Join Hands

Join Hands was written over a period of six months. The album's references to poppies represented the idea of "loss, of flesh and blood and hopelessness". The themes of the songs also included "child-like terror, attacks on social and spiritual conditioning] various kinds of death and torture, and loneliness". Some songs were also about families and nursing. For the critic Ronnie Gurr, "All lyrical options are left completely open". ==Music and Content==

The album opens with the sound of tolling bells before the beginning of "Poppy Day". On the inner sleeve of the album, the mention "2 minutes of silence" was added next to the lyrics of the song. "Regal Zone", featuring saxophone by McKay, It is, in Siouxsie's words, "an expression of claustrophobia, of being hemmed in both by society's and people's limitations". For the writer Mark Paytress, the line "We're all sisters and brothers" looked like a mockery of the Summer of Love. The song's conclusion features what sounds like "a formal choir backing for a retreating Red Army in its magnificent defeat". Siouxsie explained: "It's about the cruelty of children and that whole aspect of being thrown out into the playground in the winter in howling gales and left to fend for yourself. It's not the sort of thing you're supposed to write pop songs about". It was the band's third single in less than a year and "probably the best", according to the music historian Clinton Heylin. The single did not sound catchy, but it nevertheless entered the top 30. Severin later recalled the head of A&R at Polydor telling him he expected a commercial failure. The lullaby "Mother / Oh Mein Papa" is an interpretation of the German song "O mein Papa" with words by Siouxsie. Phil Sutcliffe called it "a raw wound of a song offered by Siouxsie from her own life and surely shared and picked and scratched at by everyone who hears it". The positive lyric is upfront and the negative one is in the background. more experimental, less abrasive, The album reflected how the band felt at the time: "We were lonely and isolated and that comes across in the music", stated Siouxsie in 2003. She added: "Musically, Join Hands was an uncompromising album but it still sounds modern today". ==Cover artwork==

Initially, the group wanted to release an album cover using an edited image from a Holy Communion card, showing children joining hands. The image had been photocopied several times, so it had become distorted. The art direction was by John Maybury, a college friend of Morris. Their manager, Stevenson, was unable to determine who owned the copyright and advised that the band would be bankrupted if they were sued as a result. Polydor also became nervous about copyright infringement, so the artwork was pulled at the last minute; Four of the soldier statues were cut out from the shot of the band. Siouxsie found the sleeve a workable solution, as she was drawn in by the imagery conjured up by the words for "In Flanders Fields", which inspired "Poppy Day". For her, it was the linchpin for the album. Maybury's drawings of the band were used on the inner spread; it was the only part of the original design that survived. ==Release and tour==

Join Hands was issued on 7 September 1979 by Polydor Records. It reached No. 13 in the UK Albums Chart. At that time, the breach between McKay and Morris and the rest of the group had become important. A warm-up show in Ireland had caused problems for McKay; none of the ancillary equipment arrived at the venue, forcing him to play without all his effects pedals. Finally, after a brawl at a record shop, McKay and Morris abruptly left the band on the day of the album's release, just a few hours before a concert at the Capitol Theatre in Aberdeen. It was a spur-of-the-moment decision, but they never returned. Severin later remarked, "Is there another band that that's happened to? I don't think so". A 2006 remastered edition included two bonus tracks: the non-album song "Love in a Void" and the previously unreleased instrumental "Infantry". The album, this time with the Maybury-designed sleeve, was reissued on vinyl for Record Store Day in April 2015. This edition had the original collection of tracks, but "Infantry" was made the album's closing track, as had been the original intent. A 180g vinyl reissue of the album, remastered from the original ¼” tapes and cut half-speed at Abbey Road Studios by Miles Showell, was released in August 2018. == Critical reception ==

Upon release, the album was well received by reviewers. Sounds gave Join Hands a grade of 4.5 out of 5, with the reviewer, Peter Silverton, noting a change in the sound: "The mix is different to the last album. Now there's a clarity which frames Sue's voice like it was a thing of treasure". Similarly, Paul Morley wrote in NME that "Side one's five songs... are all addictive Banshees mini-dramas". Ronnie Gurr, a Record Mirror reviewer, also hailed the record, saying: "Poppy Day establishes the band's perfect employ of atmospherics and sets the tone of all the tracks". "Mother" was compared to the soundtrack of an Alfred Hitchcock film, with Gurr noting that the "track features a musical box, echoes menacing guitar grumblings and Siouxsie providing vocals that would befit any of Hitchcock's best matricides". Gurr concluded that with "Severin's truly disturbing scratchings", Join Hands was a dangerous work that "should be heard". The Huddersfield Daily Examiner called Join Hands "a superb album of strength and poetry," and praised "that weird and wonderfully controlled voice of Siouxsie". In a retrospective review published in 1989, Steve Lamacq wrote in NME that Join Hands was "a more absorbing, haunting LP" than the band's debut album. Lamacq rated it 8 out of 10, though he said that the version of "The Lord's Prayer" was "out of place". The 2004 edition of The Rolling Stone Album Guide gave a 2.5 out 5 rating and commented that the "brooding trance music" of their previous material "can slip into dankness" on Join Hands. AllMusic's David Cleary considered "Icon" the best track on the album, commenting that it "survives an unpromising beginning to open out into a faster main section with fuller vocal sound and gutsier guitar work", but Cleary panned the rest of Join Hands, describing it as "almost uniformly grim, with dragging tempos, bleak lyrics, long and wandering free-form structures, static and often unfocused harmony and thick, colorless arrangements". == Legacy ==

Join Hands is considered a post-punk album by Heylin and listed as such on AllMusic. Its "funereal" atmosphere "inspired a host of gothic impersonators", according to Mojo, but "none of whom matched the Banshees' run of singles". AllMusic's David Cleary commented that "some of [Join Hands'] selections appear to strongly anticipate the work of Joy Division's second album, Closer, especially 'Placebo Effect', whose guitar sound was a clear inspiration for that of the Manchester band's song 'Colony'." Join Hands was later namechecked by other critically acclaimed musicians. James Murphy, the leader of LCD Soundsystem, expressed an appreciation of the album stating the first records he bought were Join Hands, the Fall's Grotesque and the Birthday Party's "Nick the Stripper". "All three of those records are three of my favourite things I've ever heard", he said. In late 2008, Morrissey chose the track "Mother" in his playlist when he was interviewed for BBC Radio 2, and another former member of the Smiths, Johnny Marr, said he was a big admirer of second albums from several bands, including Siouxsie and the Banshees. Tim Burgess of the Charlatans stated: "'Playground Twist' is a manic masterpiece – incredible, the kind of atmosphere rarely generated on a record". Colin Newman of Wire was "mightily impressed" when he saw the band perform "The Lord's Prayer" at the 100 Club. Music journalist David Quantick said: "One of my favourite albums is Siouxsie & The Banshees’ Join Hands, the last album they made before half the band walked out and Sioux and Severin were forced to reinvent themselves as a pop group. I like to imagine how things would have gone if McKay and Morris had stayed". == Track listing ==

; Siouxsie and the Banshees • Siouxsie Sioux – vocals, piano • John McKay – guitar, saxophone • Steven Severin – bass guitar, backing vocals on 'Premature Burial' • Kenny Morris – drums, percussion ; Technical • Mike Stavrou – production, engineering • Nils Stevenson – production • Ian Morais – engineering assistance • Rob O'Connor – sleeve design • Adrian Boot – sleeve photography • John Maybury – sleeve illustration ==Charts==