HELLO GOODBYE

Wayne Hussey recalls titters and terror with The Sisters Of Mercy.

He left Dead Or Alive for a brave new band, but tension, caned-ness and dissension said, Go! “ANDREW WAS NEVER A PARTICULARLY WARM PERSON.”

HELLO SEPTEMBER 1983

Iwas in Dead Or Alive, and we were on CBS. I was coming up with lots of guitar lines but they were putting them into a sequencer. I was a young kid with a bit of an ego, so I was feeling a bit redundant. Andrew Eldritch was talking to the CBS A&R department at the time and they recommended me for the job as [The Sisters Of Mercy] guitarist. I went to Leeds and met the band at the house Andrew shared with [guitarist] Gary Marx. We did some lines and drank some coffee and I got the job without playing a note. We rehearsed for months in the basement. It was a weird arrangement: Andrew would never deign to join us, he’d stay upstairs watching daytime TV, and then when we went upstairs for a coffee break he’d explain how we were playing everything wrong (laughs). Gary and Andrew lived together, but they never talked directly; instead [bassist] Craig Adams and I would relay messages between them. I remember about six weeks after joining, Gary, Craig and I were on the top deck of a bus and they said, “We’re thinking about leaving Andrew, do you want to join us? ” I was like, “Hang on, I’ve only just joined…” It was never mentioned again. After we played our first gigs with the new line-up we went into Strawberry Studios in Stockport to make First And Last And Always. I preferred to work during the day, while Andrew would come in at night. I had my electric 12-string which added a distinct flavour, and one day I recorded the backing track to Black Planet, then a whole new song, Marian. When Andrew came in the evening he told me, “I don’t like [Marian], it sounds like the Banshees.” The next day I discovered he’d put a vocal on it. That was what it was like – there was a tension but somehow it all worked.

GOODBYE SEPTEMBER 1985

The album came out [in March 1985] and we were proud of it, we sounded great. We had good fun on the road, too, there was lots of alcohol and white powders involved and a definite camaraderie, but Andrew was never a particularly warm person. He was also caning it and became quite unwell, but he was under a lot of pressure, managing the group and coming up with melodies and lyrics – I didn’t really understand that experience until later, when it happened to me in The Mission. But relations between Gary Marx and Andrew were deteriorating, and after a UK tour Eldritch said, “You have to choose between me and him.” There was no choice, he was the singer. Then it was, “Look, you’re the new guy, you have to tell him he’s fired.” “What?!” So I phoned Gary, and he knew it was coming. I think die-hard Sisters fans blame me for the break-up but it was Andrew. Without Gary, I had to do the job of two guitarists, which was fine, but the date at the Royal Albert Hall [June 18] was to be our last. I did some demos with Andrew in Germany, but on the first day we rehearsed back in Leeds Craig got fed up and walked out. Andrew said, “That’s got rid of all the driftwood, then,” and I thought, “You bastard.” So that was it – Craig and I formed what would become The Mission. Hearing First And Last And Always a while ago has informed our new album, as it inspired me to get my 12-string out again. For nigh on 30 years I’ve been carrying this animosity towards Andrew, but I’ve realised, “What’s the point?” I’m in this great band and it’s time to move on. It’s funny, though: I live in Brazil and when the Sisters came here recently I phoned the tour manager to get on the guest list. He called back and said, “Andrew says, ‘No way!” I had to laugh. Pat Gilbert

The Mission’s new album, Another Fall From Grace, is released on September 30.