Post-Punk Monk

[…continued from last post]

I must admit that “Mind Of A Toy” has never been my go-to Visage jam, but the live version here was more direct and impactful, with a crispness that the effete album version just didn’t get across. Steve’s adding “mommy/daddy/you told me that you love me” in the breakdown at the climax was better than the watery dub of children’s voices on the record.

Then Steve introduced “The Dancer” and told the audience that “we’ll leave you in these gentlemen’s capable hands and we’ll see you in a couple of minutes.” But he didn’t reveal that those “couple of minutes” were nearly ten as the band stretched what was a brief instrumental interlude on LP into an epic slice of bravura performance. At about the time that the mild original was ready to fade out, Robin Simon bit down deep into the neck of the song for his solo where he was on fire as his sharp tone slalomed between the rhythm section for a dynamic injection of energy. Next Logan Sky got to solo with shimmering sheets of string patches building up layers of countermelodies. Then Steve Barnacle dove deep in to the Jazz bucket fearlessly without regard to whether this was a part of the Visage sonic toolkit or not…thank goodness!

I’ll admit that the longest of the solos here was where they let Johnny Marter go nuts for maybe a minute too long as it tended to devolve the song into a place where I simply lost the plot before it finally resolved with all five players in unison once more; guns blazing away. But I still had to admire how n instrumental track had been turned into a showpiece here. I’m thrilled that this has finally reached Visage fans because had I known about this otherwise for the last eleven years, I would have been pining away sorely for a copy of this!

Then they snapped back to the present with a tight rip through “Shameless Fashion.” Reminding me of how much that Simon brought to the project with his contributions to “Hearts + Knives.” The middle eight solo with Logan dropping in motor drive samples as Mr. Simon was shredding away was pretty breathtaking.

Next came the band’s calling card, “Fade To Grey.” Where Strange throughout, was singing either out front, alone, or with Lauren Duvall offering strategic support, here Strange was clearly using Autotune live to gloss over any perceived vocal shortcomings. I’ve heard this on other performances of “Fade To Grey” whether it’s on the “Orchestral” album or otherwise. And I can only surmise that he was insecure about his vocal prowess when this song was the issue.

It’s weird, because we all know that Steve was Steve. He was never a top flight vocalist but the man given the job for practical reasons. I always find Autotune I can pick out easily to be a distancing artifact that’s worse than flat or off key singing, which frankly, I find sort of charming, depending on the circumstance. I personally, would never hold Strange up to, let’s say, Midge Ure in comparison. Though I enjoy hearing Midge sing Visage tunes live these days, at the end of the day Visage was Steve Strange. You either love him or you move on. I wish that someone could have talked [I’m guessing] Steve out of using Autotune here and would have the vocal chips fall where they may. That said, the band render the supple pulse of the song admirably. It’s a classic for a reason.

Then the always exciting namesake track closed out the album as the elegant piano chords of the intro were laid down over the relentless beat that just won’t be stopped. Robin Simon joining in with the galloping sequencer as he added finely chopped rhythm guitar to the sound. Marter was adding the right drum fills at crucial points to keep the tune effortlessly motoring forward. I enjoyed the stereo panning on synth riff the middle eight with Simon and Marter digging their heels in for as much Rock grit as they can imbue the ferocious song with. When Steve Barnacle joins in with them on bass, it’s the furthest thing from effete.

If anyone had gotten a time machine and ventured back to 1981 to tell me that one day Visage will issue a live album, I would have pegged them as deluded. This was, after all, a studio supergroup where the commitments of the players virtually guaranteed an inability to tour. But that all changed 30+ years later. But thankfully, when having completed the “Hearts + Minds” album, the notion of a Visage tour, however modest was bandied about and int he post-label era, it probably made good economic sense to have one.

Certainly with players of this caliber, it would have been a tragedy to have toured without making any recordings. Whatever notion at the offices of the August Day label what was the home to modern Visage, led them to issue this live album [and it’s companion album – more on that later] eleven years after the fact, I have to appreciate the effort. It manages to recast the DanceRock band as much more of a Rock band and gives me a new lens with which to view them with. This is perhaps made explicit at the album’s end where Strange says that now “I can get to look like Alice —-in’ Cooper!” Presumably a reference to his sweaty eye makeup running down his face.

