It was an unlikely arrangement, which was unpredictably successful and led to a unforeseen lifelong relationship. By 1986 the Cocteau Twins – Elizabeth Fraser, Simon Raymonde and Robin Guthrie – occupied a unique position in alternative music’s firmament, both critically adored and by the humble measures for that of the time, commercially so too.
Neither Raymonde or Guthrie can recall how they came to work with American composer Harold Budd, whose work with Brian Eno had endeared himself to what was then a small cadre of neo-classicists in the era before the word “ambient” entered the mainstream musical lexicon.
With no material prepared the two parties set about creating – consciously or otherwise – what would be a seamless hybrid of their relative strengths. The Moon and The Melodies features a quartet of instrumentals on which Budd’s spectral piano takes centre stange, but democratically four others which feature the sing song, ethereal voice of Fraser and lean Cocteaus as a result. It’s the latter which truly still have the ability to make things soar, but the whole body of work proves well worth remembering, a result that outside of the players themselves, few could’ve predicted at the project’s outset.
You can read a full review here.
The Voice Of Unreason 