What does it sound like?:

TFF’s second album, Songs From The Big Chair, had seen them conquer the world (and soundtrack my paper rounds of 1985). Following an exhausting year-long world tour, they holed up in multiple expensive studios with various producers including Langer and Winstanley, all of which were scrapped in favour of producing themselves with engineer Dave Bascombe.

By the time of the release of the third album they’d spent three years indoors, blown a million quid on studio fees, and driven themselves bonkers in the process of recording and mixing. Never ones to crack a joke, the strain was showing. I remember reading interviews at the time where they were taking home DAT tapes and struggling to choose the best mix, never easy when you have 100 channels of overdubs to tweak.

I first heard this in my student digs on a badly-dubbed tape and the complex Talking-Heads-meets-Sgt.-Pepper arrangements didn’t really make sense. The next time was on CD, loud in a car speeding down the M20 to Dover, and everything fell into place. I vowed to buy it as soon as I found a record shop.

This box collects together the album (freshly remastered at » Continue Reading.