The Church - Gold Afternoon Fix (1990).

I'd always kinda liked The Church since I first saw them on TV on Countdown back in the very early 1980's, singing The Unguarded Moment and a little later, Almost With You. I never actually heard any albums though, until my sister picked up Gold Afternoon Fix up in a Target sale in about 1990 or 1991.

Metropolis remains one of my favourite songs from the band - as Steve Kilbey sings at the start, "there'll never be another quite like you", and it's the kind of song that feels so deliciously familiar it'll always remind me of home, I suppose. But the whole album has a faraway feel to it, these stories of other cities, other civilizations, and other people. Apparently the band doesn't think much of it - their drummer quit soon afterwards - but as the album switches back and forth between wistfulness (Monday Morning, Grind, etc.) and altered-state imagery (Russian Autumn Heart, Essence), it feels comfortable. They've never really let me down.