Echo & The Bunnymen

Evergreen (25th Anniversary Edition) LONDON

Expanded reissue for sumptuous 1997 comeback by legendary Liverpool gobshites.

After a lengthy hiatus marked by break-ups, name changes, solo projects and grieving over the tragic death of drummer Pete de Freitas, the surviving trio of Bunnymen finally reunited at the height of Britpop to show upstarts like Oasis and The Verve how to make majestic, guitar-jangling anthems like proper northern rock aristocrats.

Evergreen, released in 1997, gave these Liverpool post-punk veterans their first Top 10 album and their biggest hit single in a decade: the soaringly romantic and still magnificent Nothing Lasts Forever (with a young Liam Gallagher on backing vocals). The rest of this classy, expansive, string-heavy collection also holds up surprisingly well 25 years on, from Ian McCulloch’s grainy, soulful croon on In My Time to Will Sergeant’s scorching psychrock pyrotechnics on I Want to Be There (When You Come).

In its two-CD version, this reissue bulks up to 33 tracks including B-sides, radio sessions and live cuts. All but four are already available, but it’s still a thrill to hear an acoustic chamber-rock version of

Nothing Lasts Forever alongside reworked Bunnymen classics like Rescue, Lips Like Sugar and

The Killing Moon. Of the previously unreleased live material, only Just A Touch Away gains in stature in this rattling, booming take.