Prolapse are the overactive underachievers of Indie. They’ve been on more record labels than I’ve had new socks and have the reputation for looking like a warring psychotic family on stage.

Although their earlier albums sounded like a grumpy Scotsman discussing murder with a Home Counties woman to the sound of the Fall, Ghosts of Dead Aeroplanes is one of the unsung best albums of 1999.

For a start they’ve gone all eerie on us.  Opening track, “Essence of Cessna” has the sort of echo in it that never fails to make me look warily over my shoulder. Instead of scaring you shitless “Dead Aeroplanes” simply makes you feel uneasy. It isn’t so much Slipknot as the monster that you know lives under your bed that will come along and strangle you in your sleep.  







The lyrics are generally unintelligible, as the Home Counties girl sings very sweetly in the foreground backed by a raving psychopath Scotsman who mutters and mumbles threateningly in the background.  You get the feeling that when they record he must be tied up in a straight jacket and a muzzle…..just in case he bites somebody.  It is therefore rather reassuring to know that in “real life” he’s an archaeologist. 







The lyrics that you do hear make you rather glad that you can’t hear the rest: “He wae a septic tank o’a man” is a nice malevolent example.  







Thumping bass lines and scratchy guitars run through the album and at times they drown out the tales of death and disaster.  Feedback and electronica play a huge part and, as I keep on telling myself, they are responsibe for the "scary" factor. However that doesn't stop me thinking that this album is something that sounds like the evil ghosts of music got up and came to pluck at your spine.