Heartland

I've just read on Gary Marx's web site that he intends to make the tracks written for the abortive 1995 Sisters' sessions available for purchase due to the demand from fans.
It got me to thinking about the circumstances behind these sessions.
Gary has stated that the project was abandoned for reasons known only to Eldritch. I'm sure it was about the same that that Eldritch announced that he would no longer be part of the band but would continuing to tour with them and produce their records.
I don't know if Gary added the lyrics later, but if they were written as part of the sessions then it would dovetail neatly with the above. All Eldritch would have to do is sing and handle production - plus a bit of programming.
Eldritch gets a new Sisters record out without having to "give" any of his songs to East West, while the fans get an album written by the one person with enough credibility with the fan base to sell it as an actual Sisters records.
Reckon must have got cold feet in the end or something.

What do you think?

There are various bits I just don't get:

Erudite wrote:Eldritch announced that he would no longer be part of the band but would continuing to tour with them and produce their records.

Erudite wrote:All Eldritch would have to do is sing and handle production - plus a bit of programming.

Erudite wrote:What do you think?

Baffled, frankly? do explain.

I dunno what SSV means but I'm not going to bother asking anyone.

Erudite wrote:I'm sure it was about the same that that Eldritch announced that he would no longer be part of the band but would continuing to tour with them and produce their records.

I haven't a clue what that means.

Marx wrote the songs in 1995, not 1985.

It's my understanding he wrote them with no Eldritch prompting or involvement whatsoever and gave them to Eldritch as a form of peace offering, but as they were never used one can only assume they weren't up to Von's exceedingly high standards.

Karin - SSV is the "techno album without drums" that Eldritch recorded in a day to fulfil a contractual obligation and get out of his record contract.

Dan wrote:

Erudite wrote:I'm sure it was about the same that that Eldritch announced that he would no longer be part of the band but would continuing to tour with them and produce their records.

I haven't a clue what that means.

Hoping to void the record contract, Eldritch announced that he had fired himself from the position of Sisters vocalist.

Dan wrote:
Karin - SSV is the "techno album without drums" that Eldritch recorded in a day to fulfil a contractual obligation and get out of his record contract.

Cheers Dan

Dan wrote:It's my understanding he wrote them with no Eldritch prompting or involvement whatsoever and gave them to Eldritch as a form of peace offering, but as they were never used one can only assume they weren't up to Von's exceedingly high standards.

My understanding was that Eldritch contacted Marx about collaborating on a new album, without Marx actually rejoining The Sisters.

http://www.angelsinexile.i12.com/ghost/ ... rymarx.htm

Open Your Arms - Gary Marx Interview 17.05.03

Q: Have you followed the Sisters and what do you think of what they are doing now?

A: I've been aware of the various incarnations of the band - I loved most of 'Floodland' and still think it's the most fully realised Sisters' album. I met Andrew around 1995 after close to ten years apart. We discussed working together again and I wrote an album's worth of songs for him - they still sit in the vault. I've seen them live with the post Vision Thing line-up and believe me it gives me no satisfaction to say they were God-awful.

Dan wrote:

Erudite wrote:I'm sure it was about the same that that Eldritch announced that he would no longer be part of the band but would continuing to tour with them and produce their records.

I haven't a clue what that means.

Sounds scarily close to Brian Wilson territory to me

mh wrote:

Dan wrote:

Erudite wrote:I'm sure it was about the same that that Eldritch announced that he would no longer be part of the band but would continuing to tour with them and produce their records.

I haven't a clue what that means.

Sounds scarily close to Brian Wilson territory to me

Isn't it something to do with the way his contract with East West was? He couldn't sing or play on any official releases, but the contract didn't stop him from singing live or producing other peoples stuff.

Therefore, until the contract was annulled, no Sisters stuff was (legally) able to be released. Since 2000 (is that right?) when the contract was cancelled he has been free to record and release music under the name The Sisters Of Mercy.

Oh, and his argument that the reason Summer wasn't released because Adam wouldn't come in and put down his guitar parts is pretty weak. Andrew has always struck me as the sort of bloke who doesn't take s**t from people. If he really wanted to release the record then he could either do it himself (a la The Reptile House) or just have serious words with Adam.

But then again, we can only go on the information we have to hand. There may be much more too it than that. Thinking about it, Adam wrote the music, so I guess this meant that Andrew couldn't record it himself as he didn't 'own' the music so to speak.

I think Erudite's argument is pretty plausible. 1995 was around the time when Von wanted to crank out an album to release him from the contract, but was also declaring himself on creative strike. Vaguely producing an album written by Marx would have been a good, easy option, and wouldn't have annoyed the fans too much. I don't know why he rejected the idea, if this is the case. Perhaps he ran it by the record company, or perhaps his quality control took over. It would have been a better move than what we have now, if only because it would have been A move. In all, this just gives us one more what if, one more opportunity missed.

