Now why did Morphine's frontman have to go and die?

I loved Volume, and especially Trans Europe Express, the electronic-only sister magazine. The Volumes mostly just sit on the shelf these days tbh but I dig out some of the TEXes from time to time and they still mostly sound fresh - well, to my old ears, anyway. They got me into a lot of stuff. Didn't know the founder died in 2007, RIP.

And RIP Mark Sandman and Morphine too. I know "Cure For Pain" is the agreed classic but "Yes" was my first and I still love it the most.

I see on discogs there was a 2xLP reissue last year on Run Out Groove with bonus tracks; don't buy much vinyl these days but might have to make an exception for that. Anyone heard it? How does it sound and is the bonus stuff worth it?

to atone for my fairly stupid post upthread, this is a good read for fans

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2019/07/how-the-internet-kept-my-favorite-musician-alive-20-years-later/

Wish Sandman had gone on to write a whole album like "Rope on Fire". Lots of unrealized rhythmic, melodic, thematic possibilities. He usually wrote cinematic noirs and thrillers, but it's a classic heist. Us against the world, with a paranoid doublecross or two.

First heard them on the Indiegestion sampler CD that came with my first ever issue of Alt Press, (#65 with MLWTTKK/Mazzy Star on the cover, ah, those days).

https://imgur.com/KI305FA

Got into a few bands from that but Morphine always felt like "my" band. Amid all those earnest, soul searching (and bong hoovering) nights of college radio, Tower Records, and venue crawling, they were so much of the soundtrack. I'm sure I used their music, their vibe, Sandman's presence, to cultivate an identity (to an embarrassing degree) but, as is usually the case with art we connect with, it felt like something that had already been inside me waiting to be lured out and articulated by, you know, skilled professionals. Like that Saliere line in Amadeus about Mozart's music sounding so pure and inevitable. That was Morphine for me (and no doubt for most of this thread).

No real anecdotes about them. I couldn't listen to their music for several years after Sandman died, and I'm not totally sure why. I remember eating french fries with pepper on the day he died, and then there was no Morphine for a long, long time. Weird. Been on a kick of theirs these last few weeks. Having to re-buy all their CDs because mine, either from the type of material used in their manufacture, or, more likely, because they spent most of their lifetimes slid behind the sun visor in my '92 Tercel for easy access, had the booklets melted and fused to the surface of the CDs.

I did see them once. Thank god. My favorite club in the universe, r.i.p. The Masquerade in Atlanta, a converted mill that smelled like clove cigarettes and had three levels -- Heaven, Purgatory, and Hell, the topmost of which had a floor that felt to be made of particle board and was ready to shake right from the walls and tumble into the underworld. I remember seeing a camera on a long mechanical arm swinging over the crowd, but this being 1996, it took like two decades for me to finally see the result. Ta-da.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXOhnkRa3N0

The audio of the whole set is on YT if you search "Morphine Atlanta." Again, no stories of that night, because ... there wasn't much to it. Of course it felt transcendent to see the band whose music was encoded into my DNA. But it wasn't eventful apart from that. A very usual 90s sort of experience: me and a friend sat in my car passing a forty and a bowl in a Burger King parking lot, drove down the street to the club, saw Morphine, went home on a cloud.

Oh and yes, they did play in Heaven.

apparently I forgot how to use imgur, anyway here's the scan of that sampler CD via it discogs page

https://i.imgur.com/jbwUn7t.jpg

I fear I may have lost mine in a move; used to have a few. Sigh.

via its* and I'm done for this night

I'm sure I used their music, their vibe, Sandman's presence, to cultivate an identity (to an embarrassing degree) but, as is usually the case with art we connect with, it felt like something that had already been inside me waiting to be lured out and articulated by, you know, skilled professionals.

I love this band and at the time they encapsulated some 90's romanticization/commercialization of the 50's bohemian lifestyle and impetus.

Cool sampler!

Lilys, Morphine & The Nightblooms all definitely my favorites on there

First heard them on the Indiegestion sampler CD that came with my first ever issue of Alt Press, (#65 with MLWTTKK/Mazzy Star on the cover, ah, those days).

They were recommended to me by my 6th grade English teacher!