Love Club - Lime Twigs And Treachery

What we have here is a female fronted Goth band from San Francisco, very much akin to the likes of Sunshine Blind, another US-based band who followed shortly after. Lime Twigs and Treachery is Love Clubs only album released in 1990 when they signed to Popular Metaphysics who were branded by MCA records. In terms of band type MCA's primary emphasis in 1990 was on metal and commercial hard rock. The label did however try to aim at the alternative rock market that year when it signed Love Club, who’s Lime Twigs and Treachery should have been much better known. Chances are that the band caught the label’s attention but didn’t perform as expected yet the person who does the most to make this left-of-centre release so exciting is Deborah Borchers; the lead singer is as intoxicating as she is frenzied on such abstract, intensely eerie fare as "Holding Heaven's Hand," "Killing Ground," and "Distant." As much as Love Club thrives on dissonance, the band also has a fine melodic sense. Hard hitting tracks like “One Last Kiss” and “Holding Heaven’s Hand” should feel right at home for any late 80s darkwave collection, and are worth the price of admission alone. I must warn you though: the second half of this album may be a little too Tori Amos-esque for some readers, but Love Club tends to be more aggressive, as well as more accessible. Had this neglected album been released three or four years later; when alternative rock was king and major labels were aggressively promoting this type of music; it might have enjoyed a lot more commercial success.