Customer Reviews

Comedy

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I love this album, and really don't understand why it and this artist hasn't gotten more attention. Great production, vocals, songwriting and humor.

Colin Vearncombe (Black's real name) shifted truckloads of his first album 'Wonderful Life' but he was too good to be commercially successful for long and none of his later albums got anywhere near that early success. That doesn't stop you finding out what you've been missing!

Some people prefer his third, eponymous, album, but I've always loved 'Comedy'. The ten tracks are miraculously both perfectly produced and full of emotion. They're beautifully written too, and speak volumes with titles like 'You don't always do what's best for you' and 'You are whatever people say you are' a bit reminiscent of The Smiths.

Most of the tracks are uptempo, like the excellent 'I can laugh about it now' and 'I was right you were wrong' but there are some great (scary!) downbeat moments: 'No-one, none, nothing' and 'Let me watch you make love'.

Final thought: 'We're all in trouble - is there room in the sky for all of us angels here on earth?'

Back in the 80's me and all my friends were into punk, and as such professed utter contempt for anything as radio friendly as "Wonderful Life". Even if you could not agree (or even define) what "good music" was, this song screamed "GOOD".
I bought all of Black's subsequent albums (in cassette) and became a (closet) fan of the band. And man, what a passionate love affair I had with the music. Black seems to be one of these artists that you can only define in terms of itself. No references to other bands seem to describe it. Roxy Music is another. Even if you can list some features that sound like some other song or artist, the sum of the parts is distinctly "Black" or "Roxy Music".
And for me "Comedy" is Black's finest hour. No song tops "Wonderful Life" -a re-recording of which is on this CD (*)- but the whole is an incredible collection of elegant, poignant, intelligent, sophisticated poetry intertwined with music that is non-obvious but familiar.
One of the records in my top 10.

(*) I have the A&M Records release (CD-5222) which includes both the re-recording of "Wonderful Life" and the remix of "Sweetest Smile"

I am looking at the original cassette tape of "Comedy" by Black and the most obvious omission on this new CD release is the re-recording of 'Wonderful Life' which, in my opinion, is a much better rendition than the original recording. Also missing from the original tape are 'Sweetest Smile' and 'Reunion'. I don't understand why one would tamper with perfection. I was very excited to see the release of this CD; however, I was very disappointed to see the realignment of the tracks. 5 stars to the original cassette. 3 stars to the CD.

I am surprised to read that other reviewers mix his 1987 album BLACK with his 1988 album COMEDY. It is no surprise that his 1987 hit Wonderful Life is missing here, if it was on the 1987 album. Colin Vearncombe - the artist - deserves all 5 stars for this album. Comedy. This album goes deeper..

I do hope my German brain was able to clear things.

This is a great album. I have all his tapes from day one (1987-1988) wanted to buy the CD album...but what happened to the missing tracks "Wonderful Life-re-recorded version" and "Sweetest Smile-re-mix"?
The two missing tracks from the "Comedy" album originally released by A&M is different from this newer album. The re-mixed tracks from the older album are both unique in their own way.
Four stars for this album, minus 1 star for the missing tracks. Will re-master the original A&M released cassette (with the missing tracks) to CD instead.
Disappointed!!!