Customer Reviews

Amplified Heart

5 star:		(57)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

If you listen to Amplified Heart for the first time, you'll find that one song will strike very deeply, and resonate with you for days or weeks. It's the best song you've heard in a long time. You'll skip over songs to get to it. As it starts to wear off, you'll find that another song, probably one you were actually skipping, is perhaps the best song you've heard in a long time. This will continue until you realize that this is one of those albums where there's really not a bad moment. This turns out to be a great collection of very strong, simple songs.

The emotion runs deep and true through this album without getting overbearing. A lot of that has to do with the songs themselves, which are just simple and powerful. But it's even more to do with the spare but rich production. The vocals are pitch perfect, and the choice of instrumentation prevents any song from getting overdone. When not to play is often as important as when to play. This album is one where every note seems to have a place and a meaning. The overall mood is longing, but thoughtful, profound, and mature.

I started out on Rollercoaster, jumped to Get Me, then found We Walk the Same Line, drove around on Two Star for a couple weeks, realized I Don't Understand Anything and just started playing the whole thing. There are many essentials that I'll be returning to for a long time.

Having become enthralled with EBTG through Walking Wounded and Temperamental I was not at first able to get my head around their earlier albums. On first hearing, Amplified Heart was barely above elevator music to me. But I find that many tracks have grown on me dramatically, so that now I listen to the album non-stop. Tracey Thorne's voice is like a balm to my troubled nerves. I could listen to her sing the phone book. One of the tracks that has particularly grown on me is Your Troubled Mind, particularly the lyric, "When you're dooooown you bring me down too-oo; and that is somethi-in' I would not do-o. You say its hard I know its hard; that is somethi-in' I don't dis-re-ga-ard."
My advice is, buy the album. If you don't like it at first, force yourself to listen to it over and over and you will come crawling on you knees begging the album to forgive you for ever having doubted it.

This review refers to the "Amplified Heart" CD by Everything But The Girl.....

The music of Everything But The Girl is many things. On this album, "Amplified Heart", I found the music upbeat yet soothing, the lyrics poetic, romantic and profound. It is the kind of music you can listen to while kicking back and reading, working around the house, or for a quiet dinner for two.

To be honest, I had never heard their music nor heard of them before I made this purchase. I had just finished reading Ben Watt's "Patient:The True Story of a Rare Illness", and was so touched by the inspirational, and very human account of his illness, that I just had to hear the music of the person who words had touched me so, and, Tracey Thorn the woman who remained at his side through the whole ordeal.

I had no idea what to expect, and was delighted after my very first listen. I chose this particular album because it was made after his hospital experience. Through this music you can really feel the love, the loyalty and the bonding that these two have experienced together.

In one of the songs "We Walk The Same Line", they say "If you lose your faith babe, you can have mine, and if you're lost I'm right behind.....". How beautiful is that??? This album is filled with wonderful songs like that.There are 10 tracks and includes "Rollercoaster", "Walking To You" and "Missing".(For a complete list of songs, see buying info). I seem to always add this to whatever mix I'm loading up my CD player with, it just makes me feel good.

The CD is excellent. A very good quality recording, it fills the room with the wonderful sounds of this album. It also comes with a booklet that has the words to all the songs as well.

For a nice soft rock/ballad type atmosphere I highly recommend this album as well as Ben Watt's book for a beautiful reading experience.

Feel the love..and enjoy...Laurie

I must admit. After buying "Walking Wounded", the only reason I had really bought "Amplified Heart" was for "Missing" and the fact that it was in the used section. And then recently I put it on from the beginning listen to it, and was very pleased. This album is near perfection. While "Walking Wounded" focus on the electronic beats sometimes muddles the emotions and lovely Tracey Thorn's voice, "Amplified Heart" shimmers acousticly. While people on these reviews seem to hate one and love another, I respect both very much. But I must say, in the end Amplified Heart is a bit superior. It's becoming one of my favourite albums.

Ben Watt takes the leads on two of the best songS (Walking to You, 25th December) and Tracey mellowly brings us through the rest of the album. These are beautiful melodies people. If you're a music fan (like a crazed one haha), get this album! I highly recommend it.

