You blinked and you missed it. Granted even less attention upon its release in 1981 than Rikki Sylvan's last album (with Rikki the Last Days of Earth) received in 1978, The Silent Hours stands proud alongside labelmates TV Smith's Explorers among the great lost opportunities of the age. Opening with the tightly coiled hypnosis of Billy, The Silent Hours is everything that the synth pop bands of the age were aspiring toward, but which so few of them were able to attain: that is, a futuristic sheen that never lost sight of the fact that it was intended to entertain as much as inform. The electronics layered across the album are perfectly integrated with the remainder of the band, which astonishes regardless, as the synths coil around Steve Wilkin's electrifying lead guitar while former Last Days bassist Andy Prince ensures that every track is nailed to a solid rhythm. Best cuts? The sibilant Black Needles, the foreboding What's That Sound? as it bleeds imperceptibly into the mad dramatics of Thin White Line, the abrasive Cigarettes, and Nighthawk, an anthem of such perfectly realized dislocation and danger that it could be a comic book. And you still haven't hit the closing Underground and Into the Void! An incredible album, all the more so since the passage of time hasn't dated it in the slightest, The Silent Hours has been unavailable in any form since the Kaleidoscope label folded in late 1981. How criminal is that? ~ Dave Thompson, Rovi

1		Billy
2		Cigarettes
3		Black Needles
4		Soft Core
5		I Am a Video
6		What's That Sound?
7		Thin White Line
8		Night Hawk
9		Underground
10		Into the Void

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