A Walk Across The Rooftops

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In 1989 Record Mirror placed A Walk Across the Rooftops at number 74 in its critics' list of the best albums of the 1980s. [33] The Guardian included A Walk Across the Rooftops in their 2007 feature 1000 Albums to Hear Before You Die, saying, "This stunning debut album was an 80s high-water mark ... The arrangements meld electro and contemporary classical influences into a rich and satisfyingly yearning whole." [34] The album was also included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. [35] As it turned out, when the time was right they wouldn’t need to look for a deal. RSO had donated cash to record more songs with Calum Malcolm, whose friendship with Ivor Tiefenbrun, founder of audio equipment company Linn Products, meant some of their gear had been installed at Castlesound. In September 2010, a biography of the Blue Nile by the Scottish journalist Allan Brown, titled Nileism: The Strange Course of the Blue Nile, was published. Although Brown was a long-time acquaintance of Buchanan, he found Buchanan reluctant to participate, and both Bell and Moore refused Brown's invitations for interviews or any co-operation with the book's writing. [28] Roberts, Chris (21 November 2012). "Review: The Blue Nile – A Walk Across the Rooftops Collector's Edition". BBC Music . Retrieved 12 April 2013.

From Easter Parade’s sepia-toned introspection, complete with tolling church bells buried in the mix as deep as a recovered childhood memory, to his joyous declarations of love during the album’s second single, Tinseltown In The Rain, against a surging string section and shuffling rhythm guitar, Buchanan imparts a sense of hope to many of the settings that evoke dislocation and distance, that sense of being alone in the crowded city. I turned to music because it was a way that you could get in touch with yourself,” Buchanan told Popmatters. “You could put two notes together and if it felt right to you, if it made you happy or sad, that was what mattered.” Read more: Album By Album – Sade Read more: Making The KLF’s The White Room For all the crafted grandeur of their second album it should be said that by the end of Hats salvation appears in the form of an “ordinary girl” rather like the bird-like creature in Joyce’s Portrait of The Artist as a Young Man. Someone who can “make the world alright” no superwoman or exotic creature needing to be pursued or attained, by gum. s A Walk Across the Rooftops remains unique in its fusion of chilly technology and a pitch of confessional, romantic soul that ‘alternative’ types would usually shy away from for fear it wasn’t ‘cool’. It was always (at least) two things at once: in the years since, its peerless power to affect has accrued multiple layers of rueful resonance. To listen closely to the Blue Nile is to become a part of the scenery. In this way, Buchanan’s metaphor about the time between albums comes alive. The long gestation of each record suggests, as in the early stages of a relationship, a sharpening of the senses, getting lost in a world that’s getting smaller around you. You want to do it right this time. The Blue Nile’s music also sounds like falling in love, slow and starry-eyed, with melodies that fizzle and glow like streetlights. By the time they released their sophomore album, Hats, in the autumn of 1989, Buchanan was 33 years old, and his songs, once littered with bold declarations of love, now seemed to be composed entirely of ellipses and question marks.

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It’s like a miracle that we don’t really ever discuss. Why in the name of God can it reduce you to tears when one note goes ‘Ah’ and another note goes ‘Oh’ at the same time? Listening to melodies and going on these mini-journeys is so crucial, and it saddens me sometimes that music has just turned into a loss-leader in a supermarket. A Walk Across the Rooftops’ first single, and one of Buchanan’s more enigmatic lyrics, Stay is filled with inscrutable images from its opening line, “I’m taking off this party hat”, onwards: “Red guitar is broken,” “Candy girls want candy boxes,” “Summer girls in disarray/ Can be so free and easy now.” “ Stay, I think, is a more straightforwardly romantic song,” Buchanan informed Johnnie Walker. “I think maybe at the same point the protagonist is reflecting on something simple that he’s lost within himself, and that’s the grounds for his appeal.” It was just the way the varying heights of the buildings were that made it possible for me just to see across the roofs.” Attended by haunting brass, stabs of bass and sparse strings, Buchanan also takes little time to establish the album’s redemptive, emotional tone, announcing after 60 seconds, “I am in love/ I am in love with you…” Melodies, mini-journeys, miracles and silence… These are the stuff of 1984’s A Walk Across The Rooftops, the debut album by The Blue Nile, whom Buchanan fronted over the course of four LPs. A work of delicate grace and understated yet transparent emotions, it’s hardly one of the 80s’ most attention-seeking records, yet – alongside its follow-up, 1989’s Hats – it remains one of that decade’s most cherished, casting a twilit shadow even now.

Instead of rushing to make a follow-up, the Blue Nile studied where their music had taken them, as they traveled through America and Europe. “[O]ne of the best things we saw in our first trip to London,” Buchanan told NME after the album’s release, “Was a guy and a girl standing in Oxford Street… They were obviously having a moment—breaking up or something, something that was wrong—and you just looked at it and knew the feeling. It was a brilliant reminder of what’s worth all the hassle.” A Walk Across the Rooftops became the first album released on the new Linn Records label, released on 30 April 1984 [13] [14] and reaching number 80 on the UK Albums Chart. [15] [16] Two singles were released from the album in the UK, with minor success: "Stay" reached number 97 on the UK Singles Chart, [17] and "Tinseltown in the Rain" reached number 87. [17] The video for "Tinseltown in the Rain" featured on the VHS video version of the compilation album Now That's What I Call Music 3, but the song was not included on the vinyl LP or cassette versions of the album.

