November 1987: I remember being picked up at LaGuardia Airport by my pal Rob B. I am home for Thanksgiving vacation, and Rob and I proceed to drive directly back into Manhattan, bypassing my home in favor of a (long since shuttered) record store on Amsterdam Avenue on the Upper West Side, Vinyl Mania (it had some sibling outlets down on Carmine Street ... they're now gone as well). Having read that our beloved and long-dormant Sisters of Mercy had resumed active duty, our mission was an urgent one, as the band's second full LP, Floodland, had just been released (notcie I didn't say "dropped'?) We needed to possess and hear it a once!
The album's sprawling centerpiece, "This Corrosion" (pointedly over-produced by Meat Loaf knob-twiddler Jim Steinem) swiftly came to define the next couple of chilly months, scoring the ensuing Yuletide season with its spiraling opening chorale, brittle synths, tastefully-plucked guitars and emphatically-barked orders to "SING!" 25 years later (good lord), the witheringly groovy stomp of "This Corrosion" still evokes memories of snowy Decembers.
The video, alas, hasn't aged quite so well (as you'll see below).
The Sisters of Mercy - This Corrosion by kalmar
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