Private View

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Opener What’s Your Name introduces a future-facing electronic soundscape, backed by marching drums as the song title repeats over the chorus, before segueing into lead single Some Times These, with a fusion of guitar and synthesiser that could have been lifted directly from the early 1980s. With plans to take it across the UK, we caught up with Neil to discuss how touring life has changed over the past four decades.

She was thinking she’d just knock on the stage door, and somebody would say ‘I’ll take all the gear in! How excellent new Blancmange albums have since appeared at a relentless rate, with producer Ben “Benge” Edwards the new collaborator-in-chief. Reduced Voltage juxtaposes pulsing synths with a dark, brooding vocal from Neil – a trope that appears across the set – while I Tried To Be You has an eerie electronic soundscape, enhancing the obsessive narrative of its lyrics. There’s noisy drilling going on outside the Southbank Centre, so we move inside… but it doesn’t disrupt the flow. The references in that song are about painting a picture, and one of those references is Donald Campbell.

This neat full circle of Blancmange re-signing to the same label that ignited things all those years ago is also reflected in the album itself, being the perfect crystallisation of four decades of creativity.

Some Times These’ also retains a fuzzy kerrang element although the chorus keyboard theme has an immersive Eno-esque air that echoes his work on “Heroes”. Are these his childhood memories of the death of Donald Campbell, killed in a 1967 attempt to break the Water Speed Record? while John Grant continues to profess his love for Arthur’s music, old and new, and has invited Blancmange to perform as part of Grace Jones’ Meltdown festival.Four decades on from Blancmange’s first release, ‘Private View’ is a cohesive body of work and, with a creative streak that shows no sign of slowing down, one that has us itching to see where Neil takes his sound next. Long-standing admirers include Moby, John Grant and Honey Dijon, who states that “British synth pop was hugely influential in the burgeoning house music scene and Blancmange was a big part of that. Their latest - 'Private View' - is an accumulation of 40 years of musical knowledge to create perhaps their most free flowing to date. It’s a sweaty, sticky afternoon on London’s South Bank, and we’re sitting outside a cafe round the back of the Royal Festival Hall. When not immersed in music, Aaron enjoys spending time with the loves of his life -- his wife Andrea, and daughters Emily and Linda (all of whom have an intense love of music too).

Helen and I have had our ups and downs, but we’ve been together for over forty years now,” beams Neil.And the explanation offers a further fascinating insight into the “Everything Is Connected” school of Neil Arthur lyric-writing.

It was great to play there, but I was looking around thinking ‘For some reason, I’m not enjoying this. Since reforming just over a decade ago, Neil Arthur has used Blancmange to experiment with sounds and express new found soundscapes across a further ten records. Conceived in the wake of the pandemic, the album looks beyond the trials of the past two years and strives to find answers and, moreover, solutions to the situation we’ve arrived at, with Neil insisting the desire to keep moving forward underpins the set. True, but what’s great about Blancmange is that the songs never feel like they’re self-consciously about Big Things. Private View’ comes to a close with Take Me, a double meaning that asks, “How much does someone have to ‘take’ before a relationship breaks down?But, as you listen intently, you realise Neil Arthur weaves subtle conversational threads through them all.