The cover of Anthem by Desolation Angels

Isn’t internet brilliant for eating up your time?

The ‘what’s new’ section of Spotify keeps displaying an album called Anthem by somebody called Desolation Angels, with a strangely familiar cover. It reminded me of something.

The name ‘Desolation Angels’ and fantasy artwork made me think that maybe it was some variety of metal, so I had a listen and track one was a cover of the Four Tops’ Walk Away Renee, so not metal then, but try telling Spotify that!

Spotify has a bit of a problem with two artists or bands having the same name, and can’t really cope with it. The biography for Desolation Angles is all about a NWOBHM band and is a minor masterpiece itself, making much of the fact that they took their name from the Bad Company album and not the Jack Kerouac novel and that they got through over a doxen drummers before their first album.

Neither version of Desolation Angels was even famous enough to get their own page on Wikipedia, but I did find out that the lot who did Anthem actually released that album in 1996.

Another thing that Spotify is not terribly good at is deciding what date to put against an album. Should it be the original release date, the re-release date, the re-mastered reissue date, or the date it was added to Spotify? In this case the 1996 album is dated 2012.

This particular band is described in passing on Wikipedia as an ‘über-group’ featuring the Roches, Kit Hain (who was half of Marshall Hain who did Dancing in the City), Karla DeVito (a jobbing singer. Successful but not a household name), Deborah Berg (Similarly successful but un-famous singer-songwriter) and others.

I don’t want to confes how much time I spent looking all that up.

As for what the album cover reminded me of – it was another album cover for an album called Anthem, featuring a fantasy painting of a female figure with wings:

The cover of Anthem by Toyah