Probably the best, and perhaps most obviously best, thing about doing these Flash Metal Suicide pieces is kicking back and digging into records you might not have played for a fair few hearings of 'Rime Of The Ancient Mariner'. So it is with this lot. Apart from a couple of outings of 'Moonchild' in The Devonshire Arms in London recently, I hadn't heard them since I dug them out, again after several (squillion) spins of Spacemen 3's version of the Elevators 'Rollercoaster', whilst reading Andrew Collins 'From The Ashes Of Angels' thinking that they soundtracked such a read perfectly, only to discover at the back that Collins wrote the book with their music in the background. Ooo, spooky.

So without further ado let us introduce...The Nephilim. Fields Of. The caped crusaders of epic-ly esoteric Psychedelic Spaghetti Western Psychobilly. The original floured up crew, sci-fi cowboys of the post-apocalypse, precision purveyors of swirling, intense psychodramas that whip up into a sudden sandstorm as though there's a decadent dustdevil on their tail, cracking the whip. But from what yonder lands did they emerge? Or where they the mystical wasteland warriors from the earth's very core that the legends foretold? Well, not exactly. In actuality they arose from the ashes of a death valley dustcloud from the darkened depths of the Wild West. Erm, Wild West England. Yes, Sussex, if my geography holds up (as well as memory, maybe it was Hertforshire, or is Sussex in Herts or....hell, I don't know), where once upon a time in those far off gray days of yore (aka - the early eighties) completely unbeknownst to the little Stu a tall, dark, handsome stranger who ate cigars and smoked trees came upon a struggling psychobilly band one day while out riding his steed called Nightmare. Sensing the potential missed by countless others, even amongst London's then burgeoning Goth scene - a scene actually populated by zero bands, as they all ran round in circles obviously been Goth to the core whilst disputing the tag as some sort of journalistic joshing. Ooooo, those contrary little so and so's - McCoy introduced himself and exchanged pleasantries. Well, the band thought and hoped so anyway, he sure mumbled something or other. He dosed them full of peyote, psilocybin and a few bouts of hypnosis to unleash the inner, repressed Pink Floyd that had lain dormant within for aeons. And they didn't even know it! This allied them to his own personal inner vision, fuelled since his strict religious Mormon upbringing, and possibly, or possibly not, oodles of drugs and prolific reading of esoteria. He christened the fledgling outfit Fields of the Nephilim, after the race of giants in the book of Genesis that pop down to our Earthly paradise to fuck the pretty Earth girls. (cos they presumably heard they were easy). Now, for anyone interested this is why a read of the Andrew Collins book is useful as he goes into detail that they weren't actually giants, that was a word used by the transcribers of the bible to make it all seem otherworldy, they were actually a higher race of people, who were seemingly a bit short on the old skirt side of things and went down to see what was on offer on the other side of town, like ancient country trobadours, even. Anyway, from this we get fallen angels - The Nephilim (and also of course a Hanoi and Vibrators stonking side project).

In actuality, really, things are more mundane. Ayuss, folks, even in the land of The Neph. What had happened of course is that a band had formed around two brothers, Pete and Nod Wright. They'd played the local circuit for a while under the name, oh irony of ironies, Mission, when they roped - sorry, lassoed - in vocalist Carl McCoy, who had been treading the boards in a variety of mainly reggae bands. (Apart from the first bit, casting McCoy as a Clint type Man With No Name I aren't making this up - honest. I read it recently in Dave Thompson's 'The Dark Reign of Gothic Rock', which is a very good read, featuring the antics and escapades of all our favourite Goth Rocka's like The Neph, The Sisters of Murky, Bauhaus and The Cure. Oh, and of course, also some of the ones that Eldritch, never mind McCoy, probably wouldn't piss on if they were on fire - Sex Gang Children, Specimen et al. And The Mission, who I used to love, but apart from the still startlingly good 'First Chapter' and 'Severina' now suck donkey's....Hell, I was 13 or something, The Dogs stayed, The Mission didn't, life goes on and I think that was a wise choice made by my ears).

I can't remember what McCoy warbled on about in the interview apart from the usual 'we used to rehearse in a shit-hole where I got electric shocks from singing' (hey, so did I, what do I get? anew hat?) and about how performing was like a shamanic rite. Which, being 13, meant sweet squiggly all to me.