Like most people I only knew of Everything But The Girl because of the hit single "Missing." Having an extensive CD collection, this album ended up just sitting there for a long time. Recently I put the disc on and started listening to the album from the beginning all the way through. What a surprise! The tunes have very simple melodies and structures, but are very powerful. The mark of a great album is one that stirs your soul and Amplified Heart does that. Surprising is that even though "Missing" is a great song, the rest of the album is even better. The split vocal on "Walking To You" will evoke feeling of a past love and what might have been. "Get Me" and "Two Star" are just terrific. All the songs flow together to create an album with an atmosphere of lamentation, longing, and reflection. You won't be disappointed, the songs really grow on you the more you listen. This is definately one of the best undiscovered albums out there.

You've listened to Eden, Idlewild and Love Not Money and written them off as being too folky. You've also heard Walking Wounded and Tempremental and discarded them being all beat and no soul. Now listen to Amplified Heart. Gotcha.

This is EBTG at their finest. One foot in their folk pop roots, the other creeping into the drum and bass genre they've recently lept into. At some points inherently acoustic, at others quite technical. It's a very distinctive sound which I've rarely heard anyone else pull with as much success. Sting and Gomez have come close but not close enough. Maybe it's because they lack the soft, delicacy of Tracy Thorn's voice. Her's is a voice perfectly suited to the melancholy love songs EBTG excel at and it's no surprise that this album is packed with them. Two Star is pain put to music, Disenchanted could drive you to suicide and as for Get Me and I Don't Understand Anything... Well they're not happy, but they are damn fine songs.

Thats not to say that EBTG aren't capable of joy. We Walk The Same Line is as upbeat as they've ever been and is quite jaunty in its own way. And then there's Missing. First off let me say that the acoustic version knocks Todd Terry's mix into a cocked hat but Terry's version acts as a nice counterpoint to the whole album. After so much acoustic work it's quite nice to hear them a little up tempo. It's also unfair to say that Terry pushed them into Walking Wounded as some claim. If you listen to tracks like Get Me and Troubled Mind you can hear a low key drum machine playing away, a sign of the way they were going even without Terry as a catalyst.

If they'd made another album like this instead of Wounded maybe EBTG would have conquered the world by now rather than having faded way like they did after Missing. I live in hope that one day they'll give Amp Heart a relisten and realise that this was their finest hour and return to the sound they made here. Until then I've got this to listen to instead. I can live with that.

I bought this CD sight unseen or sound unheard as the case may be recently. I'll echo what another reviewer said in that I too hate missing out on excellent music for so long. This CD is incredible, you must have it if you don't already. There are only two tracks that I end up skipping but the rest usually play over and over until I'm ready for a change (but like I said, it keeps coming back). I must be one of the few people who had never heard Missing or had but didn't really pay attention to it. Great song but my personal favorite is We Walk the Same The Line. Get this disc, you won't regret it.

I've listened to some of their later albums - and their most recent stuff is sounding pretty interesting (Walking Wounded was a little repetitious for me), but this album is one of my all time favorites. I bought this album right when it came out, and loved it then. But now, I've discovered how enduring it is. Every time I need to think, or I'm under emotional stress, this is the album I pop in. The songs are all so honest and true, they put to words what I'm feeling. This is a wonderful album. (I would add that one song, the 25th of December, is not sung by Tracey Thorn, but rather by Ben Watt - and is not one that I like nearly as much as the rest.)

Now that this has been out for 10 years, I thought I'd pick it up. God I hate it when I miss out on something this good for so long. "Amplified Heart" is refered to as their best album, and I can easily see why. Their biggest hit "Missing (Todd Terry Club Mix)" is on here, as well as the original, and though the whole album has an electronica feel to it, it's really not. Most of the rest is just kind of smooth acoustic pop, and reminds me a bit of "Sade". Anyway, it's very pleasing to listen to, and I find her voice soothing and comforting. The two songs I currently like the most are "Troubled Mind" and "We Walk The Same Line", both done very well. This album is a must for any collection, even if you have everything but "Everything But The Girl".

this cd by everything but the girl reminds me of the line in tangled up in blue, by bob dylan...

every one of those words rang true
and burned like glowing coal
pouring off of every page
like it was written in my soul
from me to you

this cd is so sad and sweet, tracy's voice just melts in my heart every time i play it, which is often.