Blemish

[deadbees]

when i first heard about the album and that Fennesz was guesting/had had an influence i brought Endless Summer. so musically the album wasn't a huge shock. lyrically and vocally it certainly was and on first hearing only AFITF hit home. however after seeing the live performance and hearing recordings from the later gigs in Japan and then subsequently obtaining a DVD of the tv broadcast, the album has grown on me hugely. as the tour progressed the performance versions of certain tracks expanded upon the recorded ones with new parts added (for example i much prefer the live in Japan version of The Good Son) and then of course there was the remix album......

[Sylvie]

i'm impressed that is the album which introduced you to david's solo work. It is a devastatingly beautiful emotional journey. Love this album for all its difficulties.

You will enjoy the other albums if you enjoyed this one. They all quite different. I enjoy how his music reflects where he is at certain periods in his life.

well, it's not entirely true that this is my first david sylvian album. i bought everything and nothing first and sort of checked him out on youtube before i bought blemish.
but i don't have a long history with the other albums, so i don't expect sylvian to sound in a certain way. and to me, it is his voice that make me shiver, so he could sing whatever crap he wanted, i'd still like him. luckily he doesn't.

i still have the secrets of the beehive and gone to earth to discover. i know, i'm blessed.

[proggrl]

i still have the secrets of the beehive and gone to earth to discover. i know, i'm blessed.

Yes indeed! Happy discoveries, Sylvie. It is an enviable position, but one we've all been in.

[camphorvan]

Wlel I first got Blemish, I felt so so let down. I thought it was total rubbish. Then, I listened again.. Then again. Then again. In an effort to find something in there I could relate to. If A Fire in The Forest wasn't on there, I doubt I'd have come back to it so soon. It's a CD that requires a little bit of effort on the listeners part I think. Keep with it and it'll reap dividends.

Awful bloody cover though.

[The Analog Kid]

I liked it a lot straight away and found it much easier to get into than some of his other work

cheers
Eric

[godisinthesilences]

i still have the secrets of the beehive and gone to earth to discover. i know, i'm blessed.

oh yeah you are going to love these.... gorgeous gorgeous

[Adrian]

I absolutely loved it from first listen onwards; I even think the Nine Horses project is a bit of a step backwards; regardless how much I love that as well.
When I went to see him during the E&N tour, Camphor (the instrumental track of his) was played both before and after the show and I remember thinking 'what would this sound like if he added vocals?'. Blemish was the answer.
I am really excited to see what he will come up with next, because this tour apparantly is about severing connections with his past work, so what might that mean to his future work? We'll have to wait and see. In the meantime we'll have the new instrumental disc to look forward to in about a week - can't wait as I really love his instrumental work as much as his vocal stuff.

[E.T.]

When I listened to Blemish for the first time, I felt like knives cutting off my body... so uncomfortable... maybe that was sound of guitar... so I stopped the tune. I don't think I understood lyrics though.
I guess, it means he succeeded in one of his way.

[Stoobie]

Fire in the forest is the only track i like ~ cant listen to the rest really. well down my fav DS albums. Even now after all these years ! sorry !

Stoobie

[becky]

Hi Cheery Cherry (what a lovely username!),

Blimey, so you went straight from Japan to Blemish! That's one big leap! No wonder you were a bit surprised! I think Blemish might possibly make more sense to you once you've listened to all of David's other solo albums in chronological order and you can view the work within the context of how he has slowly evolved over the years...it's a fascinating and exciting journey!

I can't really say 'I love' listening to Blemish - I have to be in a particular mood to be able to sit through it, but I really do appreciate it as an amazing work of art. It takes a few listens to really decipher it, but its a very rich work and so I often here something in it new each time I listen to it.

Blemish puts me in the mind of an aural version of Edvard Munch's 'The Scream'....it's a wonderfully accurate expression of emotional angst but just as you probably wouldn't want 'The Scream' hanging on your living room wall and have to look at it every day because it is quite emotionally unsettling...so to, Blemish isn't something you pop on the stereo to sing along to to cheer you up (unless perhaps you are yourself in the middle of a break up and are curled up on the sofa, sitting in the dark, swigging back a bottle of red wine...David's voice makes very good company at times like these!).

Anyway, I've written more about how Blemish makes me feel on another post from two days ago (Just If) so I won't blurb on more here.

You've got a real treat awaiting you in Brilliant Trees (my all time favourite Sylvian album) and Secrets of the Beehive both are gorgeous... completely different to Blemish...musically they are both hauntingly beautiful...and very poetic lyrically.

Happy listening!

[Drake]

Listened to the whole thing the other night. It's a totally unique piece of art. It hurts, but wow - I like it. And the ending - Fire in the Forest - gives hope. The fire burns down the old and gives place for something new to come.

[neonico]

its the most amazing dvd ever japan i hated to commercial

sylvian is just cool

blemish what should i say i wish i had wrote it. ,,,,,


now how he feels.