Look, he had a good hat, for god's sake. (I think too he had a Jaguar XJS - he either hired it or Situation 2 didn't stint on the advances and royalties - or whatever they were called, with a 666 reg too.) This often helps. Tyla, namesake Andy McCoy, Slash sorta, even Wayne Hussey, and ya can't forget old Guy Bailey now can you? I bought a hat too cos of them, but it was shit, and yes, I admit, I even covered it in flour. Ha ha, what a twat! Anyway, the dumbness of youth. Versus, the vainglory of age, eh? Well, in the mists of time and Nephilim tours I can't remember what I thought of the album exactly, apart from being rather blown away by it's mixture of dark, seductive, enchanting, mystical mumbo-jumbo and densely layered atmospherics - spellbinding, no less, and that 'For Her Light' and 'Preacher Man', to quote Danko Jones, rock shit hot. Snatches of lyrics like theatrical asides 'Your effigy dissolves in my hand' -not something you expect to happen standing on the platform waiting for the train - something about moving 'like opium near your heart'. And it introduced me to one of my all time favourite lines - 'Keep Talking...'. Fantastic. I also loved conductor McCoy's bellowed 'STOPPP'. moreso, I was enchanted with the liner notes - an extract from an ancient Sumerian text c.4,000 BC, beautiful. Blowing gothwebs away far beyond the next dimension, back into Crowley's pipe. Suffice to say, I loved it enough to blag all thepromo materials from our local record shop (which I hope I've still got somewhere) and buy T-shirts instead of Sisters ones, thought that might be cos I was/am a contrary barstad and people I knew far preferred The Sisters. I regrettably never got to see them tho, missing them at Hull City Hall in 1990, when they were supported by crustygothmetal slimeballs Creaming Jesus, who I also thought were great and also missed when they played themselves at smaller Hull venues, or venue, as there was The Adelphi, and pretty much fuck all else.

However, a wee while after this episode, a friend (let's call him Adrian, as that was, and still is, I presume, his name) and his chum Tim (ditto) came round my house with a bag full (well I think there might have been 2 or 3) of Nephilim records. I remember them playing me the 'Burning The Fields' EP, and the 'Dawnrazor' album. I distinctly remember though, being more impressed that this guy Tim (or Little Tim, as there was - lo and behold - a Big Tim at the time too) had a huge cowboy hat on and a great, long, old style military Hussar kinda coat, in obvious deference to our cosmic cowboy heroes in question.

This spurred me on a little bit later when some money didst come my way to purchase the 'Dawnrazor' album, which I must say works far, far better on CD with the early singles on there as extra songs than the vinyl, which seems more like an EP, really.
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Now, people with sharpish ears, or anoraks, or unobservant folk like me who only picked up on it in the aforementioned Mr. Thompson's (not to say HE'S an anorak, mind) book, will notice that The Sisters used Morricone-esque guitar lines on 'Phantom'. A link there? Yeah, a tenuous one. You don't have to thinktoo long and hard really to come to the conclusion that, atmospheric tho it is, 'Phantom' doesn't rate too highly in the shaking stakes, and was undoubtedly a piece of filler 'cos The Sisters were far more concerned with guzzling speed than writing lots of songs of the calibre of 'Alice' and 'Floorshow', eventho with such a legendarily excessive consumption they had plenty of time to.

Let's also have a quick look into the western garb issue. I remember Eldritch several years ago, around the time of 'Some Girls Wander...' saying that it's not his fault that certain people made a career out of clothes he wore for 3 months, maybe more of a dig at The Mission but odd that The Sisters adopted this sortof look upon the arrival of Hussey, who then went straight for the kiddie market with a lot of 'First And Last And Always', the songs therein being writ in the main part by Mr Hussey (tho the best songs are the least commercial like 'Some Kind Of Stranger', anyway, I digress again), around 1984, when The Nephilim were a known band, maybe a while before 'Burning The Fields' but even so. So, it coulda been a case of fashion conscious (disastrous?) Hussey half-inching it off McCoy and the Wright brothers. Ultimately tho, Eldritch looked cool in this phase, just check 'Wake' out - all long velvet frock coat, and larger chops than mine, even, and THAT great hat, but maybe he bore a simmering jealousy 'cos McCoy had ace Freddy Kreuger gloves, and the coolest of the cool wraparound World War One type aviator shades, which either makes him look like someone outta Mad Max, Back To The Future 3, or just sexy as hell, as a girl at school, Vikki, did often pronounce. So, a winner all round then, it seems.

And, in general, ridiculing the whole wild west floured-up thing is a bit ridiculous in itself, really, for 'twas afterall, the 80's. They looked a damn sight better than Duran Duran, Thompson Twins and The Stones and a whole locust legion of others, and time had been kind cos they still do. (Another brief aside, people, if I may. Thank you. Eldritch looked great on 'Wake', Hussey looked silly, in a poncho and all. Strange thing is they seem to be hugely fashionable at the moment amongst pop girls or whoever, whatever they are, high street harpies - those that if they heard The Nephilim would recoil in horror and munch ever harder on their ice lollies. Don't know what the score is in America or on the continent, but it's been amusing me. Hey girls, you wanna look like Wayne Hussey, look no further. Oh, if only they knew).

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