The Church - Heyday

Heyday is the fourth studio album by the Australian alternative rock band The Church, released in November 1985. The record represents a major artistic milestone, as it was the first time all four band members collaboratively composed the entire track list, departing from frontman Steve Kilbey's previous solo songwriting dominance. Produced by Peter Walsh, the album is highly regarded for its lush, neo-psychedelic production that blended the band's signature chiming, multi-layered guitar interplay with orchestral strings and brass arrangements. It yielded classic tracks like "Myrrh", "Already Yesterday", and "Tantalized", and it served as the band's critical breakthrough, earning them their very first chart placement in the United States.

The creative success and sonic experimentation of Heyday laid the essential groundwork for the band's massive international stardom just a few years later. By refining their atmospheric dream-pop and college-rock sensibilities on this record, the group established the distinct, shimmering identity that would eventually define their 1988 commercial peak, Starfish, and its iconic hit single "Under the Milky Way". Today, Heyday remains a definitive fan favourite and a critical darling of the 1980s alternative rock movement, celebrated for its timeless, ethereal production and sophisticated musicianship.

The Church - Remote Luxury

Collecting the contents of two separate EPs into a full-length album for American purposes, Remote Luxury actually makes for a reasonable release, avoiding the miserable drum sound that plagued Séance. The band are hardly so groansome, mixing the light synth touches evident on Séance with a tight, sharp postpunk groove. While the comparisons to bands like R.E.M. were sometimes stretched a bit, there's no denying the similar love of brisk, economic velocity which crops up on many of these songs, including the steady beat of "Violet Town" and the crisp flow on "Into My Hands." "No Explanation" perhaps fits the R.E.M. likeness best after a brief instrumental beginning, a shimmering, strummed gem with a great main melody. Kilbey again handles the vocals with his usual mix of low-key singing and sometimes clever, sometimes obscure lyrics, while the band as a whole keeps things moving. Willson-Piper, who handles lead vocals for "10,000 Miles" and "Volumes," and Koppes by now show their excellent guitar abilities almost at every turn, their avoidance of pointless flash in favour of compelling hooks and a little extra shading when needed always coming through. "A Month of Sundays" and "Shadow Cabinet" are just two highlights of their abilities, beautiful and hummable all at once. An interesting if slightly atypical effort on the disc is "Maybe These Boys," with a relentless keyboard hook that almost sounds like a military fanfare leading into the full band performance, though with further keyboards still prominent. Kilbey's vocals are eventually contrasted with a Vocodered treatment of the same words, making for a strange, unsettling ending.

The Church - Séance +

The cover may have looked like something of a Goth record of the era, though then again not many Goths would have used pink (or purple as they did for the UK release) as the dominant colour of an album. On this, the band's third full album, the band consolidated the advances of Blurred Crusade well; if Séance isn't as immediately striking as the first two albums, it still has its share of winners, starting with the opening "Fly." Its string-synth touched, stripped-down arrangement almost sounded like something from the Chameleons' quieter moments, but the following "One Day" returned the Church to more familiar ringing-yet-forceful guitar territory. One very curious thing about this song and many of the others on the album has to with the drumming; while Ploog very much remains the key credited drummer, here and on many other cuts nearly everything sounds produced by a particularly muffled drum machine. Whether or not one was used, the result is at once stiff and more than a little underwhelming, making what should be stronger songs sound more run of the mill than they are. Even the otherwise excellent remastering of the early catalogue when the albums were reissued on Arista can't save some of the problems. Aside from this major flaw, Séance keeps at the understated guitar groove that the Church rapidly made its own, containing marvellous songs like "Disappear?" and the nicely paced "Electric Lash." Experimenting with keyboards more provides some nice results, as the Kilbey-and-synth introduction to the lovely "It's No Reason" shows. Meanwhile, the interplay between Willson-Piper, Koppes, and Kilbey on their respective instruments remains strong, with many noted strong points: the dramatic, tense build of "Travel By Thought," the low-key combination on "Electric" bursting into keyboard-touched life on its choruses, and the quick, punchy "Dropping Names."

