China Crisis

China Crisis is a two-man British band which, it seems, has been around forever, but always flying under the radar screen in this country. I have the CCC CD listed first below, and it is a regular listen on the little white box. The review entries quoted below are from the Amazon pages for the specific titles. The CCC disc includes "Christian", from 1994's Difficult Shapes & Passive Rhythms, a tune with haunting lyrics:

This is emotion
emotionless war
a torn shirt and a long dead cause
I can't sleep
this kind of thing gets me down
don't say walk
I may lose my fear

I could lose myself
in this honesty

I read all sorts of things
there's so much to learn
I've seen the hand that rushes in
as it rush over you

I could lose myself
in this honesty

The band issued Acoustically Yours in 2001, with live acoustic versions of several of its tunes.

China Crisis Collection: The Very Best of China Crisis

Early 80s MTV viewers probably remember China Crisis best for the "Working With Fire and Steel" video and others will remember them from alternative radio. China Crisis never really caught on stateside and it's hard to understand why. China Crisis have a great ear for hooks and catchy melodies; not too far off from Crowded House, later Roxy Music and their oft-mentioned mentors Steely Dan. Walter Becker (ex-Steely Dan) produced a number of tracks from this collection along with Mike Thorne. I dare you not to enjoy any of these tracks...there's nary a dud in the lot of them. I was deep into China Crisis in the 80s and they're one of the groups who I bothered to replace vinyl with CDs when that time came. I regularly listen to them still, which is a testament to how good they are 10 to 15 years on.

Another:

They never made much of an impact in the US, but China Crisis put out several wonderful records throughout the 80's. This collection documents their development from synth-pop to the kind of layered, mature music that isn't heard much anymore. Smooth, intelligent, and very appealing.

Flaunt the Imperfection

I hate to even call this simply a pop album from mid 80's from an obscure group;It's anything but. It's a mixture of rich experimental global rhythms that not only bring to mind Steely Dan (like other reviewers noted) but also contains faint doses of General Public and Tears For Fears; you hear the music,try to pinpoint where you've heard something like this before, but just can't. This is the kind of admirable musical artistry that a lot of new groups lack today and that I miss. China Crisis is not calculated or contrived in any of their tracks;They seem to go with their gut instinct which works every time. . . Their later projects contained a more soft pop, jazz-like ambient sound (1989's Diary of A Hollow Horse). . .

Article Author: M. Sean Fosmire

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