Floodland is the second studio album by the English gothic rock band the Sisters of Mercy. It was released on 16 November 1987, through Merciful Release, a subsidiary of WEA, internationally and through Elektra Records in the United States. After the release of the band's debut studio album, First and Last and Always (1985), members Craig Adams and Wayne Hussey left to form the Mission, causing the dissolution of the Sisters of Mercy. As a result, band frontman Andrew Eldritch formed a side project known as the Sisterhood. After the first Sisterhood album was received negatively overall, Eldritch restarted the Sisters of Mercy and hired the Sisterhood member Patricia Morrison for the recording of a new album.

Eldritch wrote the songs of Floodland in Hamburg; the city's large amount of water influenced its title as well as the recurring lyrical theme of water. He then called upon Larry Alexander to produce the album with him and Jim Steinman to produce the songs "Dominion" / "Mother Russia" and "This Corrosion". Recording sessions began at Power Station Studios in New York City during January 1987 and carried on throughout the first half of the year at Strawberry Studios in Stockport and The Wool Hall in Bath. Eldritch served as the vocalist, performed all instruments, and programmed the band's drum machine, "Doktor Avalanche".

The drum machine acted as the drum player; other than backing vocals, Morrison did not contribute to the album despite being a member of the Sisters of Mercy. In contrast to the conventional group-based recording sessions for First and Last and Always, Floodland was pieced together on computers using sequencers. The music incorporates the genres of gothic rock and dark wave, while the lyrical content sees Eldritch cast as the observer of a slowly deteriorating world. Some of the events that inspired certain songs include the Chernobyl disaster, the Cold War, and the band's previous break-up.

The singles "This Corrosion", "Dominion", and "Lucretia My Reflection" were released in promotion. "This Corrosion" peaked at number 7 on the UK Singles Chart, while "Dominion" and "Lucretia My Reflection" peaked at number 13 and 20, respectively. Floodland debuted on the UK Albums Chart at number 9, later being certified gold in UK by the BPI for selling 100,000 copies. It also reached the top 40 in other European countries, including Switzerland. Despite initially receiving mixed reviews from music critics, Floodland has retrospectively received praise and been considered a seminal gothic rock album by several critics.

Background

After the release of the Sisters of Mercy debut studio album First and Last and Always in March 1985, frontman Andrew Eldritch intended for them to record an ABBA cover as a single, and tried to hire Jim Steinman as a producer.Spex, August 1985, p. 5 Eldritch originally contacted him when the ABBA song "Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!" (1979) was part of the band's setlist. Steinman was interested in producing the cover version, but was too busy at that time. Shortly afterward, the Sisters of Mercy disbanded.Ruff, Spex, January 1988 The break-up occurred while the band prepared their second studio album in October 1985, which was going to be titled Left on Mission and Revenge. Eldritch, who had still intended to record the album but as a solo artist, called bassist Patricia Morrison that same month, who was on a tour of the United Kingdom with her band Fur Bible in support of Siouxsie and the Banshees, asking Morrison to collaborate.Sutherland, Melody Maker, June 1988, p. 14

The music press reported the break-up of the band on 2 November 1985, announcing that "the Sisters of Mercy were down to singer Andrew Eldritch and his faithful drum machine [Doktor Avalanche] this week after guitarist Wayne Hussey and bassist Craig Adams left the band. Although this has scuppered recording plans for a new album this month, Andrew now intends to record the same album in the New Year and could well be using Wayne as a session guitarist. [...] Andrew has also approached former Gun Club bassist Patricia Morrison—now in Fur Bible—to play on the album, but it's not yet known whether Andrew will continue with the name Sisters of Mercy."Sounds magazine 2 November 1985 (page 3) Eldritch had no intention to carry on under the disformed band's name, as members who left to form the Mission had an agreement with him that the name the Sisters of Mercy would be used by no one after the break-up.Sutherland, Melody Maker, September 1987

Eldritch released the single "Giving Ground" on 20 January 1986 as part of a project under the name the Sisterhood, which features vocals by his musician friend James Ray. At the end of February 1986, the record label Merciful Release announced that the "forthcoming Andrew Eldritch album which for some months has had the working title Left on Mission and Revenge." The album was eventually titled Gift, being released in July 1986, again by the Sisterhood. It was recorded at Fairview Studios in Willerby, Hull. Eldritch did not sing on the album for contractual reasons, though Morrison collaborated with him for the first time, contributing a spoken passage on the track "Jihad". Gift was negatively received overall and Eldritch lost his publishing deal with RCA Music Limited as a result of it. A 12-inch EP by the Sisterhood entitled This Corrosion was planned for release and set to feature an American vocalist, whose identity was meant to be kept secret until release.Spencer; Strickland, Sounds, February 1986 The EP had been recorded at Fairview Studios with Alan Vega but remained unreleased, with Eldritch instead keeping the idea for when he would reboot the Sisters of Mercy.Glasperlenspiel 06, June 2003, p. 6

