The Sisters of Mercy - 2003 - Smoke and Mirrors

The people

The guys next to Andrew Eldritch (vocals and leadership) are same fourth year in a row:

Adam Pearson: guitars, bass (on Romeo Down, I Was Wrong and Never Land) and backing vocals
Chris Sheehan (aka Chris Starling): guitars (mostly additional stuff) and backing vocals (ditto)
Doktor Avalanche: beats and keyboards
Simon Denbigh: nurses the Doktor.

Adam Pearson seems more determined and ready to kill than before. Militant Groove Machine, indeed.

Among FOH crew, Nigel the lights guru is missing, apparently due to Iraq conflict (he resides in Saudi Arabia). Juergen the sound man rejoined the boys somewhere around the Berlin gig and is now with the band (this doesn't seem to lessen sound problems, which, to be objective, sometimes are caused by venue).

The message

"Ladies and gentleman, boys and girls, This War Is Wrong". As heard many times during and after Vision Thing from roughly Zwickau.

This short quip is self-explanatory; more complicated blah blah on Andrew Eldritch's war views is here.

The songs

This tour introduces one new song, introduces three Vision Thing album songs which were rarely (if ever) played live before, resurrects Marian and has more interesting mishmash.

The new song started out being called Slept, to be renamed to more descriptive Have Slept with All the Girls in Berlin by the time the circus has reached the UK. It's nice, melodic, reminds Heartland in its harmony and second verse which lasts for half the songs and has long list of "girls that ... , girls that ... , girls that ..." in unusually poem-like sequence before finishing with repeat of the title. In Deinze an audience member carefully informed Andrew "you've missed one!" "Probably your mother" was the answer.

The reworked songs all come from Vision Thing album, neglected live up to now. First and foremost, I Was Wrong is reintroduced in harshly rehashed form, with guitar, bass and Andrew, without drums. Slow and predictably great. When You Don't See Me and Doctor Jeep also show up in the set - both were played only in early gigs of 1990 lineup. Doctor Jeep is less common one; it's played in medley with Detonation Boulevard, thus updating the Train/Detonation Boulevard medley, When You Don't See Me is fairly common.

On rare occasions Marian is heard, not played live since early 1990s. One offs included  Burn, standard showbreaker of 1983-1985, and Valentine. 

(Note that links above all lead to a database that is in BETA. It mostly works, but rough edges are abound.)

The DVD

In other news, instead of live DVD (in semi-official limbo since last tour) we're treated to a half-assed concert video clip; recommended for music alone. Don't expect the visual side of it to be a fair representatation of a Sisters show though, just a glimpse of it. Think mono 32kbps mix of Meat Loaf's trademark Belgium-sized piano. Concert galleries are better stab at describing the orgasm.

Oh