Cindytalk, the mercurial expressionist outlet of Scottish artist and musician Cinder, thrives on chance and transformation, collaging elements of noise, balladry, soundtrack, catharsis, and improvisation. An evolution of her early 1980s Edinburgh-based punk band The Freeze, Cinder launched the project upon moving to London, inspired by the crossroads of exploratory UK post-punk and early European industrial.

After a series of celebrated albums for the Midnight Music label as well as collaborations with This Mortal Coil and Cocteau Twins, Cinder migrated to the States, becoming involved with various underground techno collectives around the Midwest and West Coast. Subsequent relocations to Hong Kong and Japan further expanded Cindytalk’s horizons, resulting in a fruitful partnership with Viennese experimental institution Editions Mego, for whom she released five full-lengths of swooning, granular atmosphere. 

In 2021, Cinder partnered with Dais Records to release several new projects alongside a series of long-awaited back catalog reissues, starting with elusive albums Wappinschaw (1995) and The Wind Is Strong… (1990). Now the focus shifts to Cindytalk’s 1984 seminal goth rock debut, Camouflage Heart, a fearless work that feels even more singular and prescient now forty-plus years beyond its release.

“We were trying to find our own space,” says Cinder of the formative period Camouflage Heartemerged from, amidst a move from Edinburgh to London and Cinder’s evolving exploration of gender identity, well before culture at large was equipped to understand. With contemporary discourse we see that the project manifested her transgender ideas as visceral music. The guttural, feral sound marked a notably darker turn from The Freeze’s six-year run on the fringes of punk. Changing the project’s name became vital, not just because they kept hearing the former was already taken, but the desire to embody the spiritual and sonic shift, “to uncover new pathways…to feminize it,” she says. 

Cinder, with bandmates David Clancy and John Byrne, arrived at Cindytalk, a winking nod to Sindy, the British fashion doll rival to Barbie known then for its pull-string talking mechanism. “The goal was to have a more interesting narrative, more interesting dialogue. Music was ultimately my only way of talking to people. That was my conversation with the world, an abstracted conversation…an attempt to make some kind of tiny, tiny mark, if possible, you hope somebody will notice.” Over the years, Cinder has heard from fans who did pick up on the signals and find refuge in Camouflage Heart. Subtle then, but she connects the dots more clearly now, playfully suggesting Dais reissue the long out-of-print vinyl in pink — “It had to be Barbie pink” — underscoring the mischief that’s been there all along beneath the silvery surface of Cindytalk. 

The other goal in 1983 was to land a record deal and develop the band’s roving curiosities in a proper studio, something The Freeze could never do outside of two Peel sessions. Soon came their signing to Midnight Music and opportunities for Cinder to sing outside of the project, contributing to This Mortal Coil’s Sixteen Days/Gathering EPand It’ll End In Tears album. These forays into a more pop-oriented structure allowed Cinder to see her voice in extremes, with Cindytalk drifting towards the dissonant end of the spectrum. Citing Brian Eno’s use of the studio as a compositional tool, an instrument, Cinder and the band became immersed in the process at London’s Gateway Studio. “We were determined to take our time and try to learn how to use a studio and stretch ourselves.”

Camouflage Heart plays with tension and pace, from creeping to feverish to claustrophobic. The percussion moves between restless marches and barely-there pulses; for some parts, they scratched and hit a tin bath, among other objects. Guitar lines vibrate and stab as Cinder contorts her voice freely. She pulls poetry from a cerebral abyss, like ‘make the snake in your eye, pierce the camouflage heart’ on the slow-droning centerpiece “The Spirit Behind the Circus Dream.” In that register is raw power, both vulnerable and menacing, an ability to locate something deep and emotionally charged within.”I still remember that person who was way too intense for their own good,” Cinder reflects. “I couldn’t make a record like that now, certainly not vocally, while that anger hasn’t dissipated; there’s still a kind of warrior.”

For all the destruction and disintegration of Camouflage Heart, Cinder maintains the objective was never full-on fatalistic; these songs seek not to destroy but to poke and provoke, to transform and heal, to find cracks of light in a crumbling world. She points to the last lines of the album’s opening track, “It’s Luxury”: ‘Don’t look down,’ the lyric pines through static and rhythm. Cinder extrapolates, “I’m essentially saying, just keep fucking going. As time went on, for me, that falling became flying. ‘Camouflage Heart’ is the beginning of believing in flight.”

Dais Records is pleased to reissue Camouflage Heart on May 23. This release is the first remastered edition and the first version to include lyrics and liner notes, alongside restored packaging with the original cover artwork. For the first time since 2007, vinyl (limited to 100 Pink, 500 Transparent Clear and Black) will be available in stores and across all digital retailers. All audio was remastered by Josh Bonati.  

Photo Courtesy: Cliff Ash