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underarms
I ordered Underarms last week and received it this week (in New England)...very prompt service there at Alma Road & 4AD. The release itself is incredible. I thought Smiles O.K. lacked a certain cinematic ambience that all of the TMC albums had...although I liked the album something was missing... Now I have found it with Underarms...Not only is the music beautiful, cinematic, and some of the best ambience of the past 3 years...the packaging is beautiful...a simple navy blue folding case with just the Hope Blister logo embossed on the front flap with a single card insert in an inside pocket and a CD tray like none I have seen before. I never thought I would get so excited about a CD package! I'm probably making to big a deal of it...but it is beautiful and unique.
I cannot possibly express how happy I am with Underarms... certainly recommended!
(via 4AD mailing list May 7th 1999)
. . . smile's ok
The Hope Blister pick up where This Mortal Coil -- a project that featured a rotating roster of 4AD stalwarts (Cocteau Twins, Dead Can Dance, Wolfgang Press) and like-minded colleagues performing esoteric covers -- left off in 1991 with Blood. With 4AD guru Ivo Watts-Russell once again at the helm, the Hope Blister maintain a somewhat traditional band line-up (string quartet, sax player, rhythm section) and tackle material by Brian Eno, John Cale, Heidi Berry, and Tall Dwarves' leader Chris Knox. Vocalist Louise Rutkowski lends her disquietingly detached voice to generally austere chamber arrangements, singing with more character than presence. It's an approach that works best on selections that were originally marked by overwrought or mannered vocals, such as the Cranes' "Sweet Unknown," and David Sylvian's "Let the Happiness In." The Hope Blister lack the stylistic variety of This Mortal Coil's all-star karaoke. But . . . smile's ok offers plenty of soothing sounds for souls who think navy blue and forest green are bright colors, and for fans of vintage 4AD fare.
-- Kurt B. Reighley
.... smile's ok
I knew that there was something unique about this record when our dog paid attention to the beginning of this album. She never pays attention to any of the music that gets played in our house.
Turns out that The Hope Blister is a pretty special album. It's "sort of a sequel to This Mortal Coil" from the Coil and 4AD founder Ivo Watts-Russell.
Interestingly enough, the eight songs on the album are all covers of songs done by artists such as Neil Halstead (Slowdive, Mojave 3), Chris Knox (Tall Dwarves), Alison and Jim Shaw (Cranes), David Sylvian, Brian Eno, and John Cale.
The album is bathed almost entirely in an ethereal mist of purposefully sparse sounds. Lead singer Louise Rutowski (This Mortal Coil) has a strong, haunting vocal delivery that at times can veer from slightly gravelly ("Sweet Unknown") to operatic and choir-ish ("Outer Skin").
Many of the songs are based on stretched sounds created from a bass and strings, with bits and pieces of percussion, saxophones or other noises flitting through the quietness. One notable exception is the version of Eno's "Spider and I," which starts off with louder string movements and buried vocals before degenerating into screeching cacophony. It certainly stands out on the album, but for the wrong reasons.
The Hope Blister is a quiet, somewhat muted blend of orchestral elements and ambient tones that might take a few listens to fully appreciate. But it has a simple beauty, aside from one song, that can be hauntingly peaceful and enjoyable. Mammoth Records, The Broadstreet Building, 101 B Street, Carrboro, NC 27510-1834; http://www.mammoth.com
Jeff Montgomery
underarms
Even for goths, there were tea breaks. They came between tracks on This Mortal Coil records - in which the 4AD roster would gather to cover cult ballads under a dark cloak of wafty minimalism. They were usually 'composed' by head 4AD honcho Ivo Watts-Russell and consisted of whale wanking noises for just enough time to fix yourself a cup of hemlock before the next song.
When the concept was resurrected for last year's Hope Blister album, 'Smile's OK' (yeah, right), the Glastonbury tepee field rejoiced that it only had songs on it. But break out the electric bagpipes, here they all are, collected on this companion release of 'outtakes'. But do we get ill-judged Supernaturals covers? Nope, we get droning. About an hour of it on 'Sweet Medicine' and then, after a few totally innocuous tracks flitter by, another few months on 'Sweet Medicine 2', as if Ivo wants us to experience the hell of living near Heathrow. He may still be there, in a deserted studio, finger Superglued to middle C, droning for England.
'Underarms' is the equivalent of releasing an hour-long video of adverts and calling it Father Ted: The Forgotten Scenes. Just thank Christ these pits got shaved.
14th April 1998
.... smile's ok
IT'S NOT A PARTICULARLY GOOD start is it? That name. Lifted from the humourless depths of Gothsville and no doubt intended to symbolise some kind of Yin and Yang of joy and ultimate pain. But then Mr Blister, Ivo Watts-Russell, is hardly a man given to laughs. He founded the surrealist-heavy 4AD records in 1980 and also assembled the arch-introspective This Mortal Coil. Now, seven years after the final TMC release, his creative urges have welled up to breaking point. Darling, meet The, ahem, Hope Blister.
Ivo's ethos so far is pretty much thus: rope in a bunch of sincere musos to play out the treasure trove of cover version fantasies that swim around in his melancholic little head. A cursory glance at the instrumentation (cello, bass, violin, viola, sax) is enough to throw up worrying images of coffee-table maturity but 'Smile's OK' is no more than a reverb-frenzy of orchestral-backed posh crooning and overcooked atmospherics.
Thanks chiefly to fellow TMC collaborator and vocalist Louise Rutkowski, the Blisters spend most of their time (with the likes of 'Let The Happiness In' and 'Hanky Panky Nohow') roaming in that no-man's land between the end-of-the-world bleakness of The Swans and the deadly earnest neo-folk wibblings of Enya or Clannad. However their tendency to cross over the line into mawkish sadness ' la Whitney Houston has not gone unnoticed.
You see, that's what happens when you try to flesh out all of your dreams - real life drags 'em back to the pit of mediocrity. Ho hum.
6/6/1998
...Smile's OK
Ivo Watts-Russell, founder of the 4AD label and of the group This Mortal Coil, has returned to the studio with the quietly delicate Hope Blister. Watts-Russell serves as the project's coordinator, producing and overseeing the work of its various contributors. This cover song-oriented project tackles material by artists Chris Knox, Brian Eno, Slowdive and the Cranes among others, reinterpreting the originals with their personal intimacy intact. ...Smile's OK is intentionally sparse, but despite this, it retains a high degree of warmth. The two tracks with sax and percussion aside, the album uses only viola, violin, cello and bass guitar to weave exquisitely minimal, tender backdrops for Louise Rutkowski's chillingly expressive vocals. This spellbinding, ethereal aural cloth swaddles the listener like the softest fleece bunting around a newborn.
-Kelso Jacks
From the pages of the CMJ New Music Report, Issue: 602 - Jan 25, 1999
The Hope Blister profile on 4AD
Ivo Watts-Russell talks about The Hope Blister project on KCRW radio
The Hope Blister on Mammoth
An interview with Ivo Watts Russell on Mammoth
Real Audio links for "....smiles ok";
1-5 hosted by Tower Records, 6-7 Mammoth
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