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 Album Review

Erasure – ‘Always’ (The Very Best of Erasure)

Double Vinyl out on Mute / BMG 18th August 2023

Want to tap into a feel-good feeling, have a sing and dance until your feet are killing you? Put this record on and the best (or possibly the worst) parts of forty years are quite simply wiped away.  

 

It is easy to forget everything that has passed since the musical phenomenon that was and is Erasure, first stepped on stage.  They blew away the gloom and dreariness that accommodated the dour technicians of early electronic music.

 

They made the sounds of synthesisers popular around the world and continued to do so ever since forming their duo in 1985. Erasure sang fine songs that caught the ear, but touched the soul. These were songs drawn from and essential to the burgeoning gay nightclub scene, that drove that sound sensational  onto the national Radio 1.  Out, proud, clever and loud. Listenable on a number of levels, Erasure made and make music for dancing (and for driving too).

 

The early pointers to lively electronic narratives produced by Brian Eno on his first solo albums and in some flashes by Can, were taken on by Erasure, some dozen years after Eno had split from pop sophistocats, Roxy Music.  Vince Clarke, who had left the putative Depeche Mode for something less dour, recruited Andy Bell though a classified newspaper advert and Erasure was born.

Photo: Douglas Bros

With Bell’s distinctive voice and ability to sustain a note to operatic heights, coupled to Clarke’s ability to concoct seemingly disparate electronic squidges, squelches, bips, pops and chords into catchy tunes, Erasure proved technology need not be dull.

 

What is more remarkable about this duo, is that they have been able to burn a path through the subsequent 38 years without losing the creative power.  Neon, for example, released in 2020, is an album to savour and there is an album of new songs Day-Glo (Based On A True Story) came out late in 2022.

The power of the music and strength of each song on Neon underlined that this remarkable duo is still very much with us. Day-Glo (Based on a true story), further emphasises the point.   

 

Originally released in 2015, ‘Always’ is out on double heavy vinyl (180gsm) for the very first time on 18^th August, 2023.  What someone has defined as “The very best of Erasure” does a disservice to the complete works of the duo, because how on Earth do you distill a lifetime of music pleasure into just 20 tracks?

If you had a radio and mourned the passing of The Human League’s pop-mastery, the arrival of Erasure was light in the dark.

 

Who Needs Love Like That? has an introduction that kicks off the chorus line and there is no turning back.  Oh L’Amour drops the coded talk and expresses the sheer excitement of meeting someone, heady with love, aching.  Bell’s vocalisation urges the listener to join in with the song.  And song after song after song, Sometimes, Ship of Fools, A Little Respect,  (my personal favourite of all time, I used to play it on repeat when commuting). 

 

You know what? Just read the track-list, then pick a song and just wallow.  I challenge you not to want to get up and dance with someone, or on your own, while you catch the flow.

 

Erasure are the electronic pop duo who set the standards for all other electronic pop musicians to follow.  The synth break on Victim of Love remains exquisite.  I have not got the vocabulary to describe how feel-good these tunes are, even when exploring emotional blackholes that are the staple of classic pop music.

 

This double vinyl album carries nineteen tracks drawn from the 200 or more written and performed by Clarke and Bell in what seems an unstoppable career.  Only the stone-hearted might resist a lyric that captures the feeling expressed in Love You To The Sky.

 

The twentieth track, hidden amongst all this gold dust is the classic interpretation of Abba’s Take A Chance On Me, which appeared on Abba-esque, the 1991 Erasure EP tribute to the Swedish quartet.  There can be no finer tribute to Abba than to have had Erasure cover their songs.  

All the latest news of England’s finest electro-popsters can be found here.

 

Give Erasure’s Always a listen and be transported.

 

‘ALWAYS’ – THE VERY BEST OF ERASURE (CAT # LPMUTEL26)

 

SIDE A

Who Needs Love Like That

Oh L’Amour

Sometimes

Victim Of Love

The Circus 

 

SIDE B

Ship Of Fools

Chains Of Love

A Little Respect

Stop!

Drama!

 

SIDE C

Blue Savannah

Chorus

Love To Hate You

Take A Chance On Me

Always

 

SIDE D

Fingers & Thumbs (Cold Summer’s Day)

Breathe

Elevation

Love You To The Sky

Hey Now (Think I Got A Feeling)

 

Out on Mute / BMG on 18^th August, 2023

Chris Perry

14th August 2023