Put The Needle On The Record - Week #12

Put The Needle On The Record Week #12 China Crisis - Flaunt The Imperfection

I think we all have albums we haven't played in years and this feature, hopefully, will encourage you to play the featured album we choose each week.

For this weeks feature we go back to April 1985 and the China Crisis album, "Flaunt The Imperfection", this was the bands 3rd album and definitely, from a recording viewpoint, is when the band hit their peak, it was one of my most played records during 1985 was one of the first records I bought after moving into a new flat, and to be fair, every track could have been released as singles. It is a fabulous album produced by Walter Becker, who apparently was interested in working with the band after hearing the track "Papua" (one of my all time favourite China Crisis songs, how it wasn't a single I will never know. Walter Becker got in contact with the band and that is how he came to produce the Flaunt album, he is also credited as part of the band for this album, playing synthesizers and percussion.

There were 4 singles released from the album, the superb "Black Man Ray", another track in my China Crisis Top 5 songs (which reached number 14 in the UK Singles chart), "King In A Catholic Style" (which reached number 19 on the UK Singles Chart), "You Did Cut Me" (which only reached number 54 in the UK Singles chart), and "The Highest High" (which barely dented the top 100, peaking at number 82).

By the way I learnt to play "Black Man Ray" on the first proper Synthesizer I bought!

The album peaked at number 9 in the UK albums chart.

China Crisis are still active and touring and highly recommend seeing them live, they are superb and Gary Daly's interaction with the audience is worth the cost of the ticket alone!

One of the most underrated bands of the 80s.

Track listing

The Highest High
Strength Of Character
You Did Cut Me
Black Man Ray
Wall Of God
Gift Of Freedom
King In A Catholic Style
Bigger The Punch I'm Feeling
The World Spins (I'm Part Of It)
Blue Sea

So if you have the album in your collection and have n't played it in a while, dig it out and give it a spin!