Stab A Sorry Heart

Echo and The Bunnymen on Top Of The Pops, July 1984. A masterclass in making an effort and blowing early evening teenage minds, the Bunnymen at their most pop and most stoned. 

The Bunnymen travelled all the down from Liverpool to the Top of The Pops studios to mime to the third single from Ocean Rain, their poppiest moment, the epic, swooping grandeur of Seven Seas. On the left, Pete de Freitas is dressed a penguin, white face paint and puffed out chest, a minimal kit (two cymbals and a snare). He looks deadly serious as only a man dressed as a penguin should. 

On the right, Will Sergeant (I presume, it could be anyone) miming guitar and dressed as a fish. Unlike Pete there is less effort made at the miming. Will/ the fishman strums an F chord for the entire performance. 

In the centre, Ian McCulloch. Ian is of planet Earth but not on planet , a man spiralling far away, distant and alone, porcelain skin and bird's nest hair, swimming on dry land, dancing in front of a mirror of his imagination, Narcissus in high waisted pleated trousers. Stoned immaculate. It's a miracle he can remember the words.

As the band give it their very best shot, a giant fish dangling above them and down the front Bill Drummond stands by, mouthing the words to Seven Seas and operating the stage prop waves as the band hit the third chorus. Where is Les? Missing, lost at sea...

Magnificent, the stuff that dreams are made of. Seven Seas is peak McCulloch, a song of romance and travel, cavemen and mother religious. The tortoiseshell is apparently a reference to cocaine and sex (or sex on cocaine) but let's not dwell on that right now, it might spoil the mood. 

Seven Seas

The Peel Session version of Seven Seas is a diverting take on the song, recorded in June 1983, the band still working the song out with Will's guitar front and centre and a drunken glockenspiel part that didn't make the final version.