blksqul's Full Review: Superstition by Siouxsie and the Banshees
For those who remember Siouxsie Sioux as the unwitting catalyst of the notorious Bill Grundy incident, where the Sex Pistols swore on national television; for those who remember popping in "The Scream" and being terrified and intrigued by the opening seconds of "Pure" (or, conversely, being repulsed and intrigued by the closing minutes of "The Lord's Prayer" on "Join Hands"); for those who briefly recall that punk mascot Sid Vicious was an early member of Siouxsie & the Banshees; this pink-and-yellow flowery album called "Superstition" is going to go down about as well as broken glass. But I don't believe you are really from that scene if you say you are. You should be either deep in heroin sleep or coked out of your skull by now. Or so rattled by ghosts that you've cleaned up and now host a show on VH-1. You poor sod.
For the rest of us, may I present to you an album completely torn apart and reassembled by Stephen Hague, who has produced acts such as the Pet Shop Boys (bleah) and New Order (yeah). This isn't so much Siouxsie & the Banshees as Siouxsie & The Computerized Future. It's a nice little flop, with some winning moments, but if you're looking for anger, anguish or theatrical golden spinnings of the dawn into black thread -- y'know, what Siouxsie and her band do best -- stay away, away, away from this.
The group is the same core members -- Siouxsie with her honey-coal voice; Budgie with his thundering drum currents; Steve Severin with his magesterial basslines (mostly buried in the whirrs and clicks of technology for this round); and two members that hung on from "Peepshow": Jon Klein on keyboards, and Martin McCarrick on guitar, keys and cello.
"Kiss Them For Me" starts things off right. A melancholy valentine (via a ghostly keyboard riff and Indian percussive elements) to self-destructive attention wh*re Jayne Mansfield, the song relates Mansfield's fractured ways, her heart-shaped pool, and her trademark "divoon" pink persona. While I like Siouxsie's reflections on the shallowness of fame, it is the final verse, about Mansfield's fatal car wreck, that gives the song its undertow. Some of the best words on the album sit here. "On the road to New Orleans/A spray of stars hits the screen/As the 10th impact shimmered/The forbidden candles beamed." Now you know why "I may be delayed."
"Fear (Of the Unknown)" is a mediocre song. When I want my musical artists to tell me how to live my life, I'll give them a call. Otherwise, advice on how to take each day from millionaires comes off as exceedingly shallow. (*cough* Madonna *cough*) But Siouxsie's in a mood throughout this album to dispense her wisdom. However, wisdom hardly rhymes, and when it does, it's trivialized. So we get a dancey beat backing words of c'mon, take a chance. Live a little. Don't be afraid. Don't sit in place. Yes, there's a second level to this, where Siouxsie sings "Do you ever have the strange sensation/When you're standing mighty tall/To jump from 17 floors and crash into freefall?" But it doesn't make me feel any less lectured, or the speech any less shallow in its "What if?" bromides.
"Cry" is so sentimental that I can barely stand to listen to it. Where, but in song, would someone as strong and independent as Siouxsie Sioux think "Nothing will ever be the same/All is ruined and put to shame" when her love jilted her? Give me a break. It's a sweet melody, surging and soaring, scored by guitar and keys, ruined by the thrown-off words. I get no hint of her experiences as a human being in this track. It's Prozac covering her pain.
"Drifter." Ah, here we go. The album has found its footing again. Sioux sings in a high, tear-stained voice about someone unknowable to her and unknowable to love, while tender instruments slowly creep in and out of the picture. It all locks together via the melody; a subtle, wispy thing that will easy dispel if you look at it too hard. So don't look. Just listen, and remember why you liked Siouxsie & the Banshees to begin with.
The unfolding beauty continues with "Little Sister." A song of hopeful devotion and tender sentiment (as opposed to sentimentality) ... this one soars up into the sky and makes raindrops. Scientists will tell you rain really comes from a system of evaporation and precipitation, but they're wrong. They're all wrong. I don't know what that means, and that's why it works -- a mirror of this song.
"Shadowtime" is something rare for the Banshees. A fragrant little sigh of a song without any hint of paranoia or encroaching damnation in the instrumentation. This is all gentle light playing in a pool of shadows. But these shadows aren't cast by cruel edifices or burning towers; simply the shade under your favorite tree by the river. Mmm, summer isn't too far away on this one. "Your changeling song," indeed.
"Silly Thing" walks the line between good and plain horrible. Sometimes it falls one way, sometimes another. It's made to dance to, so I can forgive the lyrics cataloguing petty fights and how they destroy relationships to a point. But it's all so vague and left to your imagination -- "Such a silly thing can destroy a man/For such a silly thing to come between friends." I understand the Banshees are going after a universal idea here, but aside from the catchy melody, it doesn't translate well, and comes off a little on the shallow end of the heart-shaped pool.
But guess what? That song's deeper than Proust when compared to "Got to Get Up." Okay, you know the Cure's horrid "Gone!" This is the blueprint. Her voice goes between a wonderfully deep bellow and shrieks akin to a cat having its tail stepped on -- very entertaining. But it doesn't change the lyrics, which are about as insightful as floral wallpaper. "There's no one else, it's up to you/Are you gonna wake up or cry boo-hoo?" has to be some kind of nadir for the band.
A lot of fans really like "Silver Waterfalls," and I admit it's growing on me, but it's by no means the highlight for me. The guitars seem to realize they exist finally, and they smear themselves all over this song. I think that's why people's ears immediately prick up -- the guitar is in short supply on this disc, buried usually under layers and layers of thump. The lyrics, for their part, are gorgeous: "We were here long ago/And now we roam like ghostly buffalo/First two lies, then two tears/Subtle curves, now glistening souvenirs." But, to me, this is an also-ran. If I want guitar, I'll pop in "Playground Twist" and terrify myself. I thought this disc was supposed to highlight the studio machines, something different?
"Softly" is, without a doubt, the saddest, ghostliest song Siouxsie & the Banshees have ever penned. It's one of the reasons I still own this disc despite all the mediocrity. Gorgeous, wavering cello, a haunted keyboard sob, and Siouxsie sounding the most desperate and beautiful I have ever heard her -- "I wanted your lips, yes I wanted your kiss/So softly the moment had flown/My body outside yours/Softly collects the falling snow." Hearing this, I remember what falling in love is like.
"Superstition" ends with something very punk in "The Ghost in You" -- a memoriam of Tiananmen Square, lyrics pouring out such as "burning paper house," "eyewitness in a shroud" and "the flag is torn and frayed." But here's the most punk thing about it: rather than hitching this man and his suitcase facing off a tank (remember that?) to guitar pyrotechnics, we have a soft, bell-strewn song that could be safely heard in a dentist's office as long as you didn't actually listen to the lyrics. I love that they make this a tender ode, rather than a screaming indictment of man's inhumanity to him/her/itself. It seems braver that way.
So, that's that. "Superstition." An album of some of the band's greatest highs and deepest lows at once. Deeply confusing and infuriating. It will evoke so much love and hate that you will be safer never buying this album at all. But then you're going to miss out on some rare moments of beauty. Huh, it looks like Siouxsie taught me something about life after all.
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