Floorshow (song)

Floorshow EP - Cover (front)

Alice - 7" single cover (front)

Floorshow is one of the earliest songs by The Sisters of Mercy and was performed live already on September 5th, 1981 at Futurama III Festival, Stafford.

The song is also featured on the early demo tapes that The Sisters used to spread to promote the band and to acquire further gigs and it also appeared on the according Floorshow EP. Years later, in 1992, Floorshow was, of course, also featured on the early singles compilation album Some Girls Wander By Mistake.

Floorshow was first released officially in November 1982 on the b-side of the Alice single and later also on side a of the Alice EP. A few days before the original release it had been played by John Peel on UK Radio One in his show of October 12th, 1982. (He surely had received an according DJ-promo ...) As the John Peel Wiki recently revealed, the song was then broadcast again during the John Peel Show on BFBS on January 30th, 1983. See also this thread @The Heartland Forums and John Peel Shows 1980-85.

Early on, Floorshow was always a part of The Sisters of Mercy's live set but has not been played for many years now. However, a vast amount of audience recordings do exist and are in circulation among the fanbase, plus - of course - the ineluctable bootlegs, the most famous one of which is surely the above mentioned Floorshow EP.

Lyrics below taken from The Sisters of Mercy official lyrics book Postcards From Above The Chemist

Some Girls Wander By Mistake - Album Cover (front)

Lyrics

The bodies on the naked on the low damp ground
In the violet hour to the violent sound
And the darkness the blinding the eyes that shine
And the voices singing the line on line
This is the floorshow the clapping hands
Animal flow from the animal glands
In the violet hour to the violent sound
Going round and around and around and around and ...

I feel the bite I feel the beat I see the dancing feet
I feel the light I feel the heat I see the new elite
I see the final floorshow I see the western dream
I see the faces glow and I see the bodies steam

See them shimmy see them go
See their painted faces glow
Slow slow quick quick slow
See those pagans go go go go go

This is the floorshow the last ideal
It's populist got mass appeal
The old religion redefined
For the facile futile totally blind

Mundane by day inane at night
Pagan playing in the flashing light
In the violet hour to the violent sound
Going round and around and around and around and ...
The bodies on the naked on the low damp ground
In the violet hour to the violent sound
And the darkness the blinding the eyes that shine
And the voices singing line on line

See them shimmy see them go
See their painted faces glow
Slow slow quick quick slow
See those pagans go go go go go