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Crispy Ambulance \ Compulsion [FBN 54]


Compulsion is the studio album Crispy Ambulance might have recorded after The Plateau Phase, with six of the eight tracks now included on FBN 54 written and performed back in 1982. To these are now added Rain Without Clouds, a previously unreleased outtake from The Plateau Phase newly restored from the original multitrack masters, and WMTP.2 with added synth lines by producer-cum fifth member Graham Massey (of 808 State and Biting Tongues).

Almost uniquely, Crispy Ambulance has retained the same line-up since the group was founded in 1978: Alan Hempsall (vocals, keyboards), Gary Madeley (drums), Robert Davenport (guitars) and Keith Darbyshire (bass).

"There's a sense of feeling compelled by irresistible forces," explains Alan Hempsall. "Compulsion is an apt way to describe our constant urge to go back and make music with people we've known since childhood. While the world may have changed, our music continues to be the product of the same influences - the passing of time, the changing of the seasons, the content of our sleeping dreams, and the existence of space."


LP tracklist:

1. Rainforest Ritual
2. Say Shake
3. Nightfall Ends the Ceasefire
4. At the Sounding of the Klaxon
5. WMTP.2
6. Rain Without Clouds
7. Lucifer Rising
8. Open, Gates of Fire


A limited edition of 500 vinyl copies (with free download) for Record Store Day 2015. Cover image by Peter Staessens. We have a handful of copies remaining. To order select correct shipping option and click on Add To Cart button below the cover image, or else contact FBN by email.

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Compulsion [FBN 54]
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Reviews:

"Comprising new readings of several tracks recorded three decades ago, plus outtakes from another age, Compulsion is the likely follow-up album to the band's debut The Plateau Phase, released in 1981. There are certainly elements of that album's era present here - the musique-concrete intro of Rainforest Ritual recalls Simon's Ghost or Death From Above, the power-rock of Say Shake that mirrors Travel Time and the blistering Lucifer Rising that takes its energy from the likes of Sexus or The Wind Season. The trusty ARP synthesizer gives the eerie WMTP.2 a toeing, while thunderous basslines create pivotal moments in the previously unheard Rain Without Clouds. And although Compulsion is mainly instrumental, there is plenty to satisfy - this is beyond simple jamming or copping out, this is compulsory mood-music for anyone with a love of The Sound, The Chameleons and, natch, Crispy Ambulance. Coupled with The Plateau Phase, one could make a seriously triumphant double album with this kind of choice" (Flipside, 04/2015)