Jan Hellriegel-- Ears' singer -- had pursued a creditable solo career after the band broke up in 1990 and had her own label, so she had the tapes remastered and rereleased as this eight-song mini album which comes with reminiscences by the various band members and a scene-setting essay by Ian Chapman who outlines the lineage of women musicians and all-women bands.

Cassandra's Ears weren't alone in that -- Look Blue Go Purple and Fatal Jelly Space (both on Flying Nun) were active in the same period -- but, as with all-male bands, each sounded very different. As expected.

Cassandra's Ear with their guitar jangle/post-Cure sonic cinemascope were a world removed the prominent synth-pop sound which was so dominant in the Eighties, and their musical ambition seems, in retrospect, highly sophistiated. Hellriegel could pitch herself somewhere between Patti Smith (the mini-epic Crystal which just rises and soars), an indie rock-pop singer with something to say (Private Wasteland with percussion player Sarah Macnab) or a confident woman who at core is deeply uncertain about a difficult choice that some must face alone (Your Estimation, "will I go down in your estimation?").

Cassandra's Ear were a band which exuded a confidence in the studio that others could only admire. Leanne Ibell plays terrific guitar.

For many Cassandra's Ears were just a brief blip on the radar, but here's evidence they deserved to be something more. - Graham Reid, Elsewhere.co.nz

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ITEM DETAILS:

Artist: The Cassandra's Ears
Title: Story
Label: Blind Date Records
Cat #: BDR-003
Format:CD

Track Listing:

1. As I Am In Skin
2. My Command
3. Your Estimation
4. Worker's Lament
5. Man From The West
6. Private Wasteland
7. Silver Sheen
8. Crystal [Calm Before The Storm]