All About Eve (band)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| All About Eve | |
|---|---|
| Also known as | The Swarm |
| Origin | |
| Genre(s) | Alternative rock Gothic rock, Shoegazing |
| Years active | 1984 – 1993, 1999 – 2004 |
| Label(s) | Mercury, Vertigo, MCA, JamTart |
| Former members | |
| Julianne Regan Andy Cousin Tim Bricheno Mark Price Marty Willson-Piper James Richard Jackson Manuela Zwingman Rik Carter Del Hood Robin GuyToni Haimi Ben Savigear |
|
All About Eve is a British rock/pop band. The creative core consists of Coventry-born Julianne Regan (vocals) and Andy Cousin (bass guitar), with other members changing over the years.
Contents |
Julianne Regan, a former journalist, played bass in an early line-up of Gothic rock group Gene Loves Jezebel before leaving to join All About Eve, previously known as the Swarm. The initial core of All About Eve was Regan, guitarist Tim Bricheno, and bassist Andy Cousin from Aemotti Crii. As a three-piece (plus a drum machine), they released a series of independent singles in the mid 1980s including "D For Desire", "In The Clouds" and "Flowers In Our Hair". After Julianne sang backing vocals for The Mission's Gods Own Medicine album, the band received greater attention and were signed to Phonogram. Drummer Mark Price was added around this time.
Their self-titled debut album was produced by Paul Samwell-Smith and released in 1988, it produced the UK hit single "Martha's Harbour".
The album itself reached #7 on the United Kingdom album charts, with much of its lyrical material drawing from hippie ideals, white magic and dreamlike fairy tales, the album's gentle folk rock-inspired pop sound won the band many fans (nicknamed "angels"). Their music is sometimes considered gothic rock by the media, some fans claim the band did not play gothic rock after 1986, though are connected mostly due to the engagements of the band members in the musical scene of the time who had left All About Eve.
In a well known incident, the band later performed a dubbed version of "Martha's Harbour" on the BBC1 television show Top Of The Pops, but, owing to a studio technical error, the taped vocals were broadcast without the band being able to hear them, resulting in the TV audience hearing the recorded version of the song, while the band members sat motionless on screen waiting for their cue to begin. By way of compensation the band were invited back on to the show the following week, and this time their performance passed off smoothly.
The following year, their second album Scarlet and Other Stories was released, and the band toured around the UK, it was another top 10 hit for the band. Widely prevalent on this album were Regan's somber, highly melancholic moods. Painful chance encounters with love also appeared on the lyrical front, and it is this motif (and period of time) which was to greatly paint the picture for the future of the band as well.
In 1990, Bricheno left the group (later to join The Sisters of Mercy for their Vision Thing era, and subsequent bands XC-NN and Tin Star) to be swiftly replaced by The Church's Marty Willson-Piper. They went on to record Touched By Jesus in 1991 (which featured David Gilmour of Pink Floyd on guitar on two tracks), before changing record companies and taking a dramatic stylistic change by releasing Ultraviolet the year after.
Going an altogether different way to their previous release, Ultraviolet mellowed the band's sound greatly, revisiting Scarlet's general sorrowful feel with a heavy inspiration from the shoegazing movement and psychedelia to turn the Eve signature sound ever colder, with much downplayed vocals. The album, released by MCA Records was not well supported by the record company, considering the change to be for the worse, and the band subsequently went their separate ways. MCA, shedding no tears, promptly deleted the album from their catalogue. Although the band continued for a couple more months without Regan's input, they disbanded in early 1993, with the album they had been working on at the time eventually seeing the light of day under the group name Seeing Stars.
Regan went on to form Mice and to work with Bernard Butler, but an album with the latter never came to fruition due to personality clashes. Though often quoted that Julianne thought Butler to be "Satan", this quote is in fact not true. Later on, she also teamed up with her old Gene Loves Jezebel acquaintance Jean-Marc Lederman in the highly atmospheric Jules et Jim project (a collaboration which continues to this day).
At the end of the 1990s, old friends The Mission reformed after a short break and started touring. They invited Regan to open for them, and their offer was accepted, starting the second era of the band. Soon after the tour the newly-reformed (Regan, Willson-Piper & Cousin) All About Eve toured for two years, releasing Fairy Light Nights, an acoustic live collection in 2000, with Volume 2 following in 2001, and later followed by two more live albums Live And Electric At The Union Chapel and Cinemasonic (the latter of which was also released as a DVD). A collection of early recordings was also released, entitled Return To Eden, Volume 1 (no second volume has yet appeared).