This IMHO stems from the whole Sisterhood issue. When Mr. Eldritch claimed the publishing rights and with that picked up the name again there were obligations of the contract to fullfill. This was done to a certain extend with the album and two compilations (the Sisterhood album excluded). There probably* was a legal tug of war in around '95 concerning the extent of the contract being fullfilled. Firing himself probably had no consequence as he was probably still under contract with East/West. The SSV thing probably was a compromise and WEA knew they were not going to get anything out of him anyway.

WEA is not in a great shape anyway as it has been sold by Time Warner to a private investment group and really is the smallest now of Universal/Sony-BMG/EMI-Virgin/WEA. The latter two are planning a merger again (refused in 2000) but WEA is currently in a bad position since the Maverick label buy out.


*speculation on my part.

Mmmmmm, I do remember that the EastWest contract was with Von and Von alone, meaning that the Sisters name or any variations on it could - in theory - be used without Von being necessarily involved (aside from him having to give permission for it's use, of course).

I think Von firing himself as singer was just to point out the ludicrous nature of WEA's argument, and to strengthen his argument to get WEA to drop its insistence on his contractual obligations.

Von was both the owner of the business organisation that is called The Sisters of Mercy, and also one of the staff (the band) on the payroll. As owner, he fired himself from the staff position, but still stayed on as owner.

As sole owner of the business, no one could be recruited without his permission, nor could they use the company name. To all intents and purposes (legally) the Sisters of Mercy had disbanded, although Von still owned the business (and hence still received any payments due to the business, and retained control over the name etc). At this point WEA had on their books a 'non-trading business' (also a legal/tax term - I'm not refering to the legal definition, but this may have been involved as well) under the sole control of the owner (Von).

The business still had contractual obligations to WEA, but since no one was employed by the business, and no one could be employed by the business without Von's authorisation, then there's a strong argument for WEA's accountants to say "bugger it - dissolve the contract".

Also, depending on the wording of the various contracts, Von may have actually been under 3 contracts - one between Von and the business that is the Sisters (in reality between Von and Von, but it would be a legal necessity since the Sisters (the business) were employing Von as a singer), one between the Sisters (the business organisation) and WEA, and one between Von as singer for the Sisters and WEA. By firing himself as singer, the third of these contracts would have been nullified, giving WEA less of a hold over him.

But, as usual, it's all guesswork.

Well, whatever legal shenanigans Von had in mind, they didn't work

markfiend wrote:Well, whatever legal shenanigans Von had in mind, they didn't work

Not at the time, but East West still ended up accepting the really s**t version of the SSV album i.e. the one iwthout the drum tracks.
Unfortunately the result was Von 1, East West 0 and fans 0.

What gives? I thought we could f*cking swear now?

Erudite wrote:What gives? I thought we could f*cking swear now?

Ah, no, there's a knack to it. You have to do it like this:

Fu<b></b>ck

But replace the < and > with [ and ]

Well, isn't that interesting. I used the word 'pushed' on one post and even that got asterisk-ed out by the powers that be....

pushed

nope, works for me

let's see if it censors the word pished

Maybe the typo pussed?

Nope, that gets posted as well.

Martin

pished?

nup that works too

markfiend wrote:Well, whatever legal shenanigans Von had in mind, they didn't work

I think Von has given some excellent interviews, the best someone in a rock band can be expected to give, I think. And so many things he said in the past really hold true and consistent for the band.

"And if it takes a year fighting corporate wars in order to be able to do it with integrity, then I'll do it...or not at all. I don't HAVE to do this."

And you have much of it right there. If someone flat-out states that they don't HAVE to do something, especially in the arts, then the behavior by Von is not so surprising.

Basically, he can do it 'right', so to speak, meaning he can keep total control over the Sisters, or just not do it. And right now, I think, with the absence of anything new in years, we can only infer the conditions are not 'right'. Much of it has to do with the industry, and I can't blame the man.

Deep down, I think we're gonna see new Sisters product one day. Who knows, Von could be 55 by then, but it'll be The Sisters, and he'll stay true to whatever his vision is. By his own admission, he has nothing left to prove. Actually, that is way more honest than most rock stars, except the ones who admit they're just whores for money, like Gene Simmons. Otherwise, you're trying to convince everyone you're still in the same band 25 years later.

They're just one of those bands now. Could have been big, never made it really big, have a small, reverent fan base, still appear now and then, and don't play by anyone's rules. He's the director who takes 15 years off between movies (Terrence Malick) or the guy who takes 10 years to write a book (Tom Wolfe), or the band that dissipates and returns 15 years later (Chameleons UK).

We're right to bitch, I think, because as supporters we're always going to think we're owed something, and that's understandable. As a matter of fact, given the way they operate, it's impressive they're managed to play as many shows as they have in the 1990s and 00s without supporting any new product. It's just not that profitable to tour sometimes, especially in the USA these days, without any record company support, new product, or a sponsor. I would be surprised (pleasantly) if we get another tour the length of Smoke and Mirrors. At this point, I think it's wishful thinking that they even return to the US...

Do not confuse articulacy, arrogance and laziness as Art.