porcupine

Echo and the Bunnymen came back from the precipice and brought the drama with icy invigoration and exotic experimentation on this prickly post-punk powerhouse. After the critical acclaim of their debut 'Crocodiles' and the minor chart success of the follow-up 'Heaven Up Here', the band was in a creative drought.  Tensions within the band during the initial sessions were not assuaged by the touring they did during April and May of 1982.  Drummer Pete de Freitas confesses:  "'Porcupine' was very hard to actually write and record...'Heaven Up Here' was pure confidence, we did it really quickly; we had a great time doing it – but this one was like we had to drag it out of ourselves."

'Porcupine' was produced by Ian Broudie at Trident Studios in Soho, London; Rockfield Studios in Monmouth, Wales; and Amazon Studios in Liverpool and featured Ian McCulloch on vocals and guitar; Will Sergeant on lead guitar; Les Pattinson on bass; and Pete de Freitas on drums.  After the first version of the album was rejected by WEA, the band rerecorded tracks with Indian violinist Lakshminarayana Shankar on strings.  

'Porcupine' went to number one hundred and thirty-seven in the US, eighty-five in Canada, twenty-four in Sweden, fifteen in Sweden, and number two in the UK, where it became the highest charting album of their career. McCulloch says:  "I think 'Porcupine' was a classic autobiographical album, the most honest thing that I'd ever written or sung...I found the material from it really heavy to play – like, really oppressive. That's the only reason why I didn't like the album. The songs were great but it didn't make me happy...A lot of songs are about coming to terms with the opposites in me."



'Porcupine'
full album:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iudtv6ZhYBU



Side one
00:00 "The Cutter" -- 3:56
03:54  "The Back of Love" -- 3:14
07:15   "My White Devil" -- 4:41
11:51    "Clay" -- 4:15
16:05   "Porcupine" -- 6:01
22:03   "Heads Will Roll" -- 3:33
25:35   "Ripeness" -- 4:50
30:30   "Higher Hell" -- 5:01
35:29    "Gods Will Be Gods" -- 5:25
40:57    "In Bluer Skies" -- 4:33



'The Back of Love' went to number twenty-four in Ireland and nineteen in the UK.  
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7jqdUBtWMc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkD0n-fwSqY




'The Cutter' sliced its way to number thirty in New Zealand, ten in Ireland, and number eight in the UK.  
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2ItNtCMgqc




'Never Stop (Discoteque)' was a non album single that was included as a bonus track on the re-issue of the album.  It charted at forty-nine in New Zealand, fifteen in the UK, and eight in Ireland.  
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuAdUgKSpok