Albums That Loved Me Back #4

This Mortal Coil: Blood

4AD, more than any other label I can think of, has always exhibited a remarkable stylistic coherence among its various acts. 4AD bands have always had a distinct 4AD-ness about them. Even today, The Mountain Goats and TV on the Radio seem right at home among older acts like Pixies and Cocteau Twins.

It seems ironic that This Mortal Coil, a project that 4AD founder Ivo Watts-Russell created to allow artists on the label to perform material they wouldn't have had the opportunity to do otherwise, drips with all the trademarks of the 4AD sound. Lavish string arrangements, reverb, samples of birdsong and babbling infants, and singers with speech impediments reconstruct classic pop songs, interspersed with a handful of original instrumentals. Any adjective used to describe any 4AD release is even more applicable to Blood, This Mortal Coil's third and final album - haunting, etherial, gossamer, other-worldly, etc., etc., etc. It's where the ghosts of pop songs loiter and rattle their chains, much to the delight of living ears.

I thought I would have more to say about my personal impressions about this album. I don't even have any specific recollections about hearing it for the first time. But upon reflection, I realize that it moves me consistently because it is nearly perfectly aligned with my conceptions of what music should be: sincere but refined. The production is merely confection. Underneath processing and samples and reverb, what you have is a simple melody and a heartfelt chorus. Lyrics are selected for content and not for a convenient rhyme. This is the common thread running through all the songs, whether a cover or an original composition. It seems that Ivo selected TMC's songs to distill these elements in particular, expressing more about why he loves music than about the subject matter of any particular track. I think that it is for these reasons that Blood remains a timeless example of a nearly perfect album.