March 14, 1999

Open All Night

The fact that [a]Soft Cell[/a] are reportedly reforming may be taken by some as proof that [a]Marc Almond[/a] has given up on outliving past glories...

7 / 10 The fact that Soft Cell are reportedly reforming may be taken by some as proof that Marc Almond has given up on outliving past glories. But like some obsessive News Of The World reporter turned tragic romantic fiction writer, he seems destined to eternally trawl the seedy underbelly of the urban night in search of romance amid the commonplace.

And no-one's complaining when he can dig up the midnight blue melancholy of 'Night And Dark' and 'Almost Diamonds'. Sure, the aesthetic world inhabited by our hero seems to have shrunk to the point where the words 'night', 'kiss', 'bedroom', and 'black' occur with a frequency that borders on the cartoon, but when, like 'Heart In Velvet', they inhabit an evocative Brel-meets-Barry landscape, then you embrace it all the more.

Besides, the sadness never seems merely stylised, the emotions never superficial, and if the menace of 'Black Kiss' or 'Scarlet Bedroom' is camp as much as chilling, it adds to the mischievous sense of 'you know, I quite like it in here doing awfully naughty things, darling'.

'Open All Night', then. Coming soon to an 0898 line near you.