Track Listing

1. Don't fall
2. Here today
3. Monkeyland
4. Second skin
5. Up the down escalator
6. Less than human
7. Pleasure and pain
8. Thursday's child
9. As high as you can go
10. Person isn't safe anywhere these days
11. Paper tiger
12. View from a hill

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #35531 in Music
• Released on: 1996-09-16
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Original recording reissued

Customer Reviews

"...what on earth are you talking about?"
After being introduced to The Chameleons by the late, great John Peel in 1983, I bought this album and it changed my life.
I'm not going to analyse each song because every one is an absolute classic, and the album as a whole is pure genius.
It still amazes me that they never reached superstardom because their songs could easily fill stadiums the world over. Unfortunately, they never got the recognition they deserved because they wouldn't compromise the music or their image to sell records, but those of us who were there know that we were part of something special. I urge anyone who hasn't heard of The Chameleons but who likes early U2, Bunnymen, Psychedelic Furs, Verve, Interpol, Stills, Longview, Engineers, The Open, and yes even Coldplay, to buy this album now!
Occasionally when talking to strangers about music you hear "..aah, so you like The Chameleons then?" ...followed by the knowing smile of a secret shared. Awesome.

Timeless classic
I am the proud owner of well over 500 cd's/LP's..and I can honestly say this is way and beyond my favourite... This album captures (more than any other I've heard)the time of it's recording..but unlike many of the similar releases from the early 80's..SOTB has transcended time and trends and remains a relevant classic to this day...With swirling guitars,occasional atmospheric synths,driving bass and drums and powerfully sung lyrics which still have real meaning even to people hearing them for the first time 20 years later,this album has all a good rock album should have..But it goes one step further...from the opening film sample of Don't Fall to the trailing beauty at the end of View from a hill it has an atmosphere and a quality that's very rare,even rarer in a first album release.
Some say the Chameleons could have been the next U2.Some say they were like Echo and the Bunnymen.Some say should have have comprimised in order to sell more records..But most who give them a proper listen say that their lives have been change..just ever so slightly...But always for the better..GT

A great lost album...
The Chameleons are one of those cultish, lost bands from the decade which is frequently written off, or summarised in Q-Mojo-style orthodoxy as 'the demise of The Jam - The Smiths - The Stone Roses', with perhaps an allusion to New Order if feeling especially adventerous (maybe only to mention the sleeve to 'Blue Monday' or the Hacienda, leading towards a tale of Sean Ryder taking drugs, which is as cool as Pete Doherty, whose the coolest mama in the sphere...)But a reassessment is due that decade, and to be fair is getting such a critical response - people realising that the roots of someone hip like The White Stripes is to be found in such 80s records as 'Fire of Love', 'Hallowed Ground' & 'Psychedelic Jungle.' While bands like Bloc Party, The Editors, Franz Ferdinand & Interpol nod towards the young men in long coats like The Bunnymen, The Cure, Joy Division & The Psychedelic Furs. Added to that great compilations-reissues like Orange Juice's 'The Glasgow School' and Scritti Politti's 'Early', and things like the development of electronic music, hip-hop and rave and the decade doesn't seem as empty as some suggest on nostalgia TV and simplistic articles. Heck, The Killers have even made Duran Duran seem like a good idea, despite lyrics like "My head is full of chopstick - I don't like it!"

But The Chameleons, and their potent back-catalogue are yet to be reclaimed from a decade that has been out of grace - 'Script of a Bridge' as the follow-ups 'The Fan & the Bellows', 'Strange Times' & 'What Does Anything Mean Basically?'
is a wonderful album - just sadly known only to a knowing few. Simon Reynolds, in his otherwise excellent book on post-punk and new-pop seems to have missed a trick or two in the chapter on what was later called 'big music' (The Bunnymen, U2, Teardrops, Waterboys, Simple Minds) - where was mention for The Chameleons in all that?

'Script of a Bridge', as any of the aforementioned albums would be an ideal primer to the band - the sound of 'Script' sounding like The Teardrop Explodes playing 'Crocodiles', though as several people I know and don't know have pointed out, the rather hip Interpol sound not unlike The Chameleons! I know Joy Division tend to be the hip comparison point for Carlos D. et al, something based on their lead singer's live-vocals, their static gothness live, and the first few seconds of drumming on 'PDA', but really, The Chameleons are much more the reference! (along with 'Heaven Up Here'-Bunnymen, Josef-K & 'Talk Talk Talk'-Furs) 'Script of a Bridge', apart from the sometime drum-machine sounding drums (common to the era, I'm afraid) easily stands up and offers a huge all encompassing sound with angular and chiming guitars that should please any fans of 'Antics' or 'Turn on the Bright Lights'...

It's all great - 'As High As You Can Go' introducing keyboards to the mix, asking us to "take a chance and join the dance and you can make the sun/take a chance and join the dance and you can go to ground...", the downer-rock of 'Monkeyland', the huge 'Up the Down Escalator' (whose chiming riffs are like a slower 'Debaser'!), & the epic closer 'View from a Hill' - whose spectral opening guitars are totally 'The Specialist'

'Script of a Bridge' is a classic of the era, from a band who released many great records, but just didn't get the audience they deserved - lumping them in a set of neglected greats including The Comsat Angels, The Sound & The Wild Swans. It is entirely possible, as the posthumous-popularity of Big Star, Nick Drake & The Velvet Underground proves, that people will catch on in the end. The hip-retro sound of 2013, or sooner?