“The band had made good money from The
Colour Of Spring and touring, and wanted to
experiment. It was purely ‘art’. No one told the
musicians what to play or gave a hint of direction.”
PHILL BROWNThe band paid a commercial price for their
free will and invention, though Spirit Of Eden
is now rightly hailed as a masterpiecewhere to place the instrument
in the room, what instrument
it should be, what notes we
should keep and their fi nal
location in the track. Once,
we spent fi ve 12-hour days
perfecting a guitar sound!
I know the album feels like
seven guys playing live in
a room, but every note is
‘placed’ where it is. The album
is an illusion.”
Aspden fi rst heard Spirit
Of Eden after its completion.
“Mark and Tim were pleased
with what they’d achieved,” he
recalls, “and were confi dent
the album would be successful.
Tim [who, according to Brown,
believed the record sounded
like a 1960s concept album]
told me he thought it would sell
at least four million copies.”In the years since, Spirit
Of Eden has come to be
recognised as a masterwork- an infl uence on the likes
of Radiohead and Elbow,
and a precursor to what
became known as post-rock.
Its free-spirited, free-form
attitude, unfamiliar structures
and unexpected bursts of
both silence and discordancy
make it a challenging listen,
but it boasts an irrefutable,
courageous grandeur that’s
both emotionally breathtaking
and intellectually thrilling.
Quite apart from Hollis’
peerless vocal performances,
its arrangements overfl ow with
unusual but enchanting sounds:
harmonium, clarinet, bassoon,
trumpet, violin, even the choir
of Chelmsford Cathedral. Often
compared to the work of Van
Morrison, Miles Davis and
Debussy, the truth is it sounds
like nothing else at all.
Legend has it that when
Talk Talk’s A&R fi rst heard the
record, he cried – and not just
at its beauty. Even Aspden
concedes: “My immediate
question was how would it
be promoted with no live
work or singles for radio. The
market didn’t exist at the time
for this record, no matter how
brilliant it was. With just Mark
and Tim involved, there was
no balance, no perspective,
no big picture. They took the
reins and drove the coach
and horses right off the cliff.
When the album was delivered
to EMI, the disappointment
was apparent, and I could
sense budgets being revised
downwards as we listened.
The reality and experience of
producing a record ‘before
its time’ is that nobody likes it
when it’s most important.”
To Hollis, the experience
was bewildering. The album,
he insisted to Q at the time,
was “only radical in the
modern context. It’s not
radical compared to what was
happening 20 years
“He said he can spend six
hours writing thousands of
words,” he’d admired, “and
then throw almost all of them
away. It’s the same with
songwriting. It’s worth it for the
stuff you’re left with at the end.”
“The band had made
good money from The Colour
Of Spring and touring, and
wanted to experiment.
It was purely ‘art’,” Brown
states categorically of their
meticulous working practices.
“No one told the musicians
what to play or even gave a
hint of direction. Mark and
Tim didn’t want to infl uence
them, and wanted the ‘input’
from whichever musician was
there at the time. There was no
urgency because we had no
time restraint or budget. The
attitude was it took as long as it
took to get the right result.”
Asked whether this might
have been due to Hollis and
Friese-Greene’s inability to
articulate what they were
looking for, Brown concedes,
“I think we only knew what we
liked once we heard it, plus we
tried out every possibility until
we stumbled on it. These would
include which mics to use,
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