The Sisterhood was a musical project led by the English singer, songwriter and musician Andrew Eldritch. With guest musicians, the Sisterhood recorded songs he had originally intended for a second studio album by the Sisters of Mercy.
Background
After the March 1985 release of the first Sisters of Mercy album First and Last and Always the band prepared themselves for a follow-up. Eldritch: "The next Sisters album was going to be called 'Left On Mission and Revenge'."
Singer Andrew Eldritch saw the time ripe for a change of direction: "I always wanted to do something different, because whatever we did it all eventually sounded the same." "I wanted to find out how to record songs without any rock structures and especially without guitars." "Andrew rejected all my songs and let me work on one single chord all the time: 'Here's my song – E minor!"
Back in England the band came together for rehearsals in October 1985, but the musical differences had become irreconcilable. Wayne Hussey: "We got to doing the second album and Andrew said 'I'm not singing any of your songs.'" Eldritch: "Then they said 'Well, okay, what are we gonna do for new songs?' And I said 'How about this, this and this' and, unfortunately, the first 'this' I cited had too many chords per minute and Craig said 'If that's the guitar line, I'm not playing it' and walked out. That was really that." "The others didn't want to play my new songs, such as 'Torch' for instance. [...] The song has some unusual chord changes. Craig thought it was crap, he said 'I'm not playing it, I'm going home.' And there he stayed."
The music press reported the break-up of the band on Saturday, 2 November 1985: "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. The split was described as 'friendly' by a Merciful Release spokesperson. 'The cliché of musical differences would not be inappropriate. Wayne and Craig were unable to comprehend the direction the band was going.' 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. Wayne and Craig are now reported to be getting their own band together."
Andrew Eldritch: "The people that are now the Mission and myself had an agreement, no one would use the name when the band went its separate ways." "The band was good and successful, each of us could continue. The split came at a time when it wouldn't do us any damage."
"Giving Ground" single (January 1986)
On that very same day of the split, Eldritch made a phone call to bassist Patricia Morrison, whose band Fur Bible was on a UK tour with Siouxsie and the Banshees at the time, and asked her to play on his planned album. Morrison: "The day they fell apart he called me and said 'Will you do it?' and I said yes. [...] We had some tours set up, so I waited until that was cleared, then left."
Hussey and Adams, who like Eldritch remained under contract with WEA Records, booked studio time at Slaughterhouse Recording Studios in Driffield at the end of October 1985, recorded a four-song demo tape, and set up a new band. But the demo tape was rejected by the record company who were not convinced by Hussey's singing talents.
Eldritch went into the studio at the tail end of 1985 to produce the debut single of James Ray and the Performance for his Merciful Release label. James Ray: "The Sisterhood project arose during the recording of 'Mexico Sundown Blues'."
While Eldritch was in the studio, Hussey and Adams, who had taken over the Sisters' roadcrew and equipment, announced their debut concert for 20 January 1986, which they were going to play under the new name the Sisterhood.
Eldritch was alarmed: "They began to claim rights to [the Sisters name], which patently had to be stopped. And when they wanted to be called the Sisterhood, there was nothing I could do but be the Sisterhood before them – the only way to kill that name was to use it, then kill it." and prepared a record to be released on his own label.
In only five days Eldritch recorded a song called "Giving Ground," which he co-wrote with Merciful Release manager Boyd Steemson and co-produced with Lucas Fox. Fox and Eldritch had met in the spring of 1985, when Fox was the stand-in drummer for Australian support band the Scientists on the Sisters of Mercy's UK tour. Eldritch recorded all instruments himself (guitar, bass, synthesizers and drum programming), while Fox programmed some additional percussion tracks.
The single contained two different mixes of the song, Eldritch's original instrumental "Giving Ground (AV)" (5:45 min) on the b-side and the vocal remix "Giving Ground (RSV)" (4:50 min) on the a-side. 'AV' and 'RSV' are explained on the official Sisters of Mercy website this way: "The 'Authorised Version' of 'Giving Ground' is Andrew's original version, and the 'Revised Standard Version' is the version developed by colleagues at Merciful Release and subsequently adopted as the standard version. 'AV' and 'RSV' are well-known versions of the Bible."
Because Eldritch, as an artist, was under contract to WEA Records, he could not sing on the record, otherwise WEA would have had an option on the recording. James Ray: "He asked me and I did the vocals, as easy as that".
Merciful Release announced the single's release with a press statement: "From among the forces allied to Merciful Release we bring you the Sisterhood. capturing (in this instance) the musical bile of Andrew Eldritch, and introducing James Ray and the Performance ... of whom more soon."
The single was released as planned on 20 January 1986, the same day that Hussey and Adams played their debut concert in London as the Sisterhood. The press hype about the two conflicting parties made the single enter the UK Indie Chart on 8 February, where it got to no. 1 on 15 February 1986. The reviews in the music press were unanimously negative, and even James Ray later declared: "It's a terrible track."
"This Corrosion" 12 inch EP (spring 1986, unreleased)
Sounds reported on 20 February 1986 that "a new 12-inch EP called 'This Corrosion' will soon be in the shops, featuring the same line-up but with the addition of a mysterious and so far undisclosed American vocalist." This 12 inch single even appeared in German music paper adverts as "available soon".
James Ray: "So during the recording of ['Mexico Sundown Blues'] we made and released 'Giving Ground'. We then spent weeks on what was to be the Sisterhood's second single, 'This Corrosion', but Eldritch decided he was going to use it to kickstart the Sisters Mk II."
Recording took place at Fairview Studios near Hull with in-house engineer John Spence. American vocalist Alan Vega, who had made friends with the Sisters of Mercy in 1983, and undertook a solo tour through the UK and Europe during February and March 1986, recorded one version of the song, other vocal takes featuring James Ray and Andrew Eldritch are in existence as well.
The projected 12 inch EP remained unreleased, instead the song "This Corrosion" in 1987 became the Sisters of Mercy's comeback single.
Gift album (July 1986)
In March 1986, the Mission began negotiations with Phonogram Ltd. as WEA Records refused to release any material. So the band released the October 1985 demo tape in slightly re-recorded form as an independent single on 9 May 1986. The single (its b-side was titled "Wake (RSV)" as a nod to "Giving Ground (RSV)") promptly entered the UK Indie Chart at no. 1. WEA Records had to release the Mission from their contract.
Both Andrew Eldritch and the Mission still had a publishing contract with RCA Records from their days in the Sisters of Mercy. A sum of £25,000 for one studio album was payable for the year of 1986 in an Advance against royalties deal, so RCA decided to split up the money to the two concerned parties.
Eldritch decided to claim the whole sum for himself by being first to compose, produce and release a studio album, much in the same way as he did with the "Giving Ground" single. Again he did not appear as a vocalist, so he could release the album on his own label without having to offer it to WEA Records: "They thought it was great that I called myself the Sisterhood while they still had the Sisters of Mercy, so they didn't have to back me at all. I had to put out the album on Merciful Release, but it gave me free rein."
James Ray: "I wasn't involved too much with the album, as it was taking ages for Eldritch to formulate any concrete ideas, and I wanted to be writing my own stuff. I personally think the album transpired to cash in on the sales of the single."
Andrew Eldritch later said about the album: "The Sisterhood album was a weapon in this corporate war. That's why I called it Gift. [in German: poison] [...] But I still like the record. It's weird but it's fine."
The official Sisters of Mercy website comments: "The Sisterhood album has become a classic; it parallelled the New Beat of the Continental avant-garde that eventually spawned Techno." and was featured in the 2012 film The Brass Teapot.