The Sea Urchins – Stardust [LP]

"The Sea Urchins' Pristine Christine was the first record to be released on Sarah Records, and still sounds like the most perfect way of launching a new label, urgent and important and guaranteed to fill dancefloors wherever it's played. Before the band's three Sarah 7"s, though, there had been two flexidiscs, Cling Film (released with Kvatch fanzine) and Summershine (released on the Sha-la-la fanzine-distributed flexi label), and those songs, along with unreleased early demo and lost classic You're So Much ("I'd never leave you, you know I would never go unless you asked me to..."), now appear here as an introduction to the shimmering lyrical and musical beauty to come. Pristine Christine and Solace might be the two big pop songs, the latter produced by Creation Records' Joe Foster, but buried away on the B-side of Sarah 001 is the bruised plangency of Sullen Eyes ("unbelieving, unaccepting, un-everything-with-a-positive-ring"), while Please Rain Fall and Wild Grass Pictures allow James Roberts' extraordinary voice to ache and soar. Why weren't you special? And was I? Of course..."

1972, 2023