Factory Benelux
(FBN084-2: 708527180044/FBN084-1: 708527180037)
Release date: 09/07/2018
Genre: Rock
$22.00
44 track 4xCD box set
2xLP with download in gatefold jacket (sold out)
Factory Benelux presents a deluxe 4xCD edition of Without Mercy, the fourth studio album by cult Manchester group The Durutti Column, originally issued in 1984 and widely regarded as Vini Reilly’s most ambitious album.
In 1983 Durutti Column mentor/manager Tony Wilson asked Vini Reilly to abandon fleeting guitar miniatures in favour of a long-form modern classical piece. The result was an ambitious 20 minute instrumental suite, Without Mercy, performed by core Durutti duo Vini Reilly and Bruce Mitchell along with Blaine L. Reininger and John Metcalfe (violas), Caroline Lavelle (cello), Tim Kellett (trumpet) and Maunagh Fleming (cor anglais).
Explains Vini: “Tony had just come in for a conversation one day and said, ‘Look, you keep making these albums that you want to make, and I’m quite happy with you doing that, but just give me this one album and do it my way.’ He wanted it to have a narrative determined by a Keats poem, La Belle Dame Sans Merci, which he said was the poet’s version of a pop song: boy meets girl, falls in love with girl, loses girl, blah blah blah. It was a very, very Tony way of looking at it. He had aspirations that I should be taken seriously.”
Produced by Reilly and Wilson at Strawberry Studio and Britannia Row, Without Mercy was originally split into 19 separate stanzas, some of which have now been restored using digital cue points on the CD. Bonus tracks include the original recordings of Duet, Estoril a Noite and Favourite Descending Intervals (all re-worked for inclusion on Without Mercy), as well as companion EP Say What You Mean, Mean What You Say, collaborations with John Metcalfe, Steven Brown and Benjamin Lew, and two previously unreleased live sets across Discs 3 and 4, recorded at London School of Economics in December 1984 and Oslo in December 1986.
The remastered 4xCD set is housed in a clamshell card box, with inner wallets and liner notes by Reilly, Wilson, Mitchell, Reininger and Metcalfe. The cover painting is L’Etang de Trivaux by Henri Matisse (1916/17)
LP tracklist:
Disc 1
A1. Without Mercy I
B1. Without Mercy II
Disc 2
C1. All That Love and Maths Can Do
C2. Duet
C3. Estoril a Noite
C4. Favourite Descending Intervals
C5. A Little Mercy
D1. Mercy Theme (live LSE 1984)
D2. A Little Mercy (live LSE 1984)
D3. Mercy Dance (live LSE 1984)
$7.80
A unique blend of jangly, melodic indie rock and alternative folk on this deluxe reissue by alumni of San Francisco's legendary Cat Heads. "Sharply poignant...
$12.00
Release date: 5/10/2024Original release date: 12/9/2022First studio album since 1989. Limited edition of 200 black vinyl LP with lyric sheet and art print signed by...
$14.75
LTM presents a deluxe reissue of the first two albums by Californian experimentalists 17 Pygmies on remastered double CD and download.Formed in Los Angeles in...
$13.99
Release date: 10/29/2021. Les Disques du Crepuscule present a new 76-minute CD edition of The Culling Is Coming by 23 Skidoo, originally released on vinyl by Crepuscule and sister...
$7.00
1. Dawning (Version), 2. AYU (ambient), 3. Calypso, 4. Interzonal, 5. Kendang, 6. Contemplation, 7. Helicopterz, 8. Urban GamelanDownload available with purchase of LP+DVD.Beyond Time...
$14.75
LTM is proud to announce a series of expanded reissues on CD and download by seminal post-punk group 23 Skidoo. Initially active between 1979 and...
$13.99
An expanded remaster of the seminal mini-album Seven Songs by 23 Skidoo, whose unique industrial ethno-funk hybrid topped the British indie charts in 1982. As...
$13.99
First released by Les Disques du Crépuscule and Operation Twilight in February 1983, The Culling Is Coming flagged two radical new directions for Skidoo following...