A Dark Enchantment

Secession was a Scottish synthpop band that was active between 1983 and 1987. The original incarnation comprised Peter Thomson (guitar, keyboards, synthesizer and vocals), Jack Ross (guitar, synthesizer and vocals), Jim Ross (bass guitar) and Carole L. Branston (keyboards and vocals). The band used a small pre-programmed drum machine. After a session of leavers and joiners, the now trio of Thompson, Branston and new boy Alistair MacLeod were signed by Beggars Banquet. The trio recorded "Fire Island" in Edinburgh; it was later remixed by the production team associated with Freeez and John Rocca. Before its release, MacLeod left the band and was replaced by Charlie D. Kelly. The final incarnation of the band consisting of Thomson, Branston, Kelly with J.L. Seenan are associated with almost the entire Secession release catalogue. A Dark Enchantment was given only a limited UK release by indie label Siren, with the CD having the cake and eating it; bonus tracks. 

Let’s pretend that we are back in a world with no Wikipedia, no Internet at all. How do you find out information about the bands you love? Well one way was to look at the sleeve. Really, really look at it. After all that was pretty much all you had. Unfortunately this sleeve doesn't give anything away. The inner sleeve declares 'Songs About Love and Death'. The band mysteriously use initials instead of first names, although there are some band photos so you know that one of the band was female. We’d grown up with record sleeves that were so well designed that it sometimes you just knew that it didn't matter what the record was like. Think 23 Envelope, Peter Saville and Factory, think The Smiths on Rough Trade, or 4AD. However this is a record with so many ideas between the grooves that it can never settle on just one thing.  It wants to be a happy sparkly kind of record but at the same time it wants to be a dark brooding angry record. The inescapable comparison, which I thought the very first time I listened to it, is with New Order. But that is a good thing. Listen to Love Lies Bleeding and you'll hear a band that deserved to play for clubs full of spannered ravers. Love Lies Bleeding is them at their happy dancefloor friendly best. And then they follow it up with something like Sneakyville, apparently inspired by the Manson killings and sounding something like Depeche Mode all deep voices and brooding synth lines. The whole record is somewhat off-kilter. It flirts with so many styles, masters some and fails to get others right. The lyrics are, for the most part impenetrable. I can never seem to get on top of the music, or perhaps I mean under the skin of it. Just when you think you have Secession down, they slip out of your grasp and lead you on to somewhere else.

Ripped from the 1987 CD release to dark and brooding MP3 @ 320kbps

Secession; A Dark Enchantment

1.      Eventide

2.      Promise

3.      Love Lies Bleeding

4.      Sneakyville

5.      Winifred

6.      The Box That Holds A Secret

7.      Ocean Blue

8.      Radioland

9.      The Magician

10.   Love Lies Bleeding (Reprise)

11.   The Wolf

12.   Eventide (Theme From A Dark Enchantment)

13.   All The Animals Come Out At Night

14.   Michael

15.   Havoc

16.   Promise Dub

You can find the 12" single "Fire Island" here