Random Jukebox: The Lotus Eaters — The First Picture Of You

For the First of June then.

In the Greek mythology of my maternal homeland, the Lotus Eaters were, as Book IX of Homer’s epic Odyssey will tell you, inhabitants of a small island whose distinctive practice was to get “blissed out”  in a wilful forgetfulness via consumption of the mysterious fruit of the lotus plant. In other words, indulging in a narcotic escapism in a maritime setting offering little in the way of other prospects. 

Is it any coincidence that the band that nabbed the name hailed from the so-called Socialist Republic of Liverpool? Originally a five-piece combo formed in 1982, by the time of the Lotus Eaters’ debut, the Merseyside of my paternal grandfather’s birth (the port town of Seaforth, triv fans) was a wilfully contrarian yet proud place. 

According to cabinet papers, Liverpool was a deprived, crumbling “stony ground” deemed beyond saving by anyone more than twenty miles due south: a decayed post-industrial empire forever scarred by the Toxteth riots of 1981, and in the throes of civic and political unrest that would see the hard-left city council come into direct confrontation with Margaret Thatcher’s even more hardline Conservative government.

Is it any wonder substance abuse becomes a thing? Where’s that ole druid Julian Cope when you need him?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4HwjjB51zE

It’s against this “concentration of hopelessness” backdrop that the early 1980s spawned a far greater number of interesting bands than the entire 1960s. Cope’s The Teardrop Explodes was one, but then factor in Wah!, OMD, China Crisis, The Icicle Works, Echo & The Bunnymen, Frankie Goes To Hollywood and a pre-disco Dead Or Alive and that’s a coruscating cornucopia of music mavens just itching to be heard.

They weren’t New Romantic, but they were certainly romantic. Released in June 1983, the Lotus Eaters’ first 45 wasn’t characterised by the angry politicking and abrasive post-punk guitars of their peers. The First Picture Of You was a gorgeously crafted slice of gentle guitar pop that gave them chart success before they’d even played a gig. 

Written by Peter Coyle (vocals), Jeremy Kelly (guitar) and Ged Quinn (keyboards) and helmed by Siouxsie and Police producer Nigel Gray, it’s the latter connection that I think is the most pertinent here. The Lotus Eaters’ sensitive cinematic soundscape was contemplative yet relaxed and embodied finesse, class, intimacy, eloquence, and a wistful melancholy as it caressed the ears with choral accompaniment, haunting piano and twinkling guitar arpeggios.

In a way, First Picture sounds a bit like it could have come from the other side of the Pennines — in particular another port city, Newcastle. With Coyle lamenting a lost relationship, the reflective, plaintive chorus slightly sounds like a superior Sting song, while the lush textures, elegiac piano flourishes and yearning sophistication anticipated mid-period Neil Tennant and the Pet Shop Boys in their acoustic ‘indie’ phase 20 years early.

Introspective, in other words. 

Either way, there are few summer songs as beautifully evocative as this. Former Radio 1 DJ Peter Powell cites it as being his all-time favourite song, and it’s said it received more airplay in the Britain of 1983 than any other.

In fact, this sweet smelling gem became such a pop perennial I bet you think it did better than the No. 15 position it achieved that August, kept at bay by a whole host of seasonal singles like Club Tropicana and Long Hot Summer. Despite its bruised, wounded delivery, the poetic sunshine of The First Picture Of You seemed to be the perfect accompaniment to those balmy summer days; a sublime evocation of innocence and yearned-for experience that seemed to offer an escape into the pure joy of post-adolescent promise:

The first picture of you

The first picture of summer

Seeing the flowers scream their joy

They don’t make summers like they used to. 

Steve Pafford