Songfacts®:

• The Sisters of Mercy were a popular English goth band who did very well in the UK between 1984 and 1993. In 1985, tensions in the band led to their split, with bass player Craig Adams and guitarist Wayne Hussey leaving to form The Mission. The Sisters Of Mercy leader Andrew Eldritch re-formed the band in 1987, without Adams and Hussey. This song takes a stab at the departed pair, with lines like "Sing this corrosion to me" and "Selling the don't belong," indicating that Eldritch considered The Mission's sound to be a copy - or corrosive version - of The Sisters Of Mercy.
  
  The Mission went on to have a successful chart career in the UK, with hit singles like "Wasteland," "Tower of Strength" and "Butterfly On A Wheel."
• Eldritch wrote this in 1986, and was going to release it as a single from his band Sisterhood, but they waited a year and released it as The Sisters Of Mercy.
• Jim Steinman produced this track. He used the 40-piece New York Choral Society to get a grand sound. Steinman worked on all of Meat Loaf's hits as well as "Holding Out For A Hero" and "Total Eclipse Of The Heart" for Bonnie Tyler.
• Eldritch described the track in a 1987 interview with Sounds magazine: "It's about the idiots, full of sound and fury, who stampede around this world signifying nothing. It's about people who sing about the revolution while selling it short, about people who sing about the corrosion of things while they themselves are falling apart. People who miss the point... It's also stupidly over-the-top bombastic, but rightly so."