Nicolas...

I never liked the horns. True enough. But I didn't say I could
not stand the 'strings'. I would have preferred keyboards,
especially if they touched up with a synth exactly as the
intrument was used on 'Remote Luxury'. I guess they evolved
somewhat between 'RL' and 'Heyday' as they do with each
ensuing release. I think 'devolved' better describes the move to
'strings' after some nice synth work on 'RL'.
As far as your thinking that the album is "too dense", I say
I don't understand what you're saying.
I've always found the combination of sound and music on
'Heyday' to be much more 'alive' than much of what they've
done on other releases.

I know you're not the only one to use the term 'over-produced'
but I'll say now I never really understood what people meant.
Are the strings and horns an integral reason for that thinking?

I recall reading somewhere that SK said they used strings
because the synths ended up sounding like strings in the end.
Well, maybe, and maybe not. Again, the synth 'touch' on 'RL'
was brilliant in that it was not overused and fit in very nicely
with the Church's sound/music at the time.
The other aspect I find strange about it is that 'Heyday' was
probably all-round the most 'kick ass' (as far as the Church goes) release they'd done to that point.
Who thought up the horns????

In any case, I've always wondered, if there were no horns,
and we cut back on some/most/all the strings, is anyone
going to still say it was over-produced?

Fraulein.

Bliss comes first as a jangling flood ...