In 2002, Willson-Piper left the band to pursue other projects, to be replaced by new guitarist Toni Haimi, previously of the band Malluka and now in the Sohodolls. Also in 2002, Julianne and Andy released their first studio recordings in a decade, with the EP Iceland – a collection of "winter songs", including reworkings of previous fan-favourite "December" and cover versions of Wham!'s "Last Christmas", Queen's "A Winter's Tale", and a minimalist electronic take on the popular song from the animated short The Snowman, "Walking in the Air".
In mid-2004, just after the release of their first single in a decade, "Let Me Go Home", the band split once again. Regan is currently working on projects including an album with Jean-Marc Lederman (in a follow-up to the first Jules et Jim album), as well as collaborating with Norwegian songwriters GKraft, and a possible solo album. The nearly-completed All About Eve studio album that was being worked-on remains unreleased, although Regan and Cousin have indicated that they may eventually finish the recordings sometime in the future. A double CD collection entitled Keepsakes, consisting of the singles, key album tracks and previously unreleased rarities, as well as some newly recorded songs, was released early March 2006, and was initially available with a DVD of promo videos and TV appearances. Re-issues of the first four albums, along with some previously un-released bonus tracks, is due out in February 2008.
| Title | Date of Release | US Chart Position | UK Chart Position |
| All About Eve | 1988 | ??? | #7 |
| Scarlet and Other Stories | 1989 | ??? | #9 |
| Touched By Jesus | 1991 | ??? | #17 |
| Ultraviolet | 1992 | ??? | ??? |
- 2002 Iceland
- 1985 "D For Desire"
- 1986 "In The Clouds"
- 1987 "Our Summer" UK #87
- 1987 "Flowers In Our Hair" UK #81
- 1987 "In The Clouds" UK #47
- 1988 "Wild Hearted Woman" UK #33
- 1988 "Every Angel" UK #30
- 1988 "Martha's Harbour" UK #10
- 1988 "What Kind Of Fool" UK #29
- 1989 "Road To Your Soul" UK #37
- 1989 "December" UK #34
- 1990 "Scarlet" UK #34
- 1990 "Thirteen" UK #15
- 1991 "Farewell Mr. Sorrow" UK #37
- 1991 "Strange Way" UK #51
- 1991 "The Dreamer" UK #41
- 1992 "Phased" UK #38
- 1992 "Some Finer Day" UK #57
- 2004 "Let Me Go Home" UK #52
- 2006 "Keepsakes" (Download Only)
- 1991 BBC In Concert Transcription Disc #526 (CD)
- 1993 BBC Radio One Live In Concert
- 2000 Fairy Light Nights 1 aka Unplugged aka Martha's Harbour
- 2001 Fairy Light Nights 2
- 2001 Live and Electric at The Union Chapel
- 2003 Cinemasonic
- 2003 Fairy Light Nights 1 + 2 aka Acoustic Nights
- 1989 Evergreen (VHS)
- 2003 Cinemasonic
- 1992 Winter Words - Hits and Rarities
- 1999 The Best Of All About Eve
- 2002 Return To Eden Vol. 1 - The Early Recordings
- 2006 Keepsakes - A Collection (CD & DVD) #134
- 2007 Sixty Minutes With
All About Eve - Flowers In Our Hair excerpt
Problems listening to the file? See media help.
- Candytree - All About Eve & Julianne Regan main site
- Julianne Regan's personal site
- Another of Julianne's sites, focused on All About Eve & with audio clips
- And another (!) of Julianne's sites, with audio clips of Julianne's solo work and collaborations
- Official Marty Willson-Piper site
- Unofficial (but approved) All About Eve fansite by 'Goony'. Very comprehensive
- Early history of the band site
- Another unofficial All About Eve site
- Ectophiles' site
- Soundclick site, with audio clips
- Every Angel - Unofficial Japanese All About Eve site
| All About Eve |
|---|
| Julianne Regan |
| Tim Bricheno | Andy Cousin | Toni Haimi | Mark Price | Marty Willson-Piper |
| Rik Carter | Robin Guy | James Richard Jackson | Ben Savigear | Manuela Zwingmann |
| Studio Albums |
| All About Eve (1988) | Scarlet and Other Stories (1989) |
| Touched by Jesus (1991) | Ultraviolet (1992) | Iceland (2002) |
| Live Albums |
| All About Eve (1993) | Fairy Light Nights (2000) | Fairy Light Nights Two (2001) |
| Live and Electric at the Union Chapel (2001) | Cinemasonic (2003) |
| Compilations |
| Winter Words (1993) | Return to Eden (2003) | Keepsakes (2006) |
| Mice Albums |
| ...Because I Can (1996) | New and Improved (2001) |
| Related Bands |
| The Church | Harmony Ambulance | Jules et Jim | The Lucy Nation | The Mission | Seeing Stars |