TODAY’S TOP TEN ALBUMS OF THE ’80s (by Kat Georgiou) 1. Tin Drum – Japan 2. Ocean Rain – Echo & The Bunnymen 3. Kilimanjaro – Teardrop Explodes 4. Dare – Human League 5. Songs To Remember – Scritti Politti 6. Hounds Of Love – Kate Bush 7. Power, Corruption & Lies – New Order 8. The Queen Is Dead – The Smiths 9. Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps) – David Bowie 10.Lexicon Of Love - ABC ‘Tin Drum caught a moment in time and has aged remarkably well,’ says Kat Georgiou from North London. ‘Over half of the eight tracks were released as singles and not many albums can boast such a feat. Japan explored whole new areas of music and the minimalist sound they created here has never dated. Love it.’ Done your Top Ten yet? Message, don’t post, your selection and if you could mention why you chose your No. 1 that would be great. If you want to promote anything – record, book, film, gig etc – send the details at the same time. We guarantee to post every one we receive. Also, if you’d like to nominate a friend or friends to do the Top Ten challenge, please be our guests. The aim is to produce the Ultimate Flexipop! Top 40 Albums Of The 80s Chart so please put your choices in order. Tin Drum was the fifth and final studio album by Japan, released 13 November 1981. It peaked at No. 12 in the UK and was certified Gold. It also reached No. 38 in Japan, 16 in Norway and 33 in Sweden. Tin Drum continued the bands use of electronic elements coupled with traditional instrumentation and leans towards Far Eastern influences more than any of their previous albums. Guitarist Rob Dean had left the band and David Sylvian took on his duties. Four of the albums eight tracks were released as singles in the UK - The Art of Parties, Visions of China, Ghosts, and Cantonese Boy and a live version of Canton was issued as a single to promote the Oil On Canvas live album in 1983. In 2011, Tin Drum was awarded BBC Radio 6 Musics Goldie award for the best album of 1981. A BBC review of the album – ‘Despite taking its title from a German novel (twas ever thus with the literary references for singer, David Sylvian), Tin Drum remains Japans most Eastern-influenced album. Its all there in the song titles of course. This, their final effort, showed the band really becoming what theyd always wanted to be all through their career: An art-rock band, with aspirations towards the musicianly end of what pop could aspire to (and, aptly, a huge fanbase in their spiritual home of the Orient). ‘Ironically as the band disintegrated (mainly due to Sylvians urge to strike out alone) following this release, they finally shook off the sub-Roxy Music/glam goth associations that had hampered them in earlier years. ‘One of the reasons that Tin Drum broke the band out of their image straightjacket (for which they were in no small part responsible, due to their propensity for make-up and fey tailoring) was the departure of guitarist, Rob Dean, after the previous album, Gentlemen Take Polaroids. Moving away from the rockist trappings of six-strings, and hanging out with The Yellow Magic Orchestras Ryuichi Sakamoto had shown the band the light. With Richard Barbieris spectral keyboards taking the high ground, aided by the almost fusionist tones of Mick Karns fretless bass and Steve Jansens masterfully polyrhythmic drums, Tin Drum is, in places wonderfully minimalist and exotically esoteric. ‘On top of this Sylvians voice had matured beyond the aforementioned Ferry-lite comparisons. His mournful deep-throated trills suited songs that explored lost love (Ghosts) and the fascination with all things Eastern (the amazingly deft Visions Of China, Canton and Cantonese Boy). As with fellow so-called new romantics, Duran Duran, these boys almost straddled the line marked muso, yet avoided crassness with the simple application of taste. Tin Drum has no flashy waste or needless bombast, just evocative skill that remains fresh to this day.’ Track List Side A: 1. The Art of Parties 2. Talking Drum 3. Ghosts 4. Canton Side B: 1. Still Life in Mobile Homes 2. Visions of China 3. Sons of Pioneers 4. Cantonese Boy ‘The band’s most ambitious song, Ghosts, turned out also to be their most commercially successful, reaching No. 5 in the spring of 1982,’ said The Guardian. ‘I recall, mesmerised, watching Sylvian performing the song on Top Of The Pops. He and the rest of the band - so still, so exquisitely cold and distant - were like nothing Id seen before or since. As for the pared-down minimalism of the song itself, Simon Napier-Bell calls Ghosts the most uncommercial song in the history of the music business to make the Top 10. ‘After Ghosts, Sylvian briefly became something of a teenage pin-up, the most beautiful man in the world, as he was called in a marketing stunt, a sobriquet he loathed. This, after all, was a time when girls liked boys who wore make-up and looked less like boys than, well, girls. It was a time when we all liked to dress up with arch ostentation and steal our mothers make-up. But it was a superficial time, and no one wishes to be reminded of the excesses of their youth.’ In 2000, Sylvian re-recorded Ghosts using the original Japan backing track and included it on his compilation Everything and Nothing. Prepare to be mesmerised...
Posted on: Mon, 08 Dec 2014 14:11:44 +0000
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