Track Listing

Disc 1:

1. Too Hot To Move Too Hot To Think
2. American Sailors
3. Falling Over You
4. Goodbye Little Boy
5. Bottle Of Love
6. Go Home Eddie
7. Spinning Top Song
8. Butterflies Into Worms
9. Can't Help Falling In Love
10. New Years Greetings
11. Good Fortune Rose
12. Shell Of The Man
13. One Mechanic Town
14. Jack's Hole
15. Black-Eyed Susan
16. You Minus Me
17. Clown Prince
18. Fairytale Love
19. How Could I Help But Love You

Disc 2:

1. Too Hot To Move Too Hot To Think
2. American Sailors
3. Why Don't You Leave For Good This Time
4. Bottle Of Love
5. Spinning Top Song
6. Butterflies Into Worms
7. New Years Greetings
8. Good Fortune Rose
9. One Mechanic Town
10. Jack's Hole
11. Black-Eyed Susan
12. You Minus Me
13. Clown Prince
14. Fairytale Love
15. You've Got A Funny Way Of Showing That You Love Me
16. No More After You
17. In The Dark

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #71690 in Music
• Released on: 2008-04-07
• Number of discs: 2

Customer Reviews

The Triffids "White Album " in it,s full sprawling esoteric glory
Coming after the twin monuments of genius that were "Born Sandy Devotional " and "Calenture" The Black Swan , originally released in April 1989( A tremendous year for albums) , seemed a touch lightweight in comparison. It lacked the depth of emotion , the sheer brio and gravitas of those two albums. It seemed a little synthetic too, the band having embraced new technology with synths and programming yet listening to it today after years of dismissing it as a pretty but slightly empty confection I have to say that while it's still not as good as BSD or Calenture it's actually a very fine ambitious and exotic pop album.
The album was originally conceived as a double album and on this re-release with various demo's and alternate versions it attains the sort of status it was originally meant to ,with six extra tracks so it becomes their version of the "White Album". In the recording sessions the Triffids were joined by producer Stephen Street (the Smiths' - Strangeways, Here We Come and Morrissey's Viva Hate). The Black Swan used a greater variety of musical instruments than their previous albums with bouzouki, güiro and accordion thrown into the mix .The title of the album was originally going to be Disappointment Resort Complex but was renamed to The Black Swan, which according to a 1989 interview by Stephen Phillips of the NME with David McComb is based on the 1952 novel (of the same name) by Thomas Mann.
Musically The Black Swan is extraordinarily diverse. "Too Hot To Move Too Hot To Think" is a suitably languorous ballad with a gorgeous chorus melody and is the one song on the album that ,like former albums did so readily, evinces visions of the band native Australia. "Fairytale Love" is a pretty tippling nursery rhyme in direct contrast to the harsher rockabilly chimes of "One Mechanic Town" which could have come off "In The Pines".
The programmed drums and synths of "Falling Over You" not to mention David Macomb's half spoken lazy rap verses make it the least likely Triffids song ever but the harmony is intoxicating .As is the single "Goodbye Little Boy" sung in her slightly peculiar crisp enunciation by Jill Birt .The other Jill Birt sung track "Good Fortune Rose" isn't as good as that but is still a shimmering appealing pop song. "American Sailors" is brief and melancholic while "The Spinning Top Song" has muted feedback over a gulping programmed backing track. The cheery four four time signatures of "Bottle Of Love" make it one of the weakest Triffid tracks ever while "Butterflies Into Worms" has a blues/jazz vibe. Strangest of all are the Romany gypsy tones of "The Clown Prince" which puts me in mind of the fabulous Devotchka."Blackeyed Susan " I'm not that fond off either but "New Years Greetings" is terrific with husky harmonies and a deft intricate acoustic arrangement.
The extra tracks make the album even more of a sprawling slightly unfocused encounter but it could be argued that a song like "Shell Of A Man "(The B-side of Goodbye Little Boy) should have been included on the original release rather than "Bottle Of Love" The rest are okay but nothing to get excited about and much as I love this band it's plain to see that they were running out of steam and the subsequent split was the right thing to do . Of the alternate versions on disc two I prefer the take of "Good Fortune Rose" and the version of "Too Hot To Move, Too Hot To Think" is notable as it sounds not so much torporous as comatose.
The Triffids are one of those bands who mean a lot to me for reasons I cannot really explain . They produced the two monumental albums I mentioned earlier and they were terrific live but they connected emotionally with me in the same way The Blue Nile did. It's just something you feel when you hear their music. The Black Swan has enough movements that grab like that to make it worth purchasing and even if it doesn't connect with you like it does with me you have to hear because well...it's The Triffids and everything they had a hand in deserves to be heard by as many people as possible.

