The Spangle Maker

The Spangle Maker was the first Cocteau Twins record with Simon Raymonde, and the first on which he played bass. The title track and Pepper-Tree were recorded in Edinburgh, and Pearly-Dewdrops' Drops in London with the engineer John Madden; the 7-inch single carried a shorter edit. The sleeve, by 4AD's design team 23 Envelope, uses Gertrude Käsebier's photograph The Crystal Gazer. Pearly-Dewdrops' Drops reached twenty-nine in Britain and topped the indie chart, and John Peel's listeners voted it second and the title track fourth in that year's Festive Fifty.