It’s been a spell since I added a song to the series of posts that was originally intended to look backwards to look forwards for music discovery.
I was disappointed with the discovery process, which either sent me to bands I already knew full well or directed me to bands that sounded nothing at all like my “seed” music.
After yesterday’s post quoting an opinion piece writer who has essentially declared that we have settled for the enshittification of our culture via the monetization of everything artistic thanks to the internet, I was left thinking about the last time I really enjoyed most of the music I was discovering. I can safely say that started to wane at some point near the end of the 90s.
Sure, I mentioned the Replacements, but only because I am reading their biography. They lost their luster for me around Don’t Tell A Soul, which was their last album I felt was worth purchasing (it had some great tunes, like Talent Show and Achin’ to Be), and I loved music discovery in the 80s, where it seemed like I could find a new band to love with every visit to the record store.
In the mid-90s, I was working in the music section of Borders Books when I wasn’t slinging espresso shots as a barista at a cafe (Or cutting hair. Or working at a print shop.). The record company reps loved having me around because I was more than happy to promote new bands, provided their music didn’t drive me crazy (Sorry, I got sick of Chumbawumba before it even hit Top 40). I got free tix to concerts as thanks for helping them make their sales on new acts.
One of the bands I had thrust as me was Delerium, an Enigma-like spinoff of Front Line Assembly. Their biggest song was Silence, which featured Sarah MacLachlan on vocals. That was only one song on the whole album, and there were several female guest singers on the tracks. In my opinion, Silence was manufactured to be a hit, but there were better songs on Karma than the hit-maker (Euphoria (Firefly) with Jacqui Hunt comes to mind).
One of those singers was Kristy Thirsk of Rose Chronicles, who sang on a handful of songs for Delerium on Karma and most of the songs on the album immediately proceeding it. While I picked up a few CDs from most of the singers around that period, Happily Ever After by Rose Chronicles blew me away from the moment it went into the player and it is the one that has stuck with me since.
While Kristy followed the rules of ambient songs (airy, breathy singing) on the Delerium album, she held absolutely nothing back when she sang for Rose Chronicles. The band is more shoegaze, for those of you familiar with the genre.
A bit of warning: If you don’t like broad ranges of singing with an almost anguished sound to some of the vocalizations, don’t bother listening. You will not like it. Kristy is very much into anguished singing on the following song, and Vicious Thorn (in the YouTube embed below) is almost radio-ready compared to other album tracks like Lovely Psycho or Krayon. She’s not as experimental as Diamanda Galas, but she’s definitely not singing to a mainstream audience on this album (her solo works are much more tame).
Is there something lost in me
Like a vicious thorn?
Is she tearing ribbons
So the pain will be adorned?
Have I wrapped it all nicely
In the soul trace of my eyes?
Do you even care your candle
Is burning out of my disguise?
Now I cradle everything
You're not coming back
You're not coming back
As always, give me your impressions. If this makes you think of someone you think I might like to listen to, please shoot me your suggestions in the comments below.
[Note: Due to a bad actor attempting to comment on this site with their rubbish spam, I have decided to shut down comments after 14 days from the date of posting so that they can’t try to seed my comments threads with their attempts to rip my readers off selling imaginary online currency.]
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