Customer Reviews

It'll End in Tears (Reis)

5 star:		(36)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Of all the record companies who have influenced modern music,I reckon none have done so as much as 4AD records.From Indie rock to trance,from alternate sounds to ambient-this company had groups that were always one step ahead of the rest and were always willing to look beyond the mainstream.When This Mortal Coil were created-an amalgamation of all these groups it was certainly an exciting prospect.Groups like Cocteau Twins,Dead Can Dance,The Wolfgang Press,etc working together to write songs and also do amazing covers of songs by Tim Buckley,Alex Chilton,etc-it was a daunting prospect and one that worked so amazingly well.It also provided a great introduction to try out the music of those 4AD groups properly.

As you can imagine with so many people working on an album-the sounds of the tracks are quite diverse.The difference between Howard Devoto of Buzzcocks fame singing Holocaust with it's piano's and cello to the Indie guitar romp track 11 "Not Me".Liz Fraser does the most amazing cover version of Buckley's "Song To The Siren"-comparisons to the original are quite startling.She almost has this soothing spiritual lilt that sounds sort of Asian,and this accompanies the most amazingly gentle shimmering guitar from Robin Guthrie-I didn't know it was a guitar until I read the innersleeve and this was made in the early 80's long before studio trickery could be used so effectively.Compare this to Lisa Gerard's frightening hypnotic vocals on the track "Dreams Made Flesh"-they're described as "yang t'chin" vocals and they are just unbelievable.Her Dead Can Dance partner Brendan Perry plays what called a bass drone-which sounds like some sort of Ancient Greek instrument.There are long Pink Floyd type instrumentals and shorter minimalist tracks of romantic sentiment.Yet despite all these contrasts each track has a close bond.It's almost like going on some sort of spiritual journey in a storm-full of different emotions-soothing,harsh,ambient and raging.There is a great sense of blissed out satisfaction when you reach the end of the c.d.

For those people who are into listening to the "chilled out" experiences that seem to make up 90% of all compilations-then maybe you should check out where this concept had it's origins.This Mortal Coil are a group of sorts that very few people seem to be aware of-yet if you name some of it's members people seem more aware.I've given this c.d. to so many people and to a person they have all come back with the reaction of "where has this been all my musical life".One of the greatest albums ever released in my opinion!

IT'LL END IN TEARS is the first album of This Mortal Coil, a loose collective gathered by 4AD record-label head Ivo-Watts Russell. It's twelve tracks come together to form the epitome of the "4AD sound" that characterized the label up until the mid-90s.

The amount of talent in this release is captivating. The cover of Tim Buckley's "Song to the Siren" is performed by Liz Fraser (voice) and Robin Guthrie (guitar) of Cocteau Twins, and Liz's divine voice fits the song perfectly. Liz Fraser provides the vocals also for the sweet "Another Day." "Barramundi" is a piece by Cocteau Twin's bassist Simon Raymonde, and its dark brooding nature creates a truly Gothic soundscape. "Dreams Made Flesh" and "Waves Become Wings" feature Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry of Dead Can Dance in two beautiful early efforts.

Just as crucial to the loveliness of the music is the excellent design by 23 Envelope (now v23), 4AD's in-house design team led by the magisterial Vaughan Oliver. The photography and layout of the album is truly beautiful.

Granted, there are a few tracks on this album which do not live up to the heartbreaking sweep of the others, "Kangaroo" is rather dull, but IT'LL END IN TEARS captures an era, a record label, and collaborative genius wonderfully.

TMC really captures the new wave eightees sound with this album. My sister, dressed in black in those days, used to play this album to death, which was why I pretended to not like it, while in reality I secretly recorded her album on cassette to play it on pirate-radio and in clubs myself. Looking back I'm convinced that TMC (and Cocteau Twins singer Liz Fraser in particular) took down many barriers that existed between 'alternative' and other genres. At the end of DANCE club-nights I could easily get away with playing Song To The Siren, and I still recall that as being a VERY exceptional experience back in 84 and 85. I could not only feel shivers down my own spine, but saw it happening to the crowd as well. Almost each track of this album is comforting to listen to when in sorrow, this is music you'll feel, no matter what your age is or where you come from.
I have always remembered the cleanliness of this album, but it would have gotten 5 stars from me if it didn't have those very few technical engineering's imperfections (but you have to be really into that to let them bother you).
Probably the most important thing about It'll End In Tears is that to me it's still getting better everytime I play it, and music that doesn't bore me is rare. I totally love this album.

