It was the emotional power that was generated by that sound that we wanted to get in.” I was really impressed with the power of massed voices. “…the music that I was listening to were a huge array of religious choral stuff, both modern and ancient, from Hildegard von Bingen, Tavener, just all sorts of masses and arias and glorias, all sorts of religious music and Russian folk music and Gregorian chants. Although not the actual religious content, but just the actual emotional power of religious music…” I think we were looking for a new direction and found a lot of influence in the emotional power of religious music. It seemed to be an essential part of our kind of method was to try to do something we hadn’t done before. “I think one of the things we always tried to do” commented Andy previously, “particularly in the early part of Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark, was desperately try not to repeat ourselves. Both the compositions inspired by Joan Of Arc, meanwhile, have a particularly desperate, yearning quality to them a need to grasp something intangible that is always slightly out of reach. There is certainly an element of frustration peppered across their third album, with ‘The New Stone Age’ seeing an anxious Andy implore “Oh my God, what have we done this time?” while there’s also elements of existential angst lurking on the likes of ‘Sealand’. Plus, the band had begun to express gloomy thoughts on where exactly the OMD journey was going (exacerbated by tensions with their record label). They couldn’t conceive of writing anything that could top the album at the time. It’s rightly considered a classic synth-pop album, but at the time Andy McCluskey and Paul Humphreys viewed it as the pinnacle of an intense musical path which had taken them from their native Wirral through to global commercial success. Consider that OMD’s album featured a title track that’s a bizarre cacophony of electronic sounds, ‘The New Stone Age’ utilises Eno-style thrash guitars, while ‘Maid Of Orleans’ employs a distorted, quirky intro and a military drum sound.Ģ021 sees Architecture & Morality celebrate its 40th Anniversary and also offers an opportunity to view the album with some perspective. It’s difficult perhaps to assess how odd Architecture & Morality was as an album back in 1981, the same year that saw the release of Soft Cell’s Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret (see TEC feature previously), The Human League’s Dare, Depeche Mode’s Speak & Spell and Kraftwerk’s Computer World. Instead, OMD embraced choirs, mellotrons and tonal soundscapes wrapped up with an ethereal quality, yet still managed to deliver evocative pop songs that brought them more chart success. ![]() Released in November 1981, the album saw a leap from the electro-punk of 1980’s OMITD album and the gothic Organisation the same year. That said, most people will acknowledge that OMD’s third studio album, Architecture & Morality marked a particularly notable milestone in their synth-pop journey. Some plump for the band’s imperial phase (encompassing the first four albums), others favour OMD’s ‘American’ period, while other voices might opt for the band’s post-reformation output. ![]() With an extensive musical career that stretches back over several decades, it’s understandable that many people will have their own particular favourite OMD album.
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