Music > Live Reviews

Sisters of Mercy

The Nick Rayns LCR, UEA

20/11/16

The Sisters of Mercy! Legends. Their fantastic, catchy, theatrical and moving album Floodland has been a goth go to for me since my extremely grumpy mid teens so I was excited to see them for the very first time, many years later. Sure, they’ve not released a single note of new material since 1993, but the fact that they can pack out the LCR with antiquely beautiful fans looking somberly but absolutely pumped is a testament to the legacy of their sound.

First up are The Membranes, who recently headlined The Owl Sanctuary as part of Norwich Sound & Vision 2016. The larger LCR stage suits them, and despite the fact there are only three of them they produce a big noise. It’s dischordant and decidedly odd in a wonderful and intriguing way- you’d be hard pressed to sing along to any of their songs or even identify choruses or verses - this is organic stuff. Everything is cut up, disjointed and recreated anew, and with a fresh and energetic take. Lead singer John Robb is jerky, unbridled in his enthusiasm for doing his job, and fully engages with the ever more involved audience. They can really play, with some sweet bass lines, complex drums and perhaps the best bass playing I’ve ever seen. John’s Shaun Ryder-esque vocals are balefully belted out amongst the shadowy and every changing light and dark elements in their set of songs from their latest album about outer space. A truly masterful and entertaining performance from a band who have been around long enough to be professional and accomplished, but still fully committed to moving forward in 2016 to create and put a massive amount of passion into their work.

So, to the Sisters. An overwhelming cloud of dry ice and bold pastel lights fill the stage like a massive, joyful 80‘s Care Bears puke, making it totally opaque. There’s SO much smoke it’s a bit like when you go to an aquarium and a shark suddenly looms out at you through the glass, baring its gnashers. Likewise, perpetually terrifying front man Andrew Eldritch appears and disappears in the pink and purple haze in dark glasses and a suit for first track More. 

I have described Sisters as goth, but really there’s always been an equally strong electronic element to their dark sound, mostly notably through the use of a drum machine rather than a kit. Their harder, industrial edge was not present at all at the LCR. Unlike The Membranes, there was no passion and no feeling - it was very much style over substance and at times even felt a little like a lacklustre cover band. Gone were Eldritch's dark locks and leather jacket of old, and his minimal-membered band were spaced so far apart from each other that there was no unity apparant on stage. His trademark mumbly, gutteral, demonic voice appeared and disappeared like his body during the evening, tragically getting lost in the mix throughout. When my attention was drawn away from the stage, which was often as really it was hard to see much activity up there anyway, it felt a bit like I was listening to the Sisters on a very old, slightly muffled cassette. All the sharpness, clarity and punchy qualities that I loved about them were gone. The epically potent choral introduction to the mighty This Corrosion was lost entirely. The air punching, call to war chorus in Dominion was weak and muddled. Alice was tired and sludgy.

After an hour where the audience stood serious-faced and unmoved except for a small knot of enthusiasts centre forward, the band left the stage, then returned for a 30 minute encore, and things finally started to feel slightly lively. The lights flashed brighter and more frequently, the pace picked up, the energy in the room rose and we enjoyed classics like Lucretia My Reflection and First and Last and Always. Temple of Love was a heartbreakingly messy, rushed beast, however, without the crazed string arpeggios so loved from the intro.

At times during the evening Andrew admitted he was struggling on painkillers, and perhaps this was him trying his best under trying circumstances. But really I feel we deserved more than a scattered collection of musicians, a barely visible or audible frontman and a weak and lazy show all round.  Rather like the Oz myth, the weakness of Andrew Eldritch’s performance was cleverly cloaked in an overabundance of smoke and colours, painting him as a wizard when in fact he was nothing but a normal man. I always thought the Sisters of Mercy were like an unstoppable rock machine, relentless, unbearably powerful and sharp as a fucking tack. This time around they were sadly weak and disappointing.