DEREK JOHNSON reports how a sore throat could end a brilliant career
Article published in NME, 12th June, 1982
Siouxsie And The Banshees | Sioux Silenced | SIOUXSIE SIOUX was this week shattered by the news that she must stop singing until 1983, or risk losing her voice irrevocably. What’s more, she’s been advised that in the long term, she must change her singing style completely — from raucous rock to a more subdued approach.
The bombshell was dropped during the course of her Scandinavian tour with the Banshees, when she visited the hospital in Gothenburg for a prescription to treat laryngitis. She was examined by a local doctor, and he was so concerned that he immediately passed her into the care of throat specialist Dr Sanner, who immediately ordered — no more singing until the New Year, at the earliest.
The band completed their dates up to Copenhagen on Monday this week, but have cancelled subsequent gigs to enable Siouxsie to return to London, where she’ll be seeing more throat experts — in the hope that their diagnosis may not be as drastic.
If the original advice is upheld, the band will be unable to finish their half-completed album. And summer festival appearances (including the Elephant Fayre in Cornwall on July 31), as well as a planned World tour starting in the autumn, would all have to be scrapped.
PAUL MORLEY talks to Steve Severin about booze, Finland, the weather .. . and, oh yeah, what’s all this about Siouxsie’s voice?
SUNDAY. SEVERIN checks in from Copenhagen: Siouxsie And The Banshees are coming to the end of a three-week tour of Scandinavia —flying home Tuesday.
“I’ve been on the wagon since I got out here,” Severin confesses coyly.
Gosh, what’s it like?
“Well, I keep waking up in the morning with a hangover and I can’t work out where it came from.”
Oh yes, I recognise that state.
Siouxsie And The Banshees | Sioux Silenced
“It’s pretty weird out here,” he goes on, “I have to keep reminding myself where I am, it’s all so faceless . . . Finland was very quiet . . . conversation is not big in Finland. And the Swedish skinheads — if you imagine that — are a real pain. So what’s happening back home, how’s the Associates LP doing; What’s new. . .”
What’s happening? Big heat. Associates? Top ten. What’s new? I’ve just finished watching a combination of Osibisa, Livingstone Taylor and The Faces on LWT — if you can imagine that. It’s the same ‘late-night’ concert showcase that the Banshees shared with the pathetic Steve Hackett a couple of weeks ago, half an hour each from two different sides of the universe. It’s a good thing the show was late and local, not networked at peak time.
“What, the sound was really rough? Yeah, someone else said that. It was recorded towards the end of last year’s tour — the TV company at the time didn’t even have anyone to sell it to, and no one’s checked the sound. It probably should never have been shown.”
Sioux’s voice, usually glorious, was cracking badly. “Aaah. . .”
Well? Serious news . . . Sioux has had trouble with her voice for the past two years. Towards the end of a long tour, it starts to crack — the reason for a number of cancelled shows, and one of the reasons why the group are cutting back on long tours. The Banshee boys do sensible things like advising her to stop smoking, stop drinking and rest a lot, and such alarming discipline does help her voice. Every two or three months Sioux sees a doctor . . .
Siouxsie And The Banshees | Sioux Silenced
“But she treats every doctor as a quack,” says Severin. A visit to a specialist in Gothenburg during this tour has resulted in what he describes as “over the top news”. Well?
“It all started when Sioux got flu on a horrible ferry journey between Finland and Sweden. The flu disappeared but she was left with a bad sore throat and we had to cancel the shows in Stockholm. The day after she went to see this specialist.”
Reputedly one of Europe’s leading throat specialists, he concluded that Sioux’s vocal chords were swollen to twice the size of an average person’s: every time she has laryngitis her vocal chords never heal properly and she’s continually susceptible to soreness. His advice was for Sioux to rest from singing for six months, and after that completely change her singing technique — a technique which currently aggravates the problem.
“Sioux hasn’t said too much since hearing all this, so I think she’s a bit worried. At the moment she’s trying not to take it too seriously and says that nothing will stop her from finishing the new LP. We won’t know until Sioux visits a London specialist for a second opinion — the two of them will then swap notes.”
Fireworks
With the new single ‘Fireworks’ the group are beginning to capitalise on their steady post-punk success and deservedly establish themselves as front-runners in the brilliant post-League new pop boom: could Sioux having to rest halt this new momentum?
“The next single ‘Cascade’ is already recorded so we can keep the pressure up. And if Sioux does need six months rest then she’ll have to have it, simple as that. But as of now nothing is cancelled, nothing is put off . . . the show in Plymouth in July, for instance, is not being cancelled until it’s absolutely certain that Sioux is in danger of losing her voice completely. We’re just hoping that it isn’t anywhere near that bad.”
So everyone’s holding their breath until that second opinion?
“Yup. . .”
Love to Sioux, and have a drink, Steve, have a drink.
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