The Triffids - In The Pines / Calenture

A brace of career highs from much-missed Aussies

Like their countrymen The Go- Betweens, David McComb’s Triffids were lavished with critical praise which never translated into bigbucks mainstream acceptance. In The Pines, from 1986, was recorded in a sheep barn in their native Perth, and married rural�folky instrumentation with the innate pop savvy of, say, The Walker Brothers. Kathy Knows broods with the menace of a young Nick Cave, while the title track brings to mind Willie Nelson fronting Echo & The Bunnymen.

Their masterpiece, though, was probably 1987’s Calenture, a grandiose collection of big-picture pop, straight from the school of Jimmy Webb. Bury Me Deep In Love was the almost hit single: a profoundly affecting romantic confessional. But it’s just one of a slew of emotionally devastating tunes which clearly made an impact on the likes of Tindersticks, Richard Hawley, and even Keane.

These reissues are loaded with bonus tracks (an entire second disc of demos for Calenture) and taken together they illustrate the breadth of the band’s talents. A couple of tracks (Trick Of The Light, for example) turn up on both albums – as stripped-down acoustic musings and then as epic, elaborate show-stoppers. Magnificent.

Domino | REWIGCD 25 / REWIGCD 26

Reviewed by Terry Staunton
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