Crocodiles (album)

Crocodiles is the debut album by the English post-punk band Echo & the Bunnymen. It was released on 18 July 1980 in the United Kingdom and on 17 December 1980 in the United States. The album reached number 17 on the UK Albums Chart. "Pictures on My Wall" and "Rescue" had previously been released as singles.

Recorded at Eden Studios in London and at Rockfield Studios near Monmouth, Crocodiles was produced by Bill Drummond and David Balfe, while Ian Broudie had already produced the single "Rescue". The album received favourable reviews from the music press, receiving four out of five stars by both Rolling Stone and Blender magazines.

Background and recording

Echo & the Bunnymen formed in 1978 and originally consisted of Ian McCulloch (vocals and rhythm guitar), Will Sergeant (lead guitar), Les Pattinson (bass) and a drum machine. They released their debut single, "The Pictures on My Wall", in May 1979 on the independent label Zoo Records. The band then signed with WEA subsidiary label Korova and were persuaded to employ a drummer. Pete de Freitas subsequently joined the band, and in early 1980 they recorded their second single, "Rescue". The single was recorded at Eden Studios in London and produced by fellow Liverpudlian and ex-member of Big in Japan Ian Broudie.

A British tour followed in June 1980 before the band went to Rockfield Studios to record their debut album. Despite talk of the American singer Del Shannon being asked to produce the album, it was produced by the band's manager Bill Drummond and his business partner and The Teardrop Explodes keyboard player David Balfe. The recording of the album only took three weeks,

Music and lyrics

The music on Crocodiles is generally dark and moody: In 1980, the British music magazine NME described McCulloch's lyrics as "scattered with themes of sorrow, horror, and despair, themes that are reinforced by stormy animal/sexual imagery" and American music magazine Creem described Crocodiles as "a moody, mysterious, fascinating record." In 1981, music journalist David Fricke, writing for Rolling Stone magazine, said, "Instead of dope, McCulloch trips out on his worst fears: isolation, death and emotional bankruptcy."

In his 2005 book Rip It Up and Start Again: Post Punk 1978–1984, British music journalist Simon Reynolds describes the sound of the album as "pared and sparse." He goes on to describe Pattinson's "granite basslines" carrying the melody; Sergeant's guitar playing as "jagged-quartz" and avoiding "anything resembling a solo, apart from the odd flinty peal of lead playing"; de Freitas' drumming as minimal and "surging urgency"; and McCulloch's vocals as having "precocious authority." Reynolds describes the songs as being rooted in "doubt, anguish, despair" while the "tightness and brightness of their sound transmits contradictory sensations of confidence, vigour and euphoria." In 1989 McCulloch told Reynolds how, as a teenager, he felt there was "a big movie camera in the sky." McCulloch described the opening line of the track "Going Up" "Ain't thou watching my film" as a terrible line, and he went on to say "It was meant to be tongue in cheek, but that was what spurred me on." Describing the cover photo, music journalist Chris Salewicz said, "[...] the Bunnymen are placed in poses of histrionic despair in a near-neurotically gothic woodland that evokes memories of elfin glades and fabled Arthurian legends." Creem magazine said, "The cover art suggests four boys dazed and confused in a drugged dream, a surreal where-are-we landscape. The Bunnymen's images are of loneliness, disconnection, a world gone awry." Sergeant was less happy, saying that he "was pissed off that there was a solo picture of [McCulloch] on the back cover."

In the book The KLF: Chaos, Magic and the Band Who Burned a Million Pounds by John Higgs, Bill Drummond says that he saw the face of "Echo", an imagined giant rabbit, in the cover design.

Releases

The album was originally released as an LP in the United Kingdom on 18 July 1980 by Warner Bros. subsidiary label Korova. Two tracks, "Do It Clean" and "Read It in Books", were included on the cassette but were initially omitted from the LP version of the album because the managing director of Warner Bros., Rob Dickins, mistakenly thought that they contained obscenities. The band's second single, "Rescue", released on 5 May 1980, became the band's first song to chart when it reached number 62 on the UK Singles Chart.

