Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
In the stark aftermath of the UK's most devastating storm since 1703, Siouxsie and the Banshees convened in a 17th-century mansion in the deracinated English countryside to write their ninth studio album, Peepshow. On November 5th, the band broke from preproduction for Bonfire Night festivities. As fireworks exploded into the sky, the bonfire procession marched a fifteen-foot Guy Fawkes effigy toward the colossal fire. Sioux later recalled, 'It was as if we were doing the whole thing on the set of The Wicker Man.'
Critically confined to rock's too hard basket, Siouxsie and the Banshees were always an awkward musical fit, shoehorned into punk history as 'also rans' then lazily mislabeled post-punk 'goths.' In a last-ditch attempt to resurrect their flailing career, the self-proclaimed 'non-musicians' recruited a classically trained cellist to embellish their modern, experimental soundscapes. Subsequently, in creating a record akin to a Hollywood film score, the Banshees 'broke America, ' were adopted into the US alt-rock canon and scored a Billboard number-one hit.
Starring Roger Corman, Bernard Herrmann, Walt Disney, and Louise Brooks, also featuring Hammer Horror and Hitchcock, Peepshow is the soundtrack to all the films Siouxsie and the Banshees ever saw. Or it might have been the soundtrack to the greatest film they never made.
Synopsis
In 1978, Siouxsie and the Banshees declared 'We don't see ourselves in the same context as other rock n' roll bands'. A decade later, and in the stark aftermath of a devastating storm, the band retreated to a 17th-century mansion house in the deracinated Sussex countryside to write their ninth studio album, Peepshow. Here, the band absorbed the bygone, rural atmosphere and its inspirational mise en sc ne, thus framing the record cinematically, as Siouxsie Sioux recalled, 'It was as if we were doing the whole thing on the set of The Wicker Man.'
Samantha Bennett looks at how Siouxsie and the Banshees' Peepshow is better understood in the context of film and film music (as opposed to popular music studies or, indeed, the works of other rock n' roll bands). Drawing upon more than one hundred films and film scores, this book focuses on Peepshow's deeply embedded historical and aesthetic (para)cinematic influences: How is each track a reflection of genre film? Who are the various featured protagonists? And how does Peepshow's diverse orchestration, complex musical forms, atypical narratives and evocative soundscapes reveal an inherently cinematic record? Ultimately, Peepshow can be read as a soundtrack to all the films Siouxsie and the Banshees ever saw. Or perhaps it was the soundtrack to the greatest film they never made.