RhoDeo 1253 Aetix

Hello,  Festive days history once more, belly full, ears ringing and the party is over, time to get a move on.

Yes, it's Aetix time and one of the big names of the early days who are being milked for what it's worth by EMI on the basis of their late  eighties work, case of hopeless AR management that didn't grasp they had a potential supergroup on their hands, they wanted hits, the quick buck and had no ear for artistic endavour, in fact they were rather nasty well EMI no longer exist as such. Here on offer their debut and 2 EMI cash in albums .....  N'Joy

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Talk Talk began as a quartet consisting of Mark Hollis (vocals), Simon Brenner (keyboards), Lee Harris (drums) and Paul Webb (bass). Hollis was the brother of Ed Hollis, manager of Eddie and the Hot Rods, and had started out in a punk band called The Reaction. They were generally associated with the New Wave movement; more specifically, in their early years, they were often compared with Duran Duran, as both bands not only featured a double-barrelled name and a Roxy Music-inspired musical direction, but also a record label (EMI) and producer (Colin Thurston). Talk Talk's first line-up released a self-titled debut EP in 1982 which was quickly expanded into a full-length album entitled The Party's Over. The band charted in the UK Top 40 with the singles "Talk Talk" and "Today", both produced by Thurston.

Brenner left after the 1983 non-LP single "My Foolish Friend", which was produced by frequent Roxy Music collaborator Rhett Davies. At this point, the band added unofficial fourth member Tim Friese-Greene, who became Talk Talk's keyboard player, producer, and Hollis' frequent writing partner. Although a major contributor to the band's studio output, Friese-Greene did not generally play with the band during live shows or appear in publicity material. Talk Talk stopped playing live in 1986.

Talk Talk had a huge success in 1984/85 internationally (and particularly in continental Europe) with the album It's My Life, the single "Such a Shame" became a major hit . Strangely, this album and its singles were largely ignored in their native UK
They shed the New Wave style completely with The Colour of Spring in 1986. This became their biggest studio album success in the UK, partly thanks to the Top 20 single "Life's What You Make It", and was again a hit album in Europe.By this time, all Talk Talk songs were being written by Hollis and Friese-Greene.

The success of The Colour of Spring got the band an open budget and schedule for the recording of their next album. Spirit of Eden was released in 1988, on EMI's Parlophone label., it was assembled from many hours of improvised instrumentation that Hollis and Friese-Greene had edited and arranged using digital equipment. The result was a mix of rock, jazz, classical, and ambient music. While critically praised, the album was not as commercially viable as its predecessors, and the band declared they would not tour in support of it.

Talk Talk released Laughing Stock in 1991, by this time, Webb had left the group and Talk Talk had morphed into a brand name for the studio recordings of Hollis and Friese-Greene, along with a bevy of session studio players. Laughing Stock crystallised the experimental sound the band started with Spirit of Eden (which has been retroactively categorised as "post-rock" by some critics). Laughing Stock adopted an even more minimalist style than its predecessor, but this did not stop it achieving a respectable Top 30 showing in the UK Albums Chart. Like Spirit of Eden, the lyrical themes are often religious, and album is widely considered (along with Spirit of Eden) as one of the first records to be classed - retroactively - as within the post-rock genre. Laughing Stock has consistently risen in critical opinion as a result of post-rock's rise to relative popularity during the late 90s. After Laughing Stock, Talk Talk disbanded. Paul Webb rejoined Lee Harris, and the two went on to form the band .O.rang, while Tim Friese-Greene started recording under the name Heligoland. In 1998, Mark Hollis released his self-titled solo début Mark Hollis, which was very much in keeping with the minimalist post-rock sound of Spirit of Eden and Laughing Stock.

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Talk Talk began life as a slavishly derivative, Duran Duran-styled new romantic synth pop band, as their debut, The Party's Over, clearly shows. Much of the album seems to attempt to recreate Duran Duran's debut, but even with their most blatant rip-offs, like the single "Talk Talk," they do it with a naïve charm that makes for some really enjoyable music, even if it isn't particularly innovative or groundbreaking.

Talk Talk - The Party's Over (flac 263mb)

01 Talk Talk 3:23
02 It's So Serious 3:21
03 Today 3:30
04 The Party's Over 6:12
05 Hate 3:58
06 Have You Heard The News ? 5:07
07 Mirror Man 3:21
08 Another Word 3:14
09 Candy 4:41

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In April 86, hot on the heels of international chart success with 'Life's what you make it' and Living In Another World'  talk Talk embarked on a major world tour promoting their album ' The Colour Of Spring'.  While the number of bands who have succumbed to the rock cliché of trading artistic integrity for a glimpse of commercial success is countless, only a few have traveled down the opposite path, and fewer still have attempted the kind of dramatic career reversal achieved by Talk Talk. Originally considered little more than derivative purveyors of New-Romantic dance-pop, with each succeeding album, Mark Hollis and co. moved further and further away from both the expectations of the marketplace and from the trappings of traditional pop-oriented song-craft. There were, of course, hints of this impending transformation on their early records, most notably, Mark Hollis' singularly expressive vocals, but it wasn't until Talk Talk's third album, The Colour of Spring, that their artistic restlessness began to explicitly assert itself. London 1986 and Live at Montreux 1986 document the resulting tour, which was to be the last the band would undertake. While The Colour of Spring is a transitional masterpiece, Talk Talk's flawless live performances during this period were simply sublime. Gone were the painfully exaggerated efforts to appear relaxed yet animated that were evident on earlier tours; now they carried themselves like a band who knew they were special. For those who have only heard Talk Talk's studio recordings, or those who may feel inclined to ignore the band's pre-1986 output, these live performances will be nothing less than a revelation.

Talk Talk - London 1986   ( flac 388mb)

01 Tomorrow Started  (7:50)
02 Life's What You Make It  (4:29)
03 Does Caroline Know?  (7:36)
04 Living in Another World  (7:05)
05 Give It Up  (5:53)
06 It's My Life  (6:27)
07 Such a Shame  (9:00)
08 Renée  (7:43)

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Released as a companion piece to the hits collection Natural History, History Revisited compiles mainly new remixes of the band's best-known, pre-experimental output. Only the dub mix of "Happiness Is Easy" had been released before -- the rest were done without the band's involvement, and the band reportedly tried to block the album's release. Talk Talk's brand of synth-pop lends itself quite well to this sort of treatment, so the collection works quite well, although there aren't many surprises. A nice companion piece for fans, but probably the least essential of their catalog.

Talk Talk - History Revisited (The Remixes)  (  flac 341mb)

01 Living In Another World - '91 (Julian Mendelsohn mix) 4:40
02 Such A Shame (Gary Miller Remix) 5:42
03 Happiness Is Easy (Harris, Webb Dub) 7:02
04 Today (Gary Miller Remix) 3:25
05 Dum Dum Girl (Spice Remix) 4:59
06 Life's What You Make It (BBG Remix) 6:14
07 Talk Talk (Gary Miller Remix) 5:22
08 It's My Life (Tropical Rainforest Mix) 5:58
09 Living In Another World (Curious Dub Mix) 7:49
10 Life's What You Make It (The Fluke Remix) 6:16

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