release date: 1989
format: digital
[album rate: 3,5 / 5] [3,35]
producer: Julian Cope
label: Copeco / Zippo Records - nationality: England, UK
Track highlights: 4. "Robert Mitchum" - 5. "Out of My Mind on Dope & Speed" - 6. "Don't Crash Here" - 9. "Great White Wonder"
5th studio album by Julian Cope marks a big change of style. The album was recorded after Cope's disillusions with what he saw as an over-polished and over-produced My Nation Underground (Oct. 1988) before that album was even released. He did not like the end result and initiated his work with musical collaborator Donald Ross Skinner on Skellington, which was recorded over a span of only three days. Island Records refused to release the album, so Cope established his own label Copeco in order to release the album, later reissued on Zippo Records (Apr. 1990). He then ran into a legal law suit with his record company, Island Records, for neglecting his contractual obligations; however, Cope only released another lo-fi album Droolian, this time on the independent label Mofoco, and Island called it a day.
Skellington is anything but polished mainstream and over-produced pop / rock aimed to satisfy the same audience who had been targeted with the predecessor. It's neo-psychedelia above anything. Secondly, it's also an alt. rock and singer / songwriter album with the addition of a certain amount of satire with only Cope, Skinner and drummer Rooster Cosby performing on the album. A track like "Out of My Mind on Dope & Speed" perhaps says much about Cope's situation at this point of his career. The satirical element sometimes makes Cope sound like the closest one ever gets to a British version of Frank Zappa.
I think, its immediate strength is a spontaneous lightness of catchy tunes and hooks - it's playful and reflects the exact opposite of self-consciousness, in contrast to My Nation Underground. Above anything, it's quite interesting much like the successor, but still with some distance from being great.
[ allmusic.com 3,5 / 5 stars ]