This is the first of 3 Mortal coils and is the brainchild of the founding fathers of the 4AD label.This is a combination of artists that were on the label at the time and include coctaua twins, dead can dance and others.Performing mostly covers albeit obscure ones with great instrumental interludes is a trip through the looking glass and beyond.If you like to listen to a meld of music that flows in and out of time then this is for you.The "Coils" have often been pushed into the "Goth" catogory but are beyond actual defenition.This was released in the early 80`s and untill a reprinting in 98 was hard to find.The songs are uncoventional and beautiful. They fit together like hand and glove.If you are looking for something to just take you away then this is it.If you pick this up you will not be dissapointed because it is a great CD and worth adding to your collection

More than music, this album is an atmosphere. This mortal coil - formed by the same people of the reknown groups Dead Can Dance, Cocteau Twins and Colour Box, to name some - wraps you with its rhythm, surrounding you with the anguish, the love and the despair of modern life, but with a deep sense of simplicity. "Song to the siren" is the most beautiful chant from this CD, along with the exotic "Barramundi", and the industrial sound of "Fyt". Six years after the first time I cassualy heard it when searching for a theatrical play, I got it and is one of my favorites in my collection.

In 1984 when this record came out, the 4AD label was releasing music that no one had ever heard before. Gothic bands such as Cocteau Twins, Dead Can Dance, and Wolfgang Press were breaking ground in the underground music culture. Coulorbox was just taking English pop to new realms. These bands got together with a few of their friends and made an album together. It was really cool. A bunch of our favorite bands doing an album together, we loved it. It was played at parties and at the clubs. It was not the best things the bands had ever done but it was different. We loved the bands so of course we loved what they did together. It is kinda like if the Rolling Stones, The Beatles, and The Who all did a record of songs from the 40s together. If you didn't like all three of those bands then you are not going to like that record, but wouldn't that have been something.something.
If you are not a fan of eighties gothic then you may not like this record (Stone). It is quiet in some parts and rocking in others. It depends on who is playing on that song. If you have a wide taste in music that includes Big Star and The Cocteau Twins, then you will probably like this record and the ones that came after.

Yet another reason to knock off the head of someone next to you who says, "I just don't like 80s music," as if there were some single genre from any decade! Please. To add insult to injury, ersatz headless wo/man is also doing injustice to all of the great work (like this) which came out of our supposedly shameful past (though I'd be, and am, more ashamed of the 90s and these past few neonatal years on the whole). This record is lovely.

I first discovered this album in 1984 when I was 15 years old. It was beautiful and sad, just like my interpretation of life. I would close my eyes and play the cassette tape from beginning to end and I would be transported to another world. Never had music touched me the way this album did and I doubt another will ever come along that would invoke so many emotions. It's been 17 years and I still play the cassette from time to time. It still takes me away to another realm. I've thought of purchasing the cd, but the cassette seems to give it an even greater haunting sound. Life is tragic and wonderful, this music is the harmony of it all.

This is the first full-length (but not the first release...that would be the "Sixteen Days" EP) by what might be termed the '4AD All-stars', marshalled by Ivo Watts-Russell. More song-centric than the following "Filigree and Shadow", this is by far one of the most interesting and beautiful debut albums of the 1980s. The arrangements are often very sparse, consisting of little more than carefully-chosen and simple playing that accentuates both the lyrics and the mood of the songs. These are interspersed with several instrumentals, all of which are some of the finest ambient-pop I can think of, easily up there with some of Eno's middle-period work. But what comes across here is how, like a very carefully-arranged room, the tracks seem to need no more, and no less...they're all perfect. Especially beautiful and haunting is, of course, the cover of Tim Buckley's "Song to the Siren", which has almost nothing to it as far as its arrangement, yet sounds more powerful than a Mahlerian orchestra at full-tilt in terms of emotional content and atmospheric evocation. TMC and Ivo had a lot of lessons to teach here in terms of what one could do with pop tunes (much of TMC's stuff is, in fact, covers!) as well as the modern studio, but the real grad-level course was yet to come on the subsequent release. Still...five stars, and truly amazingly beautiful, with only its own releases to really compare TMC's work to.

I heard this album for the first time in 1990, and it has haunted me ever since. . I never owned it until now, but I can still remember every note of "Song to the Siren." One of the most alluring songs I've ever heard. GET THIS CD. It will be with you for a long time.