Scottish band Idlewild covered the track "Rescue" on their single "These Wooden Ideas" in June 2000. In late 2001, American singer-songwriter Kelley Stoltz released the album Crockodials, a track-by-track cover version of the original Crocodiles album.

Reception and legacy

Writing for NME in 1980, Chris Salewicz described the album as "being probably the best album this year by a British band." In 1993, the NME listed Crocodiles at number 28 in its list of the 50 greatest albums of the 1980s. In 2006, Uncut magazine listed the album at number 69 on its list of the 100 greatest debut albums. The album was also included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. In 2020, Rolling Stone included Crocodiles in their "80 Greatest albums of 1980" list, praising "Will Sergeants’ ice-dagger guitar and Les Pattinson’s spelunking bass, making “Rescue” and “Pictures on My Wall” the perfect invitations to crawl down into Ian’s hot pit of despair." In 2025, Radio X included the album in its list of "The 25 best indie debut albums of the 1980s".

Track listing

All tracks written by Will Sergeant, Ian McCulloch, Les Pattinson and Pete de Freitas except where noted.

1980 UK LP version and Canadian Cassette

Side one

"Going Up" – 3:57
"Stars Are Stars" – 2:45
"Pride" – 2:41
"Monkeys" – 2:49
"Crocodiles" – 2:38

Side two

"Rescue" – 4:26
"Villiers Terrace" – 2:44
"Pictures on My Wall" (Sergeant, McCulloch, Pattinson) – 2:52
"All That Jazz" – 2:43
"Happy Death Men" – 4:56

1980 US version and 1980 UK cassette version

Side one

"Going Up" – 3:57
"Do It Clean" – 2:44
"Stars Are Stars" – 2:45
"Pride" – 2:41
"Monkeys" – 2:49
"Crocodiles" – 2:38

Side two

"Rescue" – 4:26
"Villiers Terrace" – 2:44
"Read It in Books" (McCulloch, Julian Cope) – 2:31
"Pictures on My Wall" (Sergeant, McCulloch, Pattinson) – 2:52
"All That Jazz" – 2:43
"Happy Death Men" – 4:56

2003 bonus tracks

<li value="11">"Do It Clean"[A] – 2:44
"Read It in Books"[A] (McCulloch, Cope) – 2:31
"Simple Stuff" – 2:38
"Villiers Terrace" (early version) – 3:08
"Pride" (early version) – 2:54
"Simple Stuff" (early version) – 2:37
"Crocodiles"[B] (live) – 5:09
"Zimbo"[B] (live) – 3:36
"All That Jazz"[B] (live) – 2:53
"Over the Wall"[B] (live) – 5:28

Personnel

;Echo & the Bunnymen

Ian McCulloch – vocals, guitar
Will Sergeant – lead guitar
Les Pattinson – bass
Pete de Freitas – drums

;Technical

Bill Drummond[C] – producer (original album and Shine So Hard tracks)
David Balfe[C] – producer (original album), keyboards
Ian Broudie – producer ("Pride" and "Rescue")
The Bunnymen – producer ("Simple Stuff")
Pat Moran – producer (early versions)
Hugh Jones – producer (Shine So Hard tracks), engineer (original album)
Andy Zax – reissue producer
Bill Inglot – reissue producer, remastering
Rod Houison – engineer ("Pride" and "Rescue")
Gary Edwards – engineer (early versions)
Dan Hersch – remastering
Brian Griffin – cover photography
Bill Butt – insert photography

Charts

{| class="wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style="text-align:center"

! scope="col"| Chart (1980)

! scope="col"| Peak position

{| class="wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style="text-align:center"

! scope="col"| Chart (2021)

! scope="col"| Peak position

Certifications

Notes

A. ^1 2 Originally included on the US release of Crocodiles.
B. ^1 2 3 4 From the Shine So Hard EP (Korona ECHO 1, 1981). Recorded live at the Pavilion Gardens, Buxton, UK, 17 January 1981.
C. ^1 2 Credited as The Chameleons.

References

;Bibliography