Recording

After what was dubbed the "Sisterhood fiasco" by Sounds,Scanlon, Sounds, December 1987, p. 10 Eldritch decided to continue under the name the Sisters of Mercy, feeling as though doing so would improve the name's reputation after the previous fallout. He also thought that it would have been nonsensical to change the name, as he still wrote songs the same way as before. Eldritch, who in 1985 first moved to Bramfeld and then to St. Pauli, began to compose a new album while in Hamburg, under the Warner Elektra Atlantic (WEA) label.Ute Arndt, Bernd Gerstacker, Thomas Duffé: St. Pauli – Gesichter und Ansichten vom Kiez (Historika Photoverlag 1995) The demos for the album were mainly recorded with a Casio CZ-101 synthesiser, acoustic guitars and a new drum machine. At the time, Eldritch was attempting to find a MIDI drum machine of a modest price that featured a "tighter snare drum" sound.

Despite hiring her to play bass guitar on the album, Eldritch later claimed that Morrison did not contribute to the songwriting for it, with him saying that it was practically a solo record. Eldritch insinuated that she suffered from writer's block and was unable to come up with many musical ideas, also adding that he "couldn't even get her to pick up the bass in the first place."Riemann, Bravo, September 1992, p. 28 He reaffirmed this in a 2012 interview with Classic Rock, stating that she "didn't make the cut" and therefore did not appear on Floodland. Merciful Release office manager Boyd Steemson also gave confirmation that Morrison's contributions were minimal.McIntyre, Classic Rock, July 2007, p. 61 Eldritch denied that his approach to songwriting had changed since the band split, saying "'This Corrosion' sounds like 'Temple of Love' II, '1959' sounds like 'Afterhours' part 2. I don't see any difference or any real change. I think I just carry on where I stopped."Niechziol, ME/Sounds, February 1988 He licensed the publishing to SBK Songs Limited, which is now part of EMI Music Publishing.

The starting point for the album was the song "This Corrosion", which was set to be produced by Steinman. Eldritch had immediately thought of him when he came up with the idea for the song. He stated that "when we were trying to sell 'Corrosion' to Steinman, we told him it was like the high-point of a Borgia's disco evening and he went for it." Eldritch also used Steinman to get his record label to concede an appropriate recording budget. He figured that the label would not grant money to use on choirs, but that they would immediately do so if Steinman were to ask for it.Scanlon, Sounds, December 1987, p. 9 According to Steemson, Max Hole, the head of WEA's A&R, managed to get the band a budget of £50,000 for "This Corrosion".

The recording of "This Corrosion" and "Dominion" / "Mother Russia" started during January 1987 in New York City. Steinman and Eldritch used Power Station Studios in the city's Manhattan borough, where they worked with engineer Larry Alexander. On both songs, Steinman used six background singers and 40 members of the New York Choral Society. Eldritch recalled that he was unsure as to why so many vocalists sung all at once, but noted that this "seemed like a good idea at the time" and worked out well in the end.Andrew Eldritch TV interview (Bingo programme, BRT 26 February 1988) Steinman mainly focused on the production of the choral singings and did not contribute much to the actual composition and arrangements. This caused him to receive only partial production credit on "Dominion / Mother Russia".

The remainder of Floodland was recorded in England. Initially, Eldritch worked with an unknown producer, whom he eventually fired. He called Alexander while in New York City and hired him as a co-producer. The two travelled to England, where they recorded at multiple studios. They spent time at Strawberry Studios in Stockport before transitioning to The Wool Hall in Bath to finish recording. The mixing for the album was then done at AIR Studios in London.

Composition Music

The music of Floodland was described as a mix of gothic rock and dark wave. In contrast to the Sisters of Mercy's previous album, First and Last and Always, which had been recorded in a conventional way, Floodland was pieced together on a computer that used sequencers to help. Eldritch worked on the recorded parts with a Voyetra Sequencer Plus, while a Yamaha SPX90 was used as an effects unit and the parts were saved on a Compaq Portable 286. The guitars were played by Eldritch himself, apart from the solo on "This Corrosion", which was played by Steinman's friend Eddie Martinez. The drum sounds on the album were sampled together from various drum machines with an Akai S900. The tom sound was from an Oberheim DMX, which had previously been used on First and Last and Always. The other drum sounds were from a Yamaha RX-5. The track "1959" features only the sound of a piano, but was pieced together with a sequencer by Eldritch and played without an actual piano.

Lyrics

Regarding the title Floodland, Eldritch realised that, after writing all the songs for the album, the theme of water came up repeatedly. He attributed the theme's recurrence to the amount of water within Hamburg, where he was writing these songs. Michael Bonner of Uncut viewed Eldritch as casting himself in a role where he is a "jaded observer, watching cynically as he and the world slouch towards Armageddon," adding that the songs are bonded together by "images of the apocalypse that straddle the gap between the personal and the political."