Spooky business - an Xmas Gift

What’s this then Ian, a blog post? Where is the update about all the rides from the summer? What about the write up about the Norfolk tour, Cycle Sheffield launch and all the other stuff. What’s that? You’ve been too busy on twitter, oh give over…...

The blog has been inactive for months, for which I apologise, and this isn’t even a cycling post. If your a fan of Spooks , have an unhealthy geeky interest in old Goth tunes then read on , otherwise carry on with the present wrapping………


Jump back to Series 6 of Spooks, Ros is working within the Yalta group and they’re planning to use a weapon called “Floodland” to defeat a superpower. I thought it was just coincidence that it also happened to be the title of the second Sisters of Mercy LP. Later on Juliette (aka duck face) talking to Harry starts a sentence with “First and Last and Always”, the title of the first Sisters LP. So the script writer is having a bit of a laugh with those (sad enough) to be in the know.
Jump forward to series 7 finale and the script starts name checking the Sisterhood LP “Gift” (same script writer it seems).

Please don’t set lawyers on me as a lot of time has passed but from what I remember, and sniffing round on various web sites here follows my very brief account of the Sisterhood

The Sisterhood was a project created by Eldritch to prevent Hussey and Adams using that name after the Sisters of Mercy had split. From what I remember Hussey and Adams were already touring as the one version of the Sisterhood (I remember seeing posters in Leeds for their incarnation of the band) but it’s said that the first band to actually produce a record would receive an advance from the record company and have the name rights. Eldritch appeared with a single “Giving Ground” and an LP called “Gift” under the Sisterhood name and laid claim to it (some sources claim the LP was made in 11 days and the advance for the record was £25000). I actually quite liked “Gift” and more than 20 years on it still a fresh industrial sound, unlike the jangly guitars of SOM.

I also remember a Janice Long session when Hussey and Adams were simply billed as the “Hussey and Adams” band due to legal reasons so maybe the accounts aren’t so far from the truth. Hussey and Adams finally used the name “The Mission”, and Eldritch slips back into the “Sisters of Mercy” name for all subsequent incarnations of the band (touring yet again in 2009 and I aim to see them)

So what’s all this got to do with series 7 episode 8? Well several name checks to the Gift album

Russian sleeper agents have just been activated in the UK, they are about to release a nuclear weapon called “ Rain From Heaven”, which just happens to be the final track from “Gift”

When Malcolm is monitoring Russian radio traffic he picks up a call sign “Finland Red, Egypt White”, followed by repeating numbers “2..5..0…0…”
“ Finland Red , Egypt white” is track 4 on “Gift”, and the numbers “2..5..0..0…0 “are repeated at the start of track 1, “Jihad” (and are supposed to- be a reference to the record companies advance on the album) While Im on it the Finland Red reference is read out from the manual for an AK47 but you already new that.

Finally (or not quite) when Connie is diffusing the bomb in the tube station Lucas starts a sentence with “what you have lost can never be found”. Now that bugged me for hours as I knew it from somewhere, then I remembered, it’s a line from “Giving Ground” track 3 from “Gift”

Now there is one other link to all things Sisters that Ive spotted on forums but Ive not gone back through the episode to check yet (oh come on I may be sad, but Im not that bad…yet).
The sleeper agent is supposed to come from Faversham in Kent, and the early haunt of the Sisters of Mercy and their followers was the Faversham Arms (the Fav) in Leeds……..

So I hope that’s enough geeky trivia for you, normal cycling service return in the New Year.

Merry Xmas and all that