The Church - The Blurred Crusade

After such a fine debut as Of Skins and Heart, creating a follow-up might have been a burden for the Church; and maybe it was, but the end result was well worth it. Perhaps even better than their first, The Blurred Crusade captures what for many remains the classic early Church sound, blending both the various strains of '60s inspiration and postpunk drive detected from the start with an even more elegant melancholy. Musically, both Willson-Piper and Koppes are just fantastic, their combination of guitar playing running the range from sparkling post-Byrds chime to sharp power. If the group doesn't fully explode here as much as later albums would demonstrate, especially on Heyday, it perhaps can be laid at producer Bob Clearmountain's feet. Consider the slow but steady build-up of "When You Were Mine," guitar lines and notes setting the scene before fully kicking into the main riff and the clever but not forced production on the vocals on some of the middle verses. Add on the fantastic solo about four minutes in, and this is great rock music, period, deeply impressive coming on a sophomore album. Highlights are plentiful throughout Blurred, but the best numbers are perhaps the opening "Almost With You," a note-perfect combination of hooks and downbeat but not morose atmosphere, and the lengthy, powerful "You Took." Willson-Piper's lead vocal number "Field of Mars" and the brief, concluding "Don't Look Back" are further songs of note.

The Church - Of Skins And Heart

On their debut, Of Skins and Heart, The Church play straightforward pop/rock firmly rooted in new wave, though owing no small debt to '60s pop. Edgier and more direct than their later work, it also ranks among their finest for that very reason. None of the excesses and ambitions that would sometimes get out of hand on later releases are present, though much of the band's basic formula was laid down; Steve Kilbey's cool, detached vocals and slightly surrealistic lyrics combined with some outstanding pop hooks, nice harmonies, and layers of ringing guitar. The classic "Unguarded Moment" (arguably one of the greatest singles of the '80s) overshadows much of the material on the album, but there is really no shortage of great songs here.

While the group never truly gained the popular acclaim many thought was due, The Church have still managed to carve out a consistently interesting career for themselves, moving from underground sensation to (briefly) popular mainstream act to legendary veterans, all while never resting on their laurels. A reassessment of the Australian quartet’s early LP’s is especially useful considering how well it displays the band finding their way toward their signature sound, a swirl of psychedelic rock that contains familiar elements but that sounds like no one but The Church.

Fans who entered The Church following the international success of their fifth album Starfish and its career-defining hit single “Under the Milky Way” might be surprised by the forthright sound of the band’s debut album Of Skins and Heart. The gauzy psychedelia for which the group would become known appears only in hints and glimmers here. Instead the band (bassist/ singer/ songwriter Steve Kilbey, guitarists Peter Koppes and Marty Willson-Piper, and drummer Nick Ward) boasts a rocking sound that’s more in line with the rising tide of 80’s new wave. It sounds like a young band with talent to burn, eager to get its ideas down on vinyl as quickly and energetically as possible.

The snarling post-punk “Fighter Pilot…Korean War,” the straightforward ballad “Don’t Open the Door to Strangers” and the bombastic “Memories in Future Tense” sound very different from the band with which most people would become familiar – the guitars are much more muscular and less pretty. Steve Kilbey had not yet found his style as a vocalist, pushing his natural croon into an urgent yelp influenced by his 70s glam rock heroes. It mostly fits but he occasionally sounds like he’s straining beyond his comfort zone. Sprightly pop rockers like “She Never Said,” “For a Moment We’re Strangers,” “Chrome Injury” (which is marred by a dated electronic percussion thwack) and the Australian hit “The Unguarded Moment” show some of the group’s hallmarks – the uncommon chemistry between Koppes and Willson-Piper’s axes, Kilbey’s enigmatic lyrics – but also have a stripped down, propulsive power folks rarely associate with the band now. The leisurely epic “Is This Where You Live” and the jangling “Bel-Air” give hints of what was to come, but overall Of Skins and Heart sounds like the work of a different band than The Church we all know – though quite a good band, to be sure.