Land (The Comsat Angels album)

Land was released in 1983 on Jive Records. It was The Comsat Angels' fourth album. The album was reissued on CD with 5 b-sides as bonus tracks in 2001 for Jive's Connoisseur Collection.

The song "Independence Day," which was on their debut album, Waiting for a Miracle, was re-recorded for Land. "Will You Stay Tonight" and "Independence Day" received a reasonable amount of airplay and charted in the UK at #81 and #71 respectively. "Island Heart" was also released as a single.^[2]

Land was the first of two albums for the Jive label and it was viewed as a major departure from the Comsats' first three albums. Frontman Steve Fellows looked back in a 2006 interview: "We made more commercial albums in the mid 80s because the record company wanted us to do so. We were happy to find a new label after the commercially not-so-successful first albums." He regretted the result, but their options seemed limited because of the pop music world at the time. "Indie didn’t really exist, so we had no choice. But in retrospect we should have [stuck] to our early sound."^[3] Bass player Kevin Bacon put it this way: "The demos we did for Land were really good. It was a weird time for us – we felt deflated after being dropped after three albums by Polydor. Eighties pop values were rife; we didn’t naturally fit in, but were all into being popular (pop) and felt we could achieve it in a more damning way. We didn’t think Land was crap at the time, we just didn’t think it was us."^[4]

Track listing 1983

All tracks written by Fellows/Glaisher/Bacon/Peake

1. "Will You Stay Tonight?" – 4:21
2. "Alicia (Can Your Hear Me?)" – 3:54
3. "A World Away" – 5:11
4. "Independence Day (re-recording)" – 3:50
5. "Nature Trails" – 4:55
6. "Mister Memory" – 5:18
7. "Island Heart" – 3:54
8. "I Know That Feeling" – 5:20
9. "As Above So Below" – 5:39

Track listing 2001

All tracks written by Fellows/Glaisher/Bacon/Peake

1. "Will You Stay Tonight?" – 4:21
2. "Alicia (Can Your Hear Me?)" – 3:54
3. "A World Away" – 5:11
4. "Independence Day (re-recording)" – 3:50
5. "Nature Trails" – 4:55
6. "Mister Memory" – 5:18
7. "Island Heart" – 3:54
8. "I Know That Feeling" – 5:20
9. "As Above So Below" – 5:39
10. "A World Away (dub)" – 4:57
11. "Shining Hour" – 4:29
12. "Island Heart (dub)" – 6:00
13. "Scissors And The Stone" – 4:31
14. "Intelligence"* – 4:32

Personnel

• Stephen Fellows - vocals, guitar
• Andy Peake - synthesizer, vocals
• Kevin Bacon - bass guitar
• Mik Glaisher - drums

References