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In July 2016, Buchanan took part in the David Bowie Prom at the Royal Albert Hall, performing " Ashes to Ashes", " I Can't Give Everything Away" and, as a duet with Laura Mvula, " Girl Loves Me". [ citation needed] In 2006, Buchanan had a top 10 hit in the UK when he featured on Texas' song, " Sleep", which reached No. 6. A remixed version of "Tinseltown in the Rain" was used as the theme music for the BBC Scotland drama series Tinsel Town. It became apparent during the recording of High that old tensions among the band members had resurfaced. Buchanan's comments in a 2012 interview seemed to indicate that the album was finished out of a sense of duty and loyalty rather than any willingness to do so. "When we eventually finished High, I don't think it was bristling with the same joy and naivety we'd felt when we started. We'd gathered ourselves long enough to make it. It seemed to me a stoic record, to some extent a record about ourselves, though I didn't realise that 'til later. It was a collected and fairly stoic record which I was proud of and, in a sense, we just made ourselves focus. We showed up, we went into the room and worked, and whatever drift had set in we were loyal to each other and we knew we had to form the wagons into a circle." [16] Dominated by the melodies, mini-journeys, miracles and silence Buchanan would later identify as the very source of music’s alchemy, it’s more than just A Walk Across The Rooftops. It is, in fact, as Buchanan himself suggested it should be, “like being able to walk on air…” Read more: Deacon Blue interview Read more: Making Talk Talk’s The Colour Of Spring The Blue Nile: A Walk Across The Rooftops – The Songs

Dolan, Karen J. (October 1985). "The Blue Nile: A Walk Across the Rooftops". Spin. Vol.1, no.6. p.31 . Retrieved 7 January 2022. Brown, Allan (2011). Nileism: The Strange Course of the Blue Nile. Polygon Books. ISBN 978-1-84697-185-3. In June 1996, seven years after Hats, the Blue Nile released a third album, entitled Peace at Last. It displayed a marked difference in style to the first two albums, with Buchanan's acoustic guitar work more to the fore. Buchanan recalled that he had bought the guitar in a New York music shop, and by coincidence Robert Bell had seen the guitar earlier the same day and called Buchanan to tell him about it. [16] A gospel choir made a brief appearance on the first single, " Happiness". Despite the release of Peace at Last on a major label, critical reaction to the album was more mixed than for the band's previous records, [4] although sales were good, entering the UK album chart at #13. The myth goes like this, The Blue Nile was approached by Linn Products, a local hi fi manufacturer, to produce a song to showcase the company’s sound systems. The song the band created pleased Linn founder Ivor Tiefenbrun so much he decided to specifically create a record label for their release A Walk Across the Rooftops. The real truth was Tiefenbrun was a friend of Calum Malcolm and when he played a demo of Tinseltown is in the Rain to Ivor he was extremely impressed; so much so that he offered the band a contract with the prospective record label. Linn Records was already in the process of being set up when the encounter in the studio took place and signing was not a slam dunk for the band. It would take the band 9 months to accept the offer, but it proved to be the best fit for the band. Linn upon signing the band left them alone allowing them tremendous artistic freedom in the studio. Tiefenbrun when asked about why the label did not inject themselves into the process with an untried band replied, “ (The band) was so fervent about what they were doing that nothing would dissuade them from it and nothing would persuade them to do anything other than what they were doing.” In the run up to entering the recording studio Buchanan and Bell would write songs on an acoustic guitar or piano and later P.J. Moore and Calum Malcolm would have at the songs in the studio. The band would recruit drummer Nigel Thomas to assist with percussion. The album would take 5 months to record at Castlesound Studios in Pencaitland, Scotland. Holmes, Tim (26 September 1985). "The Blue Nile: A Walk Across The Rooftops". Rolling Stone. No.457. pp.101–102. Archived from the original on 24 August 2007 . Retrieved 11 September 2011.McGalliard, James (15 December 2004). "An Ordinary Miracle". Inpress. Melbourne, Australia: Street Press Australia. With his own studio, Castlesound, and his own band, The Headboys – who’d had a hit for the label in 1979 with The Shape Of Things To Come – he’d first cut his teeth recording traditional Scottish music before working with early Postcard Records acts, including Josef K and Orange Juice, not to mention The Krankies on It’s Fan-Dabi-Dozi! Everyone knew instinctively what the shape and atmosphere of the album should be, but without really knowing how to do it. So we worked hard at that, what colour sounds should be, and we knew when it was right. I don’t think they were slow at all; plenty of artists take far longer to make records.”

A Walk Across the Rooftops is the debut album by Scottish band The Blue Nile, released on 30 April 1984 on Linn Records in the UK and on A&M Records in the US. Although the album was released to little fanfare and was not a big hit on its initial release, it slowly accumulated fans and sales through word of mouth as the years passed, and by the time the follow-up Hats was released in 1989, A Walk Across the Rooftops had sold 80,000 copies. [4] It continued to gather praise when reissued in 2012. Carroll, Jim (26 August 2004). "And quiet flows the Nile". The Irish Times. Dublin, Ireland: The Irish Times Trust . Retrieved 4 April 2013.

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Roberts, David, ed. (2006). Guinness Book of British Hit Singles & Albums (19thed.). Guinness World Records Limited. p.66. ISBN 978-1-904994-10-7. a b c McNair, James (22 November 2006). "The Blue Nile: A band that likes to take its time". The Independent. London, England: Independent News & Media . Retrieved 13 March 2013.