REVIEWS :: VEIL



VEIL (REVIEW BY LOKI MUSIC)
The best is back, after years in what seemed to many of us "obscurity" Andi Sex Gang is back with a vengeance and in no small way either. Andi has come a long way from his flat in Brixton in 1983. Alot of us remember "the Sex Gang Children" and to be honest I thought that "they were OK". Veil is one of the finest albums I have heard for a very long time. Andi has managed to produce an album with a modern touch and yet retains that wonderful "old Goth" feeling that is still there. Trying to pick a favourite track has been totally impossible; every single track is an absolute masterpiece of music. This is an album that I could easily listen to over and over again. One thing I am looking forward to is playing some of the tracks from this album when I'm DJ'ing in the future. Many of the "new Goths" will have never heard anything by Andi Sex Gang before, this album will help with their education; and as for some of us slightly older ones will love it even more. Should you buy this album? Yes! Yes! Yes!

VEIL
Andi Sexgang is back with a vengeance, a new band and a new label. Veil is his latest offspring. You may remember Sex Gang Children, a popular alternative from the mid-Eighties, before Andi left the UK for America. Now firmly planted in England, he means business. Veil opens with a bang: 'Peepshow', the most convincing glam rock instrumental since Gary glittered on 'Rock 'n' Roll Part 2', hits you in the face like a ton of bricks, its infectious riff staying with you well into the other songs. Cleverly crafted, Sexgang's musical madness and mayhem is catchy, at times reminding one of the woodland bopper himself, Marc Bolan - at least in spirit and attitude. Veil is a simple-sounding, yet complex work. There's more to it than meets the ear, which means you'll be listening to it often. Sex Gang means business and Veil is his key to sucess.

RE"VEIL"ATION | THE RETURN OF THE CABARET BOY
A grandiose extravaganza of monumental proportions by anyone' standard, but for Andi Sex Gang, Veil is a purposeful and majestic return to the fold after the trials and tribulations of his LA experience. His former charges, the tribalised and seminal goth band Sex Gang Children, figured highly in the early Eighties, yet their star fell as quickly as it rose. Since then, with an acclaimed album - Arco Valley - under his belt, and fruitful sojourn to America (that is, until he was arrested on ridiculous charges ranging from kidnap to terrorism - all since dropped), it seems Andi has a point to make. Veil presents an unusually accessible body of work, opening with 'Peepshow' - a rumble-glam style instrumental - before settling into a cabaret/theatrical odyssey, mixing Seventies Bowie riffs silhouetted by luminescent string arrangements. 'Janus Head' is a distant cousin of the aforementioned's version of 'Alabama Song', conjuring as it does with nursery rhymes, while 'Phase Out The Boy' bears a passing resemblance to 'Crosstown Traffic', but has such a soaring chorus that you forgive him for it. The heart of the album lies, though, with the stately and monumental 'Bathsheba'. Time to get out the sequins and facepaint: you've have been warned.

THE WAY GOTH COULD HAVE BEEN
The onset of the years has not been kind to the original Eighties goth acts. Gene Loves Jezebel, The Mission, The {Southern Death} Cult - all of them gradually lapsed into flatulent AOR-dom. Bauhaus deftly self-destructed at the peak of their achievement. Only Siouxsie Sioux carries on from strength to strength regardless, but then she doesn't seem to have aged a day in the last decade or so. Which brings us to the strange and quixotic case of Andi Sex Gang, former frontman of Batcave veterans Sex Gang Children. As the abbreviated name suggests, Sex Gang is now his personal project, with a revolving cast of collaborators, Swans-style, that has, at various times, included the likes of Purple Electric violinist Ed Alleyne-Johnson and assorted SGC-era bandmates. Veil is the third release from this incarnation of the band, and demonstrates that Mr. Sex Gang continues to head in the Peter Murphy direction, as opposed to the dreaded Wayne Hussey one. Minus the punkish insolence of youth, he reveals himself as a mature Bowiesque popster, rather than a has-been old rocker. Appearing on a small label and playing gigs for independent promoters, Sex Gang remains a credible underground act. Only on a couple of tracks, 'Janus Head' and 'Harpers & Queens', does one find anything with much resemblance to the original SGC. These tracks incorporate good old pre-Sisters Of Mercy punk-goth guitar styles, but in a far more arch and polished way than SGC ever did. For the most part, the album is notable for a colourful mixture of sounds, from Kurt Weill and old-time carnival sounds, to Sixties psychedelia and Seventies glam at their most bizarre, with violin and piano very much to the fore. By turn, it's baffling, melancholic and amusingly twee. The trademark shrill vocals and warped nursery-rhyme lyrics are now suggestive of wide-eyed innocence, instead of the bitingly camp sarcasm that SGC exuded in the Eighties. For those who love both Bauhaus and Bowie, this album is a treasure, and an intriguing reminder of the truly unexpected pop avenues goth night have wandered down had Andrew Eldritch and Carl McCoy not remade it in their own dour image.

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