This Mortal Coil – It'll End In Tears

This Mortal Coil eventually gained a true cult status that even Projekt Records came up with a sampler called:
"Various - From Across This Gray Land No. 3" in 1992 tried to create something similar. Here are some of the bands represented on this sampler:
Love Spirals Downwards; Eden; Thanatos; Lycia; Attriton; Black Tape for a Blue Girl. Although that sampler is not bad, these two projects are worlds apart.

"It'll End In Tears" is one of those truly rare sacred objects made available to general public still unaware of its significance. A little more accessible than its two, conceptually stronger successors, it remains most memorable for the song Liz Fraser and Robin Guthrie (as the rumour had it) hated they recorded. Well, as much as they hated it eventually, a collection of such beauty and charm wrapped up in occasional melancholy cannot be missed. It is very spiritual and even pierces through the most stubborn of souls.

Ivo Watts-Russell and John Fryer had the privilege to work with a whole group of impressive vocalists; interesting enough, Alison Limerick and Louise Rutkowski remain somewhat more linked to TMC than Liz Fraser and Lisa Gerrard. Not to forget one lonely God among the Godesses, Gordon Sharp, whose strikingly frightening, calm, angelic vocal sets the perfect tone for what This Mortal Coil ever truly was, remains, or means, carved deep into the hearts of indie lovers. His deliveries alone on this album are worth possession of the lot - the opening 'Kangaroo' and the closing number 'A Single Wish' giving it altogehter a slightly disturbing closing, echoing away the album's title we cannot resist of shedding an honest tear. Because that is what this album is about - making people cry and enjoying it, forgetting themselves in it.

Somewhere in between there is even more frightening, yet at peace with the fact one day we'll turn to dust - the most beautiful saddest song in the history of mankind - 'Fond Affections', with its memorable line - 'There's no light at the end of it all, let's all sit down and cry; there's no light at the beginning, let's all sit down and cry...'

'Song to the Siren' and 'Another Day' are the album's jewels, worn and sang by Liz. Several even more surprising, yet obscure moments are 'Holocaust' in a strange, almost cynical delivery of Howard Devoto and uplifting rock-standard 'Not Me' sang by Robbie Grey. Lisa Gerrard rarely sings in articulate English and 'Waves Become Wings' proves she gets away with it perfectly as her 'looped accordion' sequels into a heavenly instrumental of 'Barramundi'. 'Dreams Made Flesh' although more of a Dead Can Dance standard gives this album a little bit of a necessary exotic touch that mainly drifts in its European folk-ish melancholy.

Writing about This Mortal Coil has something almost sacred, as if you had to describe the Mona Lisa. This Mortal Coil is not a band, but a collaboration of artists around 4AD producer Ivo Watts-Russell that seemed to have as only objective: create beauty built for eternity. And so they did, on three albums, "It’ll End In Tears" being the first one. The voices of Elisabeth Fraser (Cocteau Twins) and Lisa Gerrard (Dead Can Dance) are those from sirens, emphasizing the overall fatal beauty this album exhales. "Fyt" by the Wolfgang Press is visionary ambient. Even the artwork is a work of art (you should buy the vinyl alone for that). This is unearthly beauty that will strike you with disbelief.