Shriekback “Big Night Music” 1986, Island Records, their fourth full length LP release. The back cover states “Shriekback celebrate the blessed dark – the place where they were always most at home.” I would say it is definitely not as dark as their earlier releases, however – including delightful sounds of castanets and maracas in “Gunning for the Buddha” and a horn section of trumpet, trombone and tenor sax (and “an army of hateful quicas”) giving a decidedly jazz flavor on “Black Light Trap.”

That said, vocally and lyrically Shriekback remain masters of weaving a tapestry of forbidding and shadowy secrets. “Pretty Little Things” seems to indirectly reference “Faded Flowers” from their “Oil and Gold” LP (“Complicated as a flower, glamorous as anything, Dangerous and evanescent, yes oh yes those pretty things…”) yet musically is much perkier (marimbas!). One of my favorite things about Shriekback is their ability to sneak in science – and rhyme it! From “Oil and Gold,” of course, “Nemesis” mentions parthenogenesis, and on this release’s Side B we have “The Reptiles and I” –

Chromium, radium, nickel, iridium

gold and actinium

Arsenic, plutonium, neon,

molybdenum, zinc, iodine

Braking the elements

The reptiles and I…