Released in 1979, The Raven would be the album where the Stranglers almost completely lost any semblance of links to their early days, leaving the crazy punk sound for a far more broad and generally un-pidgeonhole-able sound that would lead to a rift between fans of the group, with some fans feeling betrayed by the change in sound, and other embracing it and seeing it as the band moving forwards.
The album's success was both blostered and hindered by forces outwith the strength of the music on it, with singer/guitarist Hugh Cornwell's arrest for drugs posession, a charge that would later see him jailed for a few weeks,providing nothing but publicity for the record,however a clerical error cost the record it's number one spot in the UK album charts, with a healthy chunk of the album's sales being attributed to the Police's Reggatta de Blanc, which wasn't even released for another week. Funnily enough, Sting and company would come back to haunt the band later, they were due to be the first band to tour India, which went pear-shaped upon Cornwell's incarceration, and the Police went instead.

The band at this stage still consisted of Cornwell, along bass player/singer Jean Jacques(JJ) Burnel, drummer Jet Black and singer/keyboard/organ player Dave Greenfield, and they still enjoyed a fairly large following in the UK, but America hadn't taken notice of them in the way it had of The Clash or the Sex Pistols, something that American record label A&E were keen to change. Instead of releasing the Raven, they propositioned the band with releasing a compilation of the best songs from the first three records in the states, to try and build up a following before the album's release. The band's reply came in the form of a telegram from Cornwell, who stormed into the offices of EMI, the band's British label, and typed up the message:

"Dear A&E,
Get f***ed
Love,The Stranglers".

Naturally A&E cancelled their contract, and the group found another American record label, who in fact released the record IV, a compilation of the best tracks from The Raven, mixed with some of the early singles from the band.

However, the record itself was released everywhere else, and even in a rare version, which featured a hologram of the picture of the Raven's face, which appeared to follow the owner around the room, sadly this effect doesn't appear on the CD, which instead takes it's cover from the standard version, which is nonetheless a lovely painting of a raven.

The album kicks off with Longships, barely a minute in length, and featuring no vocals, this little instrumental is fairly pointless, but at the same time a nice little piece of music that is over before it actually hits you how pointless it actually is.

Then we get the title track, which brings with it one of the album's biggest complaints,The Raven features a very length intro, that had many fans up in arms "it sounds like progressive rock,this is meant to be the Stranglers!". However, I personally don't mind, seeing as the lengthy intro, before Burnel's vocals about an imaginary conversation with a Raven, imagined through the eyes of a viking kick in, features a lovely little bit of guitar work from Cornwell. In fact, while the song on a whole is fairly enjoyable, I personally feel it becomes a bit generic after the much maligned intro, which makes it stand out amongst the other tracks.

Then we get hit with what I feel is one of the most memorable tracks on the record, Dead Loss Angeles, a less than positive look at the band's experiences in America. The lyrics, which talk about how phony and manufactured the band found the place, and feature a brilliant reference to a mastadon dredged up (the dredged up mastadon/has got his glasses on/he's never seen such sh!t/from the La Brea Pit) and how it wouldn't be used to the sheer amount of sh!t on show, are cool, but my real love of the song comes from the fact Cornwell doesn't play guitar on the track, oh no, on this he plays a second bass, which just creates an altogether new sound, expecially when you consider JJ's bass was always known for being such a pounding and driving force, having another to complement it makes for an interesting, and in my eyes, or ears, great song.

This album boasts what Cornwell describes as his singing debut, on Baroque Bordello, which features another lengthy introduction, and while it's nice to see where his voice started to get used for more than snarling,this isn't really a favourite song of mine.

The singles released from this album were Duchess,Don't Bring Harry and Nuclear Device (The Wizard of Aus). The latter is a brilliant song that harks back to their earlier sound, with Cornwell gleefully spinning a tale of Australia, and ripping into the at the time Mayor of Queensland John Bejelke Peterson, a man who cheated to stay in power, sold uranium and land to foreign countries, and imposed almost draconian laws upon the areas in his jurisdiction. Naturally, when a band like the Stranglers,reputation proceeding them, arrived to play Brisbane, chaos ensued as they done everything in their power to wind him up, which climaxed with the band's gig being cancelled due to fighting breaking out, fighting the gig's promoter felt had been started by Peterson's men as a set up.
The song is delightful, as it actually brings back a bit of the snarl of the Stranglers of old, with Cornwell's delivery of the lines unique, and excellent on the ears (Nuke-lah Deev-ICE), with of course Greenfield's keyboard's and JJ's bass providing some heavy and memorable moments. It also has a completely different sounding bit dubbed 'Down Under' tacked onto the end, where Hugh declares he believes the unique-ness of Australia's wildlife is possibly down to nuclear testing, possibly by aliens, in the outback. More on the band and aliens later...

