That's Marc Almond, the Diana Ross of the 80s!

Yeah, they're one of my all time favorites since high school for so many reasons I'm not even going to bother enumerating them.

Y'all forgot about Sparks.

Everything Almond has done without Dave Ball (the other guy in Soft Cell) has been pretty terrible, I'm just gonna say.

He did some concept album about bullfighting in the 90s that I've got a soft spot for, not because it's good (it isn't) but because it's one of the gayest not-overtly-gay albums I've ever heard.

But yeah, solo Marc Almond isn't so hot usually. I need to revisit Torch (the solo album, not the Soft Cell song) some time, though, if only because last time I heard any of it I didn't know the whole (apocryphal?) story about Marc Almond forcing his way into the office of a critic that panned it and destroying as much as he could with a fire axe before security kicked him out. That also happened during the year long speed binge that preceeded This Last Night in Sodom, if I remember right.

IZ, you should check out the album This Last Night in Sodom. That was the final one, allegedly done while Marc was on a year long speed binge.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aw8qbAxAS_A

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvX0C_z9NuE

This one's almost Neubauten:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZLx8FiJWrk

Yeah I've been hearing a lot of Soft Cell around at places recently, and admittedly I had to Shazam it because I was too embarrassed to ask what was playing. It's like a whole generation of music nerds got stuck on how good they actually were who dismissed them as a one hit 80s wonder.

I guess it must be a regional thing because it seems like most of the people I hung out with in high school and throughout my 20s loved Soft Cell, even though most of them didn't generally listen to synth pop.


It's always interesting to compare them to Nine Inch Nails, too (who they were obviously a massive influence on, even if Trent hadn't done a bunch of Soft Cell covers over the years). It's like hearing the original versions of songs the Cramps covered and realizing how toned down the Cramps' music actually was compared to their inspirations.

Yeah it's funny, Nine Inch Nails got me into Joy Division and I sort of stopped listening to Nine Inch Nails after that. I'm guessing if Joy Division had remained a band it would've sounded something like Soft Cell instead of New Order's super poppyness. But "Tainted Love" became "Taint and Butt" and other taint jokes, kinda like "Come On Eileen" was taken literally. We weren't a very mature bunch.

You should also check out Almond's work with Foetus. They did some eps together. There is a compilation that's been reissued a couple of times, but it's usually credited as "Marc Almond and Foetus".

Non Stop Erotic Cabaret had a lot of good songs actually, but Sex Dwarf might be the best. Also the one where it keeps repeating "misery, complaints, self pity, injustice."