Furniture — The Wrong People (2010 Cherry Red reissue) review

FURNITURE
The Wrong People
CHERRY RED

Belated remastering for the west London five's 1986 debut with bonus rarities.

A maverick bunch (post-split, two formed world-dance collective Transglobal Underground, two became music journalists) who made nuanced, designed pop in the Prefab Sprout mould, Furniture deserved more. Brilliant Mind, their nimblest, hooky highlight, was a hit but Stiff's financial meltdown halted the band's progress. The '80s production hasn't aged well — imagine this lexicon of lovelorn, love-torn songs with the warmth of, say, The Triffids — but Jim Irvin's junior Scott Walker passion is spot on, and the songs are still paramount. A torchy I Miss You, the edgy romance of Escape Into My Arms, the deceptively groovy Love Your Shoes, whose stinging chorus "We're going to have a great time/The time of our worthless lives," nails the decade's conflicts for many.

Martin Aston