FEATURE:
Vinyl Corner
Talk Talk - The Colour of Spring
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I want to bring in a couple of reviews…
for Talk Talk’s third studio album, The Colour of Spring, in a bit. Released on 1st March, 1986, I was wondering whether there would be a thirty-fifth anniversary release for the album – the anniversary is here, so I guess not! I cannot see any special editions, though it would be interesting to see if there is one out there (let me know). In terms of the music, The Colour of Spring was a break from the synthesised Pop of the band’s earliest albums. There was an emphasis on guitars, pianos, and organs. There is a more natural sound through the album. Whilst that may have surprised some fans in 1986, I think it was a needed evolution for Talk Talk and it works really well through The Colour of Spring. I would encourage people to buy The Colour of Spring on vinyl because it is such a fantastic album. Life’s What You Make It, and Living in Another World are two of the best songs Talk Talk ever created. Talk Talk would follow The Colour of Spring with the genius Spirit of Eden in 1988 – perhaps the finest album they ever put out. Because Talk Talk formed in 1981, I wanted to mark forty years of their formation alongside thirty-five years of one of the best albums of the 1980s. I think that The Colour of Spring is a good starting place if you are new to Talk Talk. One might say to go back to the start, though I think there is an accessibility to The Colour of Spring that has made the album so enduring. The Colour of Spring became the band's highest-selling non-compilation studio album - reaching the top-twenty in numerous countries, including the U.K. (where it reached number-eight and stayed in the charts for twenty-one weeks).
I will wrap things up soon enough, but I want to source a couple of reviews for the mighty and beautiful The Colour of Spring. This is what AllMusic wrote in their review:
“With It's My Life, Talk Talk proved that they could pull off an entire album of strong material. With The Colour of Spring, they took it one step further, moving to a near-concept song cycle, following the emotional ups and downs of relationships and pondering life in general. Musically, they built on the experimental direction of the previous album with interesting rhythms, sweeping orchestration, complex arrangements, and even a children's chorus to create an evocative, hypnotic groove. Though the songs were catchier on the earlier efforts and the ambient experimentation was more fully achieved later on, The Colour of Spring succeeded in marrying the two ideas into one unique sound for their most thoroughly satisfying album”.
I do like how there was this marked shift between 1984’s It’s My Life, and The Colour of Spring. The band – Mark Hollis, Lee Harris ands Paul Webb at the core – are phenomenal throughout, and I especially love Hollis’ vocal performances on The Colour of Spring. When Classic Pop wrote when they reviewed a simply marvellous album:
“The watchword for album three is ‘organic’. “That whole synth side – get it in the bin!”, Hollis told interviewer Jim Irvin in 1997 about its change of direction. He was similarly combative about synthetic instruments a decade earlier, no doubt angering Electronics And Music Magazine as he proclaimed to their journalist: “I absolutely hate synthesisers. If they didn’t exist, I’d be delighted.”
The band were happy to excise all vestiges of synth-pop from their sound and The Colour Of Spring would become their biggest-selling album. It sits at the apex of the melodic, conventional songwriting approach of their first two albums and the more experimental ambience of remaining efforts Spirit Of Eden and Laughing Stock. The perfect midpoint, in fact, and often underappreciated amid the remarkable affection in which those last two LPs are held.
As would become de rigueur for Talk Talk, the album was painstakingly assembled in the studio with a huge array of guest musicians. At their most focused, Hollis and co-writer Friese-Greene would be in the studio in 12-hour shifts, six days a week, during sessions that lasted nine months.
Texturally, piano, organ and guitar dominate as the band imbue a more natural musicality into lyrical preoccupations with pastoral themes. Hollis namechecked classical composers Debussy, Satie and most prominently Bartók throughout recording sessions, with all contemporary influences given short shrift.
A Tomorrow Never Knows for the 80s, Life’s What You Make It is built on an unwavering rocking 10-note piano riff that continues throughout the whole song. As the track ebbs and flows, stunning piano and guitar solos flash into the mix while that underlying riff continues beneath, the skeleton of an iconic anthem-in-the-making. Band manager Keith Aspden was concerned the album lacked a hit, so Hollis and Friese-Greene answered the challenge with this. Job done.
On the haunting April 5th, Hollis loses himself in almost wordless reverie. There’s an abrupt change of pace for the pulsating Jean-Paul Sartre-inspired Living In Another World, with Winwood whipping up a maelstrom on Hammond. Mark Feltham – later to work with Oasis – supplies bluesy harmonica. There’s a gritty defiance to the percussive Give It Up and Hollis brings his love of Bartók to bear on the striking intro to Chameleon Day, which morphs into an echo-drenched piano ballad boasting one of the singer’s most dynamic performances; hushed whisperings one minute, gut-wrenching roars the next”.
I am a relatively new fan of Talk Talk – having discovered them properly a few years back -, but I really love The Colour of Spring and how it impacts you. With all eight tracks written by producer Tim Friese-Greene and Mark Hollis, there is not a weak or wasted moment on the album! It does not matter whether you are a huge fan of Talk Talk or are fairly new to the band. One should grab a copy of The Colour of Spring, put the needle down, and immerse themselves in…
SUCH a wonderful album.