The most successful of the singles was Duchess, lyrically about a former flame of Cornwell's whose blood lay with the aristocracy, the tune is simple and pure pop greatness. It's as catchy as anything you'll ever hear on the radio, along with harmonised "AH!-AH!"'s from the rest of the band as Cornwell pours his heart into it. It's all about Dave's keyboards here, although I once read something about the Manic Street Preachers song "If You Tolerate This..." ripping this song off, I don't see the resemblance myself, although I haven't heard that song in years.
Sadly, the success of the song was hindered by the fact the BBC refused to play the video, on the grounds that it was blasphemous. It features the band dressed as choirboys, singing the song. That's the BBC for you. Anyway, it's a wonderful song that I defy anyone not to sing along with, and the band often used it to close shows.

The final single was Don't Bring Harry, and absolute beauty of a track, slow,mournful, and based around nothing more than a piano riff, until Hugh's lovely solo. The lyrics, as delivered in a wonderful fashion from JJ, relate to the pitfalls of heroin addiction. Sadly, it flopped as a chart single, but in terms of musical quality, it's a timeless piece that is up there with the best of the band's work.

The problem is, that with the singles aside, none of the other album tracks really do much. Ice,another track dealing with JJ's fascination with Japanese culture and Shah Shah a Go Go,about Iranian Oil issues aren't bad, they simply aren't very memorable at all.

The other two tracks are memorable, but not for totally positive reasons. The better of the two, and the album closer,Genetix, the sole track on this record sung by Dave, is memorable only for his delivery of the title line, and for Jet's drumming, which reminds me of a marylin manson song's drums, even if the songs sound nothing alike.

The last of the album tracks I'll look at is Meninblack, a slow,weird and distorted sound for the music, which was made by taking the song Two Sunspots, which wouldn't actually appear until the next record, and playing it backwards. But that's not what makes it memorable, oh no.The band's voices have been distorted to an almost chipmunk effect, to make them sound like Aliens, delivering this silly story about harvesting humans for food. It does feature the now famous line "human meat tastes just like pork", which was JJ's first revelation of his thing for cannibalism(which he claims is totally speculative), which the band as a whole first brought up way back on Straighten Out in 1977. This was to pave the way for the band's follow up record, the dreadfully recieved (The Gospel According To)The Meninblack, where their obsession with the phenomenon of the Men in Black, took over their lives and almost cost them their careers. This song would possibly have been more acceptable as an oddity, had the band not already put one on the record in the form of Longships.

That is where the record The Raven ends, but like all of the CD reissues of Stranglers albums, it features bonus songs tacked on. As for the regular album, in terms of giving it a score, Im a bit torn on the issue. It's too good to fall below 3 Stars, but Im not really sure if it does enough to warrant any higher.

The bonus tracks,sadly, don't do much to elevate it in my eyes. The first song was the single only release Bearcage, known also as GmbH, is about communist occupied Germany, and how the group sympathised with those caught up in it. It's slower, Dave's keyboards are rather swirly and hypnotic, and I personally actually like the song, even if the band themselves feel it didn't turn out as well as it should have.
The remaining bonus tracks aren't up to much,sadly. The most interesting is N'emmenes Pas Harry, which is just Don't Bring Harry, but recorded in French. Fools Rush Out, is rather bland and generic and another instrumental,Yellowcake UF6(wrongly written as Yellowcake UFO on the sleeve) is much of the same.

Overall, while I feel that the Raven is an enjoyable record, and it's best songs are brilliant, it just doesn't have all that many of those songs, and has a bit too much filler for my liking. 3 Stars and a recommended will have to suffice for The Raven,and I would like to point out that it really just misses out on 4 stars, because as I say, the good songs are very good, and some of the band's best material ever comes from this release, but sadly it isn't as consistant as the group's other albums, or as I would like it to be.
I would recommend it to fans who like all of the Stranglers many sounds, this album isn't as easy to pidgeon-hole as their others, and to the casual fan, this probably wouldn't appeal.
The thing is, giving the record 3 Stars is a bit ironic, and possibly asking for trouble. Upon it's release,a journalist gave the album the same score, and was accosted by JJ in a pub in a situation that almost turned nasty. Looks like I better start taking karate lessons...


Track Listing
1.Longships
2.The Raven
3.Dead Loss Angeles
4.Ice
5.Baroque Bordello
6.Nuclear Device(The Wizard of Aus)
7.Shah Shah a Go Go
8.Don't Bring Harry
9.Duchess
10.Meninblack
11.Genetix
Bonus Tracks
12.Bear Cage
13.Fools Rush Out
14.E'emmenes Pas Harry
15.Yellowcake UF6

More Stranglers Reviews
The Stranglers - Rattus Norvegicus
The Stranglers - No More Heroes
The Stranglers - Black & White

Recommended: Yes