Cranes ★★★★
Fuse
DADAPHONIC. CD/DL/LP
Rare, early recordings from Portsmouth’s most gothic group. Martin Hannett was a fan.
Cranes co-founders, siblings Alison (vocals) and Jim Shaw (guitar), would soon discover beauty and contrast, but this, their 1986 debut – limited to just 200 copies on cassette – was captured on a four-track Portastudio, and sounds like they’re emanating from a cave, in a dank blur of reverb, and drawing on industrial music’s clank as much as early Banshees. Alison’s Baby Jane vocals are buried in the murk, so you’ll need a lyric sheet to decipher the likes of “It’s a slow degenerating hole/Our blistering ideals abound.” Despite the lower-than-fi recording, the mood is uncanny and affecting, its gothic purity haunting in all the right places. Still, the more rounded spirit of bonus track New Liberty, recorded in 1987, shows they were right to move on.