Day 79: The Sisters of Mercy – First and Last and Always
The older I get, the more I appreciate things that are spooky. Being slightly spooked is an underutilised thrill in my opinion. My most boomer opinion is that we’ve lost the art of the spook — these days horror films are just jump scares and gore, which does nothing for me. I just want to enjoy things with a pleasantly spooky atmosphere without feeling like I’m getting pounded with loud noise while watching the director’s thinly veiled fetish for violence against women, please and thanks.
Album cover courtesy of Elektra Records
Recently, I’ve discovered that I love old horror films and rediscovered that I like classic gothic literature. In the course of this album project, I’ve also discovered that I like a bit of goth rock, so I’ve decided I’m just going to lean into that whole thing when it’s a bit dark and gloomy outside. It’s not a phase, mom! But surely it actually isn’t if it starts in your 30s.
Today, I decided to go for a classic of the genre, First and Last and Always by The Sisters of Mercy. They are a rock band formed in 1980 in Leeds who firmly reject the goth rock label, but let’s be real, that is what they very much sound like, with elements of psychedelic rock and post punk peppered in. They’ve got such a ship of Theseus-situation going on with the band that their Wikipedia entry has a helpful visual aid into who was in the band playing what and when, but their only remaining original member is the frontman, Andrew Eldritch.
The band started off as a bit of a dry joke pretending to be a rock band that takes itself very seriously, with Eldritch saying that their goal was to get played on the radio once, but they eventually ended up becoming a real band. First and Last and Always was released in 1985 and was fairly successful commercially, peaking at 14 in the UK albums charts, but the biggest impact it had was inspiring the goth rock and darkwave bands that came after it.
My first thought listening to it is that they’ve got a very unique and distinctive sound, I can think of a few more modern bands who clearly modelled themselves after both the style of singing and the general vibe. They’ve got a drum machine with almost ‘60s psychedelic rock sounding guitars along with Eldritch’s baritone vocals, which combines to build the spooky atmosphere that I was after. Before watching any of their music videos, I’d say they sound like there’s red lights, leather jackets and smoke machines galore. They’ve almost got a bit of a cinematic sound in the imagery that the songs evoke, but it doesn’t take itself too seriously and still sounds like it’s all still a little bit tongue in cheek.
The Sisters of Mercy are fun and slightly ghoulish, just the way I like it. I had a great time listening to this album. I was originally going to go for a 9 but the record dips at the end, I think the stronger songs are all in the beginning. It’s still a very reasonable 8.5/10. Eldritch says that for their next record after this one, they brought in Jim Steinman — the other guy behind Bat Out of Hell — and told him that they want the record to sound like “a disco party run by the Borgias”, so that’s going to the top of the list of albums to listen to soon.