Reviewing this finally reminds me that it’s past time to update the Visage Rock G.P.A.; written in the heady days when “Hearts + Minds” was new in the world with only five releases to make up the curve. I must have lost the plot when I was unable to get the “Orchestral” album on release due to saving up for travel, and I had to play catch up a year or two later. With a fat row of Visage CDs currently in the Record Cell, we’ve got the potential to get what may be the whole Visage story down for posterity now. So watch this space.

-30-

We’ve been thrilled with the Visage final wave of activity from 2013 which concluded too swiftly with the death of Steve Strange in 2015. But the impact of that period is still causing waves to lap at the shores of Lake Strange and now we’ve been given the least likely album release ever with the formerly studio-only band issuing “Visage Live 2013” in October of this year. With the talent that made the studio album “Hearts + Knives” one of my favorites of 2013 out on the stage, this was a project to show how “real” the studio project could get.

The lineup on the shows was with Steve Strange and Lauren Duvall on vocals, with Steve Barnacle on Bass and Robin Simon on guitar. Logan Sky had contributed synth programming on the album and stepped into the live keyboard role, which he’d continue to occupy for the rest of the band’s lifespan. For drums, Barnacle brought his friend Johnny Marter to the drumstool. We’d gotten a taste of the grittier live Visage sound on the “Dreamer I Know” CD-5 with a live take of “The Anvil” as recorded on Hoxton. We get a lot more of where that came from here, and the new CD features a different performance of “The Anvil,” for the record.

Visage: Live 2013 – UK – CD [2024]

1. Never Enough
2. The Damned Don’t Cry
3. The Anvil
4. Hidden Sign
5. Pleasure Boys
6. Mind Of A Toy
7. The Dancer
8. Shameless Fashion
9. Fade To Grey
10. Visage

We first hear Robin Simon giving us a couple of very Frippy lead lines but that was before the juggernaut beat kicked in and synched with the sequencers as the brilliant “Never Enough” got this set started with a burst of Post-Punk energy. It was a thrill to hear Simon weaving his guitar leads nimbly through the beats and synths in glorious syncopation. Listening to this performance, I’m seriously envious of those who got to experience Visage live eleven years ago. Especially in hearing Mr. Simon’s elegant riffage in the song’s climax.

The CD edition of the songs takes pains to leave in some of the chatter from Steve Strange between the songs. While the performances are indeed the show, I appreciate the decision made to put across Steve’s personality in what was certainly a momentous event in his life. Finally fronting Visage in more than name only. In addressing the audience he sounds as if he can hardly believe his luck in getting this chance. But luck had nothing to do with how accomplished the band were as the tight, energetic group brought their A-level game to the table.

Longtime fave “The Damned Don’t Cry” got a lighter, more delicate touch with Robin Simon’s watery tremolo guitar licks contrasting with the sequencer and Logan Sky’s shimmering synth melodies. Things took a turn for the harder and tougher with “The Anvil” sporting a merging of Mr. Barnacle’s muscular bass lines with Sky’s horn-like synth riffs and the catlike prowl of Simon’s guitar. Mr. Marter adding the all-important metallic percussion that was the essence of this relentless, homoerotic anthem. In fact this version was so male-oriented I will admit to missing the backing vocals from Ms. Duvall here as on the album version, but her sitting this one out made a kind of thematic resonance, I suppose.

We then got another new song in the well-chosen set with “Hidden Sign” manifesting in a arrangement that took a step away from the Country/Folk-adjacent sound of the familiar album version deeper into Rock territory; as if the metallic riffage in the intro from Simon didn’t let us know immediately. This time we got the song as a proper duet with Duvall joining Mr. Strange for the heartfelt song as Simon unleashed a taut solo in the middle eight, complete with bent, violin-like riffs that really left the studio version in the shade. Prompting an ebullient Steve to proclaim “that woke you up, didn’t it?”

Opening with sampled cycles and the deep bass of Barnacle, this version of “Pleasure Boys” opened with delightful syncopation between Simon and Sky on the vaguely Asian riff in the intro. This song was always an outlier to something hard and minimal in the Visage canon and here it’s been stripped back to its grittiest airing ever. And it all sounded the better for it! With the envelope on the sequencer riff kicking particularly hard on this outing. And the appearance of Simon’s guitar here was a first for this number; having been recorded after Midge Ure had left the project back in the day. Let’s just say that he didn’t water down the soup!

Next: …Exploding Dancers