Nick Marsh

Waltzing Bones

BANDCAMP Posthumous second from Flesh For Lulu vocalist.

From the gorgeous melancholia of sumptuous album opener Masquerade (pitched somewhere between Blackstar Bowie and Rottenhat Wyatt) to the bittersweet final turn around life’s dancefloor of Waltzing Bones, this beautifully realised posthumous solo set from the former Flesh For Lulu frontman is both fitting tribute and artistic triumph.

Completed after Marsh’s 2015 death from cancer by his partner Katharine Blake (Miranda Sex Garden/Mediaeval Baebes) and featuring significant contributions from his friends (Rachel Stamp’s David Ryder Prangley, Thee Hypnotics’ Ray Hanson and Jim Jones, Alabama 3’s Nick Reynolds et al) and bandmates (The Urban Voodoo Machine’s Paul-Ronney Angel), Waltzing Bones perfectly encapsulates Nick Marsh’s complex musical persona.

The subterranean sensibilities of the too-sexy-for-goth Flesh For Lulu infuse every last nuance, as do hot-blooded, Iberianhaunted echoes of The UVM’s moonshine-skewed gypsy blues, but always at front and centre is the fabulous distracted ennui of Marsh’s distinctive vocal; jaded but passionate, heavy with unspoken experience, a whiskey-croaking Steve Harley charged with emotion at the last-chance saloon.

It’s cinematic, evocative, beyond any simple categorisation, and as intriguing a multi-faceted musical conundrum as Nick Marsh himself. All involved have done their man, and his legacy, proud. ■■■■■■■■■■

Ian Fortnam