The Legendary Pink Dots
So Lonely In Heaven (Metropolis)
Previously in Outsideleft we have described Legendary Pink
Dot’s founder member Edward Ka-Spel as a “national treasure”, and bemoaned the
fact that the Dots have never received the recognition they are long overdue,
especially in the UK. Interviewed in these pages, Ed felt
that although he is an optimist, someone who believes in the future, right now
the future seems to get a little bit darker every day. That was back in
February last year. I think things may have gotten even darker since, with no
light yet visible at the end of what is shaping up to be a very long tunnel.
It is against this backdrop that ‘So Lonely In Heaven’
emerges, with Ed reflecting “Way, way, back in the early days I used to say a
lot about 'The Terminal Kaleidoscope’, a concept comparing the fragile planet
we live on to a drowning human being with life flashing before his or her
eyes, the images constantly accelerating. It's 2024, a little over two decades
since the turn of this unbearably turbulent century and the concept
appears to have become an unlikely soap opera where we are the cast.” In
the spirit of disclosure, I have to declare a personal interest in The Terminal
Kaleidoscope, having helped to form and co-run the original mail order
operation of that name with Ed and Phil from the Pink Dots out of Phil’s
Walthamstow flat in East London back in the mid-1980s. Providing a sales outlet
for underground electronics, it also operated as a label, releasing material by
early industrial royalty, before morphing into the Dots mail order operation. But I digress.
Its 2025 now and things feel very different, with little of the optimism of
that time left intact, and ‘So Lonely in Heaven’ could form the
soundtrack to what is to come in the rest of the year. 
From the opening bleeps and blips of the title track, and the announcement that we are all now surplus to requirements (predicting Apple’s recent announcement that AI will soon replace their human workers), before lurching into it’s chiming lament for the future obsolescence of our self-destructive race, it is clear that this is going to be no fluffy and vapid joy ride. Apocalyptic and gloomy predictions are commonplace in many an album these days. It is either that or head-in-the-sand entertainment (which The Dots have never done). Having said that, Ed Ka-Spel has been warning of what has come to pass for a long time now, yet takes no comfort in being proved right, as ‘The Sound of The Bell’ tolling for all of mankind illustrates, its ominous tones a portent of the darker shades unveiled further into the album. Tracks like ‘Cold Comfort’ are just that, whistling over radio static vocals and discordant guitar, yet still quite beautiful at the same time. One of my personal favourites on here ‘Blood Money’ is ethereal, yet nailed to a floor of stark reality where “murder is respectable”. Each track has sampled and found sounds buzzing away in the background, little arpeggio’s (a Dots trademark) married to orchestral moments and grinding industrial, before being usurped by spacey guitar and other-planetary sounds. There are many such wonderful moments hiding in the shadows of every track, meaning that this album begs repeated plays to fully discover all of them.
The Dots have always been impossible to categorise, though
many have tried. Lazy journalists (not
I!) have compared them to early Pink Floyd, largely because of a passing
similarity in vocal stylings to Syd Barrett.
That’s a false comparison. If you
must, look to Ash Ra Tempel and their ilk, but even better, don’t look for
comparisons at all. The Dots, LPD’s,
call them what you will (even the shorthand used for their name defies standardisation!),
are in a class all of their own. ‘Blood
Money’ transits into ‘Pass The Accident’ and the album closes out with the
languid ‘Everything Under The Moon’ with the Baa-ing of sheep (you!)
contrasting with shuffling drums and a flute like keyboard line before the
final note is sucked into a void. The
silence you are left with is palpable.
Previously, I had thought 2022’s ‘The Museum of Human Happiness’
to be a career high, but this surpasses even that. I’d risk saying that The Legendary Pink Dots don’t
get any better than this, but I think I would lose that bet come the next album. I keep on saying this, and I will keep on
repeating it until someone takes notice.
Why aren’t the Dots bigger than God? It may well be lonely in Heaven
(though Hell is looking rather crowded these days, both down below and up here
on earth) but be glad that at least you will have this album for company.
Essential Information:
‘So Lonely In Heaven’
is released on Metropolis Records on 17th January. Support
independent music by ordering it direct from the band on vinyl, CD and download
through their Bandcamp site here
Main Image by Michael McGrath. L-R: Erik Drost (acoustic and electric guitars, bass guitar), Randall Frazier (synthesisers, devices), Edward Ka-Spel (voice, devices), Joep Hendrikx (live electronics, devices)
