Mantaray

There's always been excitement and trepidation at the prospect of new music from Siouxsie, whether with The Banshees or The Creatures (not to mention collaborations with Basement Jaxx and that Morrissey duet), along with eternal polemic over her title - The Ice Queen, Punk Icon/Legend, First Lady of Goth (cringe!), that shrieking old witch who sounds like nails down a blackboard.... (thanks mum..)

What Mantaray does, however, in spectacular, glorious style, is showcase the Siouxsie that is often overlooked - that of bona fide Pop Star. It is at once a complete distillation of everything she's ever done, or been, yet ambitiously heads into new musical territory rather than merely rehash former glories.

While "Loveless", for example, has the same leaden thudding beat as "Nightshift", and "One Mile Below" has a lively percussive texture not dissimilar to her outings with The Creatures,sandwiched between them is the awesome "If It Doesn't Kill You" - a smokey torch song which could easily open a Bond Movie. And why not? The idea of Siouxsie elbowing her way into the same musical arena as the likes of Tina Turner and Sheena Easton and COMPLETELY wiping the floor with them makes me smile - surely a more "punk" thing to do than one record label's suggestion she duet with Marilyn Manson?

"About To Happen" has a great glam-stomp feel to it, saved from hideous pastiche by sheer humour and enthusiasm, "Here Comes That Day" is brassy like Bassey only with Sioux's own lyrical venom, and "Sea of Tranquility" is nothing short of magnificent - a kind of shuffling oceanic lunar odyssey, with more stars in the sky than grains of sand. (Personally I'm relieved to hear it - on Anima Animus there were just black holes.)

Oh and it finishes with a piano ballad. No, really.

I think it's a masterpiece.

I guess that, in this day and age, if Amy Winehouse can get away with putting out an album barely over 40 minutes, then punk/goth/rock high priestess Siouxsie (apply whichever crusty old epithet you prefer) thinks she can do the same, and with one fewer track. Well, she's right!

Having been a little inattentive to her last couple of releases, this album has surely got to skyrocket Siouxsie into whatever music Halls of Fame she's not yet been inducted to. Except that might suggest a coda to a 30-year career which clearly isn't over yet.

Produced with Steve Evans and Charlie Jones, this, like Amy's bestseller from the spring and Roisin Murphy's recent opus, is very much a unified album with an overall vision - the type that those Mercury Music Prize judges are so keen on, and Mantaray deserves to be appreciated with such concentration - only at a very HIGH VOLUME!

I can understand why some die-hard fans might be a little disappointed by its maturity and, for Siouxsie (if no one else), "poppiness". But we've already got Kaleidoscope, we've already got Juju, A Kiss In The Dreamhouse and Boomerang, so why not embrace something new?

When I first heard them in isolation, I wasn't crazy about either the first single, Into A Swan, nor the (better) follow-up, Here Comes That Day; I thought they skated uncomfortably close to self-pastiche. But, cranked up loud, they really hit the spot. Lyrically, one or two of the tracks might seem a little flaccid in places (I think another reviewer has already noted the House of cards/feet of clay mixed metaphor on the current single), but they are delivered with such oomph, and are such well-crafted songs that it doesn't seem to matter after all. "Don't be bitter/Don't be gloomy/All your torment/Flowers blooming" could almost be from Kim Appleby's unlistenably trite "Don't Worry", except that it's from the quietly stunning If It Doesn't Kill You, which reminded me of nothing so much as Siouxsie's version - many years ago - of Strange Fruit, but with a much more epic sweep. So much so that any right-thinking person must think that, if there's a battle on to do the next Bond theme, Siouxsie must now be neck-and-neck with the aforementioned Ms. Winehouse (after Love Is A Losing Game... but I wonder who would generate more column inches?).

Seriously, though, I always thought there was something quite beautiful about Siouxsie's voice - in fact, getting this album made be go out and buy the remastered version of Juju, the mangled vowel sounds of which must be etched deep in my cerebral cortex - and they're all present and correct on Mantaray's compelling closing track, Heaven And Alchemy. Maybe we're "in love with the idea of her", but I when I was soaking up the energy of her stage performances 25 years ago, I never imagined she'd become such a grande dame of music, and still radiating the same energy as she grasped each new baton - the video for Here Comes The Day demonstrates that, and a ticket to one of her live shows is so much more than a vote for nostalgia.

Respect!

Just got my new cd of Mantaray and eagerly listened - we all know Into A Swan is a fantastic track but what about the rest?? If you're expecting every track to be as punk sounding as Swan then this isn't for you. Siouxise has a more grown up sound - even jazzy in parts. There are a fair few slower (but still very good) songs and the songs seem to have a more personal tone. All in all a very good cd in Siouxsie's unique style -but don't expect Love In a Void!