Back in stock: Coldwave/Synth

Review: After over four decades out of print, Henry Badowski's 1981 debut Life Is A Grand finally comes reissued by Caroline True Records. Despite cult status, this is a can't unhear record whose privies are never lost on those who love it. Badowski built a quiet reverence for himself over the years, eluding mainstream rediscovery while gathering admiration from those drawn to its peculiar charm. Though he eventually slipped away from music and began a succession of other jobs - fans often wondered how such a gifted musician could just disappear - Badowski was known to have been a teenage bassist in Chelsea briefly linked to The Damned, later stepping away from punk's sharp edges to craft something far more whimsical and idiosyncratic. Drawing on his affection for Roxy Music, Ian Dury and Jethro Tull, he wrote, arranged and played nearly everything on the album himself, rom the baroque pop of 'Swimming With The Fish In The Sea' to the instrumental strut of 'Rampant'. Rich in synth flourish, sardonic lyricism and melodic invention, and now pulled up by the pinky and thus saved from the gorge of obscurity, Life Is A Grand returns with its sly wit and strange beauty completely intact.