Mark Hollis passed away this week at age 64. He was the lead songwriter and singer of Talk Talk, a band that began firmly planted in pop (scoring a hit with “It’s My Life”) but veered into more experimental territory, crafting a hybrid music with no real equivalent.
Andrew Kirell perfectly describes hearing Talk Talk’s music in the Daily Beast :
“I remember when I first heard Spirit of Eden.
I was 16 years old, anxious as ever, and newly in love with Radiohead’s Kid A and the emotionally cathartic, freeform textures of post-rock bands like Explosions in the Sky and Mogwai. I was lying in bed one evening, battling the usual rush of teenage panic, when I put on this moody, atmospheric album I’d heard so much about.
Suffice to say, I didn’t fall asleep to any “background music” that evening. Instead, I’d describe that first listen as having seen and heard music from another realm.
That evening, my perception of how music can translate beauty and pain into something supernatural completely changed in the 40 minutes it took to listen to Spirit of Eden’s six songs. Ask any admirer of the album, and they will say the same of their first experience.”
My experience was similar, although I was 10 years older. I too was listening to Kid A and Mogwai, and I remember my initial reaction to Spirit of Eden was, “I’ve never heard anything like this before, and it’s what I’ve been looking for.” At that point in my life, there wasn’t too much that was still surprising to me, but first hearing Spirit of Eden was a defining moment for me.
I’d never heard anything so patient, so open. It felt like the music was just created in one pass, like it was unfolding, not written or planned out. I still don’t know how you coordinate recording music like this, getting musicians to play music in between long moments of silence (much of the final recording was pieced together from improvised sessions).*****
It is truly a stunning combination of rock, jazz, and classical.
Timothy Michalik provides another powerful description of the album:
“Spirit of Eden is desolate, a meditation on creative solitude, singular and undeniably prophetic. It is something that lives in each and everyone of us—not the literal album, but the place in which Hollis traveled to, shedding his own artistic inhibitions to embrace something so incredibly beyond human error and thought. “
While Spirit of Eden remains my personal favorite, Laughing Stock and The Colour of Spring are wonderful as well.
To get started on the musical career of Hollis and Talk Talk, check out Stereogum’s list of essential songs.