Eclectic and Inspired Swansong (bad pun)
When "The Black Swan" came out in 1989, those who had been singing the Triffids' praises for over 5 years began frothing at the mouth in excitement. The ambition of this Australian band seemed to have increased by a huge amount, whilst not losing the unique Australian-ness of their strange sound. That it was to be their final album took everyone by surprise - but at least they went with a bang, rather than an embarassing decline into blandness... or worse.

With the cool gaze of hindsight, The Black Swan looks a crazy mix, but one that works superbly. Opener "Too Hot To Move..." finds them firmly in sun-parched Aussie territory again, and could be an out-take from their much-loved "Born Sandy Devotional" LP. After that, though, things veer off into truly uncharted territory with the Pet Shop Boys influence of "Falling Over You". "Goodbye Little Boy" is pure, chunky, melodic pop, and was (unbelievably) a flop single.

It's toward the middle of this album that the magic truly begins to work, though. "Butterflies into Worms" is sparse and sad, "The Clown Prince" successfully pulls in a wobble-o-phonic opera singer and a lush string section as it tells the story of an entertainer who rises above the dive bar in which he works. "Good fortune Rose" sees them back in pure pop territory, pre-dating the Lightning Seeds by a year or so. "New Year's Kiss" is McComb's towering epic that dominates the second half of the CD: Set in an empty, flat and threatening Australian outback, McComb tells loneliness how it is, before drifting off into a reverie that is almost hallucinogenic, as if he's running short of water and has started seeing mirages.

The album closes with the gentle, bell-like "Fairytale Love", on one level a song that is absolutely charming, and yet now seems almost like a premonition of the band's dark future - no records for nearly ten years, and then the shocking news of singer/writer Dave McComb's untimely death in 1999. "Black swan spread its wings and hissed/ lo, the night came on" says the last line on the last Triffids album ever.

So. Great music. A fitting farewell to a band that became very special to a few people. A heady brew of eclecticism that expands the Triffids portfolio beyond the skewed, sun-scorched Australian desert songs that established them as NME cover stars in the 1980s, but one that - taken on its own merits - is hugely enjoyable.

The Black Swan
This polished, expanded and exhaustive reissue of 'The Black Swan' highlights the ambition of late period Triffids. Ambition of course has pros and cons (ask Napoleon). Every song is beautifully arranged, produced, sung, played - but, yet. It is as if leader David McComb is not sure where this is all headed and just keeps going anyway.

The album is mostly languid and lush. There is variety (pop, polka, hip-hop, ballads, electronica, country, guitar rock). The muse is sometimes close to but also sometimes quite distant from McComb's narrative and musical strengths. The production throughout is well fed and the ambience a little torpid. But perhaps most importantly, there is nothing here on a par with 'Wide Open Road' and no suggestion in the sound that the same band was in the studio.

'Black Swan' took The Triffids from critical adoration and a major label berth to some tepid reviews and a break-up that surely McComb saw as the launch pad for a far more considerable solo career. And the seeds of this future inform 'The Black Swan'. It is not at all a 'classic' album or really a 'Triffids' album if we mean a band venture with an evolution of the established group sound.

This is a wonderfully presented reissue that scores five points for love, care and presentation. But for a talent who had promised so much during the salad days of 'Born Sandy Devotional' to end The Triffids with this slightly woozy and unfocused epic was quite disappointing.

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