Ocean refrain

To mark the release of the first Echo & The Bunnymen album in four years, Ian McCulloch and Will Sergeant recall the triumphs and pitfalls of their professional and personal past. Terry Staunton listens intently to tales of cockiness, collapse and killing tunes.

The red half of Merseyside is a pretty good part of the world to inhabit these days. It’s a world full of hope, optimism, promise and sheer unadulterated joy, following the phenomenal events that took place over a couple of hours or so in an Istanbul football stadium one evening in late Spring.

Against all odds, not to mention the wisdom of so-called experts, Liverpool Football Club pulled off the most triumphant trick the game had seen in many a year. Having been written off at half time, three goals down against the might of AC Milan, Steven Gerard and his magnificent foot soldiers battled relentlessly onwards and became champions of Europe, restoring a large and unfailingly impressive piece of silverware to its rightful place in the hallowed halls of Anfield.

So what does any of this have to do with Echo & The Bunnymen? Well, it all depends if you believe in omens or not. Ian McCulloch certainly does. The same month the football club lifted the European Cup in 1981, the Bunnymen celebrated their first entry into the UK Top 40 charts with the Shine So Hard EP. The Reds’ next conquest of Europe came three years later, coinciding with the release of Ocean Rain, the group’s best-loved and most successful album.

Now Liverpool have their feet under the top …

by Terry Staunton
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