COLF1
1984
The Colourfield are best remembered for the hit Thinking Of You, and its follow-up Castles In The Air. Both songs set Terry Hall's trademark deadpan vocal against airy pretty pop tunes.
But their eponymous debut single was another thing altogether. Hard, dark, brooding, ominous, with a bleak, almost paranoid lyric, it still had one foot firmly in the Fun Boy Three camp. The difference between the bands lies in the guitarryness of The Colourfield, which manifests on this track as a hard Bunnymenish edge.
Constantly pushing forward, sinister and urgent, unlike anything else they ever did, it's a truly magnificent single.
The B-side, Sorry, is a failed-relationship song, and was re-recorded for the Virgins And Philistines album. More typical of what the band would become, it is really too good to have been tucked away on a B-side.
Incidentally, I went to see The Colourfield at Liverpool University on the Virgins & Philistines tour. Hall was as dour and miserable as you'd imagine him to be, and then some. He introduced the album's title track as 'Virgins & Fill-me-arse', and sang the first verse of Thinking Of You as 'I guess you kind of ought to know I ought to be having a shit / But friendship built on trust means everyone gets on my tits'. Miserable bugger.
[MP3 deleted to make way for new ones. Sorry!]
5 comments:
Brilliant blog. Very impressed.
Two great songs,Merrick!...I love the V&F album..it's a shame Deception was such a poor followup,imo
(I also wish V& F would see re-release as it's rather pricey anymore here in the States)
Hilarous gig story..what a saddo
D'oh!.."V&P" that should be...Hey,it was early and I must have taken Terry's remarks to heart
Love this band, would it be possible to get a post of Things Could Be Beautiful also, lovely song, only video I remember seeing of the band
Shaughn
al iii, yes indeed the guy on the far right is Terry Hall, previously of Specials and Fun Boy Three and latterly of Terry Blair and Anchouka.
anonyperson, I don't have Things Could Be Beautiful, sorry.
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