David J - Crocodile Tears & the Velvet Cosh (Glass Modern).

David J – Crocodile Tears & the Velvet Cosh (Glass Modern).

Re-released, the second of David J’s solo works, this time on the rejuvenated Glass Modern Records.

Crocodile Tears & the Velvet Crush sees a remastered version hit the airwaves and will soon slip between the ears of more than just the die-hard goth. Of course David was and still is bassist with goth royalty Bauhaus, as well as being captain of the ship that was Love & Rockets, and playing on – and producing – 2 albums by The Jazz Butcher. So from here on we have qualified David for his part played in British music; why then revisit an album that was first released when mobile phones were as big as shoe boxes and Thatcherism was still riding high?

Well, with a reinvigorated Bauhaus once again playing to audiences across the World on a 40th anniversary tour, this solo release is certainly ripe for further investigation. If his moniker doesn’t already tip a nod to another David ‘J’, then the first and title track on this album certainly will! But once you are past this album’s opening number, he becomes far less like that particular someone else. With acoustic guitar upfront, David sings songs that could well have been on my playlist forever!! Songs like ‘Stop This City‘, I mean how often have any of us thought the same? “Stop this city I want to get off!”, when the world is just passing us by, no time to think? This is an artist who is proving his song writing credentials and will slide into the “…airwaves”, with such ease that it really doesn’t need any effort to welcome these sounds into your home, or put another way, ‘space between your ears’ and ultimately into your very soul.

I could quite easily describe this as ‘a perfect album’ and the more I listen, the more I truly believe this. So as a musician, producer and song writer David J Haskins is nothing short of a true professional, one who is comfortable with his art, whether it be playing, behind the controls in a production role, or as one member of the band who can be cited as creators of the first successful “goth rock release” – ‘Bela Lugosi’s Dead’. So to press ‘Stop’ or more likely ‘Pause’ from my ramblings, in short this is a truly wonderful work and one that will slip down as easily as a “spoonful of sugar”. 13 tracks that in this case sidestep the obvious phobia. Perry Farrell once described David as the “Avant of the Avant-garde” and though I would certainly agree with this analogy when describing his debut Etiquette Of Violence, this album is far easier to digest, a different dish found on the menu and one I am very pleased has been re-visited.

The re-issued Crocodile Tears And The Velvet Cosh is out now on Glass Modern.

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