THE ASSEMBLY - NEVER NEVER

Back in the early 80's after Vince Clarke left Depeche Mode, he was contemplating his next move as a musician. Along with Eric Radcliffe, he came up with the idea for The Assembly. The band was going to record each song with a different vocalist. Sadly, the only officially released tracks from the project appear on this release. 'Never Never' features Feargal Sharkey on lead vocals. The single is fairly straight forward. It has the standard version of the song, standard version of the b-side and then two extended versions. Extended versions were extremely popular back then.

'Never Never' is a pleasing number. It's nothing remarkable considering Vince Clarke's body of work both to date and afterwards. And yet it possesses a tender fragility in the emotional vocal delivery by Sharkey. You can hear the resignation in his voice. A quiet defeat. It's very touching. The extended version contains additional music mostly at the beginning of the track. The introduction is quite long, yet serves to accent the message rather effectively.

'Stop/Start' is an instrumental piece. Clarke did a number of these pieces in those days. Each one of them could easily be pop songs if lyrics had been written and this one is no exception. It's got a wonderful beat and is enjoyable to listen to. The differences between the regular and extended versions are minimal, making both versions fairly similar.

Considering the enormous back catalog of Clarke compositions and his continued work in music, you have to admire these foundation tracks that even now sound lovely and inspiring. If you can locate this single, it's worth a listen. A very enjoyable piece of synthpop history! My final words: ENJOYABLE CLASSIC!

THE ASSEMBLY - NEVER NEVER
01. Never Never
02. Stop/Start
03. Never Never (Extended Version)
04. Stop/Start (Extended Version)