Private View

Product Information

Since reforming in 2011 (Luscombe left shortly after for health reasons) Arthur has harnessed a duality of experimentation and seamless pop melody to release a staggering 10 albums in the last decade.

How the band split as the hits waned, how a fame-weary Neil retreated into film soundtracks before the duo reformed for acclaimed 2011 album Blanc Burn. sees our hero lost and forlorn while ‘Everything Is Connected’ offers a strange kind of eerie indie electro-funk but while not a reprise of ‘Feel Me’, it is as the title suggests, part of the lineage. Blancmange is also reflected in the ongoing influence the music has on younger generations of artists and fans over the years. Private View is set for release on London Records almost exactly 40 years to the day since they released their debut, Happy Families.Not that Benge doesn’t get involved with that, but I usually have the song structure and lyrics in place before I send them to him. Four decades on from Blancmange’s first release, ‘Private View’ is a cohesive body of work and, with a creative streak that shows no sign of slowing down, one that has us itching to see where Neil takes his sound next. This neat, full circle is also reflected in the album itself, being the perfect crystallisation of four decades of Arthur’s creativity.

Brilliantly taking cues from the forest-laden atmospheres of CLUSTER, ‘Take Me’ features some wonderful piano and guitar work. Blancmange vocalist Neil Arthur has been keeping busy since their 80s synthpop heyday, with Private View their 16th album.There’s noisy drilling going on outside the Southbank Centre, so we move inside… but it doesn’t disrupt the flow.

Blancmange has always utilized guitar in its electronic sound, but since Commercial Break, Arthur has not been afraid to bring the guitar front and centre. All the sounds and feels you'd want if you love Stephen's previous bands, but with some new twists and ideas keeping it fresh. Continuing FADER partner Benge as producer who worked on the recent BLANCMANGE albums ‘Unfurnished Rooms’, ‘Wanderlust’, ‘Mindset’ and ‘Commercial Break’, ‘Private View’ presents a striking opener in ‘What’s Your Name’; not a cover of the 1981 DEPECHE MODE tune, despite a sparse vibey start, it strums and crashes into action while Arthur uses a manipulated voice treatment to give a sense of other worldly alienation away from the indie rock track that this could easily be. I was thinking about the difficulties everyone is going through, and about the people that aren’t here any more. Sadly, Luscombe had to leave the band due to health issues, but Neil Arthur continued on, and in 2022 he has just released Private View, the first Blancmange album on London Records since 1985’s Believe You Me.Private View’ comes to a close with Take Me, a double meaning that asks, “How much does someone have to ‘take’ before a relationship breaks down? Some Times These’ also retains a fuzzy kerrang element although the chorus keyboard theme has an immersive Eno-esque air that echoes his work on “Heroes”.

She was thinking she’d just knock on the stage door, and somebody would say ‘I’ll take all the gear in! Allusions to the group’s heyday aren’t unfounded; one track, Here We Go Go, has been in Neil’s head since 1980 and only just materialises on his latest body of work, proving that a good song never goes out of fashion. So I took it down the dump with a load of other stuff – including VHS cassettes of all the films I’d taped over the years.Despite it being 45 years since the teenage Neil Arthur left his native Darwen for the moderately bright lights of late 1970s London.