The Reaction - Souled Out (1979)

The Talk Talk story begins in the late 1970's. when bassist Paul Webb and drummer Lee Harris did some studio work with producer Ed Hollis, who later went on to manage punk band Eddie & the Hot Rods, and who suggested the two should meet his younger brother Mark. Mark had originally planned to become a child psychologist, but in 1975 he left university to relocate to London, eventually forming a mod/punk band called The Reaction. His brother called in a few favours, and in 1977 the band recorded a demo tape for Island Records, including one Hollis original titled 'Talk Talk', which later surfaced on the 1977 Beggars Banquet punk compilation 'Streets'. Island were impressed enough with the demo to offer The Reaction a single deal, with 'I Can't Resist'/'I Am A Case' coming out in 1978, and following the release of the single the band recorded another set of demos in 1979, although shortly after this The Reaction disbanded, and Hollis's brother introduced him to Webb and Harris. The trio immediately clicked and began arranging Hollis's tunes and even writing their own together, and after recruiting keyboardist Simon Brenner, the group coalesced as Talk Talk, after mining their growing roster of new song titles for a name. They had no guitarist, which was a purposeful omission, and after EMI expressed an interest in them, they signed for the label. After recording a number of demos with producer Jimmy Miller, they were assigned Duran Duran producer Colin Thurston to helm their first two singles, one of which was the old Reaction song 'Mirror Man', but now recorded in the spirit of the current new romantic movement, which seemed to be the direction that EMI wanted to push them into. Their debut LP, 'The Party's Over', was indeed a product of its time, defined by contemporary synth pop sensibilities but with an honesty and lyrical depth absent from most other records of the moment, and from that point on the band never looked back. But we are now able to, however, and to hear those 1979 demos, plus their lone single, and their compilation contribution, on this collection of all the existing recordings by The Reaction, some of which later turned up on Talk Talk records in drastically different forms. 

Track listing

01 Caro Lyn
02 Mirror Man
03 Renée
04 I Can't Resist
05 Candy
06 Have You Heard The News
07 Crying In The Rain
08 I Keep On Telling You
09 I Am A Case
10 It's A Question Of Time
11 Talk Talk
12 Souled Out

Thanks to Geof McM for the suggestion

Talk Talk - A Chameleon Hour (1994) **UPDATE**

I stumbled on a Talk Talk forum the other day, where Jules (aka Specialist Spectrus) had commented on this post, and mentioned that he still considered that 'Again, A Game…Again' should lead into the piano version of 'Call In The Night Boy', which then goes into 'My Foolish Friend', as those three run together so well, and they should ideally lead off the album. I never tried this combination when he first mentioned it in the comments to the post, but was now intrigued to see if it worked, so I've completely revamped the running order of the album, and have to agree that it does work very well. 'Again, A Game…Again' / 'Call In The Night Boy' / 'My Foolish Friend' now opens the album, with the piano version of 'Call In The Night Boy' replacing the band version, and I've also flipped the order of 'Desire' and 'Renée' as they flow better that way, and lastly I've moved 'Such A Shame' to the end, as it has the perfect outro to close the album. As I think this version works so well, I've updated Soulseek and Mega, so give it a try and see if you agree.

Track listing

01 Again A Game...Again
02 Call In The Night Boy
03 My Foolish Friend
04 Renée
05 Desire
06 Why Is It So Hard?
07 For What It's Worth
08 Without You
09 Such A Shame 

Talk Talk - A Chameleon Hour (1984)

Talk Talk began as a quartet consisting of Mark Hollis (vocals/guitar/piano), Lee Harris (drums), Paul Webb (bass guitar), and Simon Brenner (keyboards), and in their early years they were often linked to the New Romantic movement, more specifically with Duran Duran, as both bands sported a name which was a single word repeated, a Roxy Music-inspired musical direction, and shared the same record label (EMI) and producer (Colin Thurston). The band released their first single 'Mirror Man' in February 1982 to little public recognition, and this was followed by a re-recording of an old song by Hollis's previous band The Reaction, entitled 'Talk Talk', and this actally reached No.52 in the UK Charts. The band's first album 'The Party's Over' was released in July 1982, and they had their first UK Top 40 hits with the singles 'Today', and a re-release of 'Talk Talk'. Brenner left before the 1983 non-album single 'My Foolish Friend' was released in 1983, which was produced by frequent Roxy Music collaborator Rhett Davies, and this song was intended to be the first single from their second record, a concept album entitled 'A Chameleon Hour'. This would have been based on the book 'The Dice Man', but the record in its original conception was never released, although several songs, like 'Such A Shame' and 'Call In The Night Boy', did appear on their second album, and others ended up as b-sides. Hollis explained the concept of the album as being "inspired by the book 'The Dice Man', which is about decision making through dice throwing. Although they didn’t actually refer to it in the book, there's a scene when he's in a party for an hour undergoing about ten different personality changes and that idea seemed quite appropriate in terms of what we’re doing. It's a fabulous book, the idea is so appealing. I’ve just written ten times as many lyrics as I needed and thrown the dice on which ones go in. It’s ultimately wrong though, definitely immoral!". 

At this point Talk Talk was officially a trio, as Brenner was not replaced, although keyboard player Phil Ramocon, who had already played piano on the band's live shows beside Brenner, basically took up his role. However, Tim Friese-Greene was brought in to assist with the recording of 'It's My Life', and he soon became the band's producer and occasional keyboard player, as well as Hollis' frequent songwriting partner. After 'A Chameleon Hour' was abandoned, more songs were recorded and in 1984 'It's My Life' became their official second album, and with Fries-Greene on board their music became much more esoteric,with both 1986's 'The Colour Of Spring' and 1988's 'Spirit Of Eden' being rightly regarded as classic albums of the period. The band have even been credited with inventing "post-rock" in their last two albums, 'Spirit Of Eden' and 'Laughing Stock', and artists who've praised the band or cited them as an influence include Tears For Fears, Radiohead, Doves, Elbow, Shearwater, Cedric Bixler-Zavala of the Mars Volta, and Steven Wilson of Porcupine Tree. Mark Hollis died on 25 February 2019, aged 64, and the obituaries from friends and fellow musicians showed the high regard in which he was held by everyone who knew or worked with him. Hopefully you'll enjoy this reconstruction of the 'A Chameleon Hour' album, as there's only a couple of songs from 'In My Life', so a lot of the material might be unfamiliar to all but the most avid fans. 

Track listing

01 Again A Game...Again

02 Call In The Night Boy

03 My Foolish Friend

04 Renée

05 Desire

06 Why Is It So Hard?

07 For What It's Worth

08 Without You

09 Such A Shame 

Thanks to the stevehoffman site for the suggestion, and to Jules for the revised opening trio of songs.