin, complete with Siouxsie singing in
Spanish. It's the first song of theirs I've gone happily berserk
to since The Creatures' singles. I'm sure translated it's all
about death, skulls and buckets of blood, but there is a sense of joy in
the performance - something which was totally missing from the LP and
made me question whether The Banshees were not stuck up a cul-de-sac of gratuitous
morbidity. God knows why this isn't the A-side.
|
|
Even now,
skeptics are
nudging one another in the ribs with delight as they swap
sound-a-likes: "The Goombay Dance Band's 'Seven Tears'!
'Amazing Grace'! 'Mull Of Kintyre'!" Of course, it's none of
these things. It's an interior confessional made as you kneel on a
stone floor under vaulting so cold you can see your breath. It's a
psalm for accordion and brushed drums, packaged in antique script and
parchment effect, a bid of Aubrey Beardsley fin-de-siècle decadent
allure. But less alluring than 18-carat crust of gems seemed five
or so years ago.