Bread & Jam for Frances [Import]

Switchblade Symphony | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (October 8, 1997)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Label: Cleopatra
• ASIN: B000006UX1
• In-Print Editions: Audio CD  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (39 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,351,867 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Definately not as bad as a lot of people make it seem, August 7, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Bread & Jam for Frances (Audio CD)

Well, I haven't been a fan of Switchblade Symphony that long. I bought Serpentine Gallery first and then read reviews of this CD. They mostly said that this one sucked. So I waited for their new CD which I bought immediately when it came out. It was great so I was:"O well let's buy Bread And Jam too to complete my collection" I wasn't expecting much from it but after listening to it I was amazed. This is really a very cool album. Okay it's very different than Serpentine Gallery and maybe that's why most people hate it but musically speaking it is a very cool CD. My favorite songs on the album are Sleep, Harpsichord(great guitar), Funnel and Fractal(great noise and opera-like vocals). Also I rather like the Situation #58 track. All other songs rule too ofcourse but these are my favorites.

What I do find odd tho is that the tracklisting on the CD is wrong. Maybe it's just my CD, but track 2 and 3 are switched around. On the listing it says that Rollercoaster is 2 and Dirty Dog is 3 but on the CD itself it's the other way around. I noticed this too on Three Calamities. (altho a bit different. They didn't list Track 9 on the listing there. It goes 7, 8, 10, 11) Maybe this is intentional.. I dunno.. O well.. I'm drifting.

In closing I'd like to say. Don't be put of by negative reviews of Bread And Jam. Listen to it first before you make your decission about this CD. It's really very good.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Splendid, March 8, 2003

By 

FormerZygote "Opinion" (Right Here, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Bread & Jam for Frances (Audio CD)

This album has it all really. Hard to locate items this good without the heady critisism that often escorts experimental artists. Switchblade Symphony's often revered "Serpentine Gallery" showed us a very "goth" band and for fans of "Goth" imparticular find themselves fleeing to thier 'Christian Death and 'London After Midnight albums after hearing this one. You wont find a genre that this album obeys and when you decide music is simply either good or bad you'll most likely truley enjoy it.

Excellent dark melodies, eerie and childlike vocals, grooves remniscent of trip hop and rock psychedelia meet at a circus... a few small filler tracks... Yea this album does not sleep at all and is so very complimentary of what these girls can do. This album and thier follow "Three Calamities" are just about perfect albums. Very very rare indeed. These ladies of experimental mind have created some entirely outstanding music.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Not as good as SG or TTC, but still enjoyable., July 4, 2000

By 

Mechanical Deity (San Marcos, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Bread & Jam for Frances (Audio CD)

To begin with, the track listing they give you on Amazon is incorrect. When the CD was first released, "Dirty Dog" and "Roller Coaster" were switched around, and "Harpsichord," a non-existent track, was listed as #7. The final track listing ends up being 1) Witches, 2) Dirty Dog, 3) Roller Coaster, 4) Situation #58, 5) Soldiers, 6) Sleep, 7) Funnel, 8) Insect, 9) Rampid, 10) Situation #9, 11) Sheep, 12) Fractal, 13) Sick Mary, and 14) Episode G15.

Now that I've made that clear...

Personally, I like "Serpentine Gallery" and "The Three Calamities" more than BAJFF. Switchblade Symphony added trip-hop type beats and experimented with completely new sounds with this album. It is still good, and lyrically and vocally it isn't much different from SG. Actually, on tracks like "Fractal" and "Soldiers" Tina's voice soars high enough to make it seem as if the windows are going to break.

Musically, as I already said, SS experimented with new sounds on this album. Gone are the lush soundscapes and complex keyboarding from SG (which reappear on TTC) and instead, trip-hop beats are added with an actual drummer and it sounds as if a DJ is lurking behind the music. If you're looking for SG or TTC type soundscapes, the only tracks on this album that offer this are "Roller Coaster" and "Sheep." In addition, they have added heavier guitars, most notable on "Fractal," "Insect," and "Funnel," in which case it seems as if for a time, SS was experimenting with the possibility of writing metal music.

In my opinion, all of the tracks are about equal to one another in quality and originality. I don't really have any favorite songs on this release and usually simply listen to it from beginning to end, although "Soldiers" is good for a laugh if you play it in front of someone who has never heard of the band before.