THE REELS – QUASIMODO’S DREAM
How to look back on an album that was released 30 years ago? Well in the case of The Reels and Quasimodo’s Dream it is a case of looking back without sentiment, and if any band would eschew the rose-coloured glasses it would be the quixotic Reels. Can you think of any other band that toured the country on the rail system? In a time of guitars and beer the bright colours and pop synthesisers of The Reels were true rebels. They were the band who totally subverted the paradigm of the time, even if it meant conforming to it in the extreme. What other ‘indie’ bands would have even thought of teaming up with product marketers K-Tel, let alone making it work for them? But what is left now three decades later is the music, and undeniably these songs stand the test of time. The singles in particular would have been hits in any era, the title track, According To My Heart and After the News are as perfect slices of pop today as they were in 1981, while Shout & Deliver can only brings back memories of Video Hits and Countdown. The album’s darker moments perhaps have more meaning with hindsight, and the closing Kitchen Man leaves a haunted feeling.
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