Gorey End, The - Tiger Lillies (The)/Kronos Quartet

Advantages: Martyn Jacques of the Tiger Lillies singing God Save the Queen
Disadvantages: 20 minutes without a break and you can't go to the bits you like.

...If you like the Tiger Lillies and their acoustic accordion/bass/guitar/drum sound, you may not like this. Contrastate are an electronic band with synthesised sound - as such, a contrast to the Lillies. What Contrastate have done is taken a couple of the Tiger Lillies early recordings, 'Tears' and 'Palace of St James' and mixed about with them. However, if you are a Martyn Jacques fan, this cd is worth it just to hear him singing God Save the Queen. If you don't have the original versions of 'Palace of St James' and 'Tears', buy the albums they are on - 'Bouquet of Vegetables' and 'Births, Marriages and Deaths' from the band's website to get the fuller, unadulterated versions of these songs - much better than this mixed offering.... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average somewhat helpful

Advantages: Crazy performance, songs well taken from the book
Disadvantages: Falsetto could be too much at certain times

...Earlier today, I reviewed a Frank Zappa album and that immediately made me think of The Tiger Lillies, another band fronted by a dramatic genius Martyn Jacques who supposedly spent several years living in a brothel in Soho whilst perfecting his falsetto voice. Martyn leads the line well with his hillarious face, intonation and general onstage behaviour. This album covers the songs from the Shockheaded Peter tour, a collection of tunes based on the stories from the children's book Struwwelpeter (Shockheaded Peter) written in the 1840's which I imagine would be fairly terrifying for any child but is supposedly for 3-6 year olds! Anyway the performances from the dark trio are immense and really bring the stories to life. Martyn is completely insane on the song "Dreadful story about Harriet & The Matches", where he plays a cat who... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average somewhat helpful

Advantages: Eleven of them!
Disadvantages: None !

..., and was written in typical shouty protest to the on-going war in Iraq. Much like some of the the sociological issues that fuelled "The Holy Bible", this is a up-and-at-em' track and an indirect dig at the super-powers of today!. Although 'Tigers..' is only a short album (38 minutes to be precise) it's one that's packed with memorabilia and quality. You'll find yourself on a nostalgic journey through all eleven tracks and an extra special surprise in the form of a secret John Lennon inclusion at the end of track ten. Send Away The Tigers works even without a synopsis of each individual track. Most people go with what they know, but even if you're a newcomer to the Manics, Your Love Alone is a good directive to the stance and calibre of Send Away the Tigers. The Manics have re-assessed their perspective, taken a leaf out of their punk fuelled... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful