One record at a time: 22. Björk - Debut

Whilst I bought the original CD of this album back in 1993, I didn't own it on vinyl until 2015. I know this because I posted about acquiring some of Björk's back catalogue on coloured vinyl here. Although I've owned the record for 6 years, I have only played it once to my recollection. I haven't played it much for two reasons. 

Firstly "Debut" isn't my favourite Björk album. Although it starts strongly, it meanders off into weirdness that I can't abide. Everything is going well until we hit "Like Someone In Love" which is a fairly limp interpretation of a dull Jazz standard. Not only is this track inferior, it is also incongruous and ruins the mood that had been building. Things pick up again with a few good tracks before the disjointed mess that is "Aeroplane" sours the atmosphere and "The Anchor Song" vomits everywhere just so we are clear the party is well and truly over. You can tell I hate saxophones.

The second reason I haven't listened this record much is that I had previously played the coloured vinyl of "Post" and "Homogenic" and they had all the sonic fidelity of a hairdryer full of iron filings. Who could have predicted coloured vinyl pressed by GZ media would sound horrible? *sarcasm mode disengaged* But truth be told, this particular record doesn't sound nearly as bad as the others I own and it behaved quite well on this listen through.

Having not heard this album in a long time, I am struck by how 'nineties' it sounds with the guitar samples on "Human Behaviour" and the liberal use of organ being especially dated. My alternate version of this album would jettison "Aeroplane", "The Anchor Song" and "Like Someone In Love" and add in "Play Dead". I would also swap out "Big Time Sensuality" for the Fluke remix that made it a chart hit and substitute "There's More To Life Than This" for its non-toilet version included on the "Venus as a boy" single. It still wouldn't be perfect, but it would be a lot less disappointing than this.

Another disappointment of this re-pressing is the sleeve. I understand that record companies may not have the original artwork for a record lying around twenty years after it was released, but at least make some effort to reproduce it to a reasonable quality. The sleeves on these coloured vinyl versions look like bad scans in places and just aren't very sharp. If you consider the poor sleeve combined with the poor vinyl, it mystifies me why people are asking such high prices for these albums on Discogs and eBay. Acquiring them may have posed me some initial problems but they aren't that rare and they really aren't as desirable as you might think. 2/5