Customer Reviews

Bande a Part-Limited

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This new Nouvelle Vague CD, Bande a Part, is ridiculously good. So far I'm only on track 4, and all I have to say is HOLY MOLY this is a yummy CD!! They cover "new wave/alternative/post punk" songs from the 80s--Bauhaus, Echo and the Bunnymen, Buzzcocks, Blondie, Billy Idol, New Order with a twist: set to a Latin rhythm for the most part. (I had never heard of this band until a few weeks ago, and apparently they have three CDs out now. Whoops!)

Heard "Heart of Glass" oiginally and thought to myself, "clever." I then heard "The Killing Moon" and loved it. I also liked "Fade to Grey" a lot but I have totally fallen in love with "Don't Go." Once I listen to that a couple hundred times, I'll move on to "Dancing with Myself!"

Now, aside from Billy Idol, Blondie and U2, I haven't heard much of the other groups, though I know that they were huge back in the 80s (sorry, as a teen in suburbs of NJ, I grew up solely on top twenty pop, unfortunately, until I went to college). I religiously watched John Hughes movies, so I had a passing acquaintance with the artists who created this music. And I owned the "Pretty in Pink" soundtrack, so I knew who the Psychedelic Furs and Echo and the Bunnymen were. I also knew some New Order stuff.

I worked with a cool girl who was a huge fan of Bauhaus and I hung out with her a bit and listened to a lot of their stuff. She also introduced me to Ska (Philly style), and I started hanging out at a post-punk/alternative club seconds before the Seattle grunge scene hit.

I'm saying all of this to say that I haven't been COMPLETELY ignorant of alternative music of the late 70s and 80s!! What this CD is saying to me is taking a piece of music and changing it to suit a different style with brilliant results shows you the quality of the song to begin with.

Now I'm going to have to go back and pick up some of this stuff in its original form.

If you're sick of listening to chicks sing about how hot they are and how much hotter they are than the other girls, and dudes rapping and singing about how they're going to have sex with you six different ways from Sunday, pick up this CD. Seriously.

Caught these beautiful people in a private broadcast session from Seattle's Bumber Shoot festival last month and had to have the CD--does not disappoint!

High quality eclectic musicianship includes willowy vocals, percussion master equally facile with hands or sticks, tasteful guitar. Very fresh. Yessss!

I'm one of the listeners who isn't totally familiar with most of the 70s/80s originals ... and maybe because of that I really find that this album stands alone. The 'Nouvelle Vague' style given to all of these covers is intriguing and definitely catchy. Those who like bossa nova and the new soft-voiced European style should check into this album. The vocals unexpectedly drew me in and captured me after several listens ... but the instrumentation is excellent. Relaxing. Two tracks - 'Dance With Me' and 'O Pamela' - stand out in this album, both for their bittersweet intrigue. After listening to the album several times through, though, it was 'Ever Fallen in Love' and 'Escape Myself' that really stuck in my head ... so that later on I'd find myself humming different parts from these two ... and then have to listen to them again just to get them right. Bande a Part is standalone ... but I myself bought it with Nouvelle Vague's self-titled cd, so I feel that these two really go hand-in-hand, with the consistent style. Both are definitely keepers -- I can listen to them over and over regularly, and haven't tired of them yet.

I had heard the stuff about 2 years ago, and buy it only now. Angel's voices and pretty sound of a songs we thought we knew well :) It's still playing in my headphones as I'm typing these words. "Dance with me" & "Confusion" are my favorite. Don't miss this album.

I was familiar with their music when I bought this CD, but after listening to it twice, it has become boring. Same type of music over and over again, same type of voice, etc. Maybe it's just me, but now my CD is confined forever in the bookcase.

"Bande A Part," the second album by Nouvelle Vague, follows the same formula as the first, offering up clever covers of new wave/punk/new romantic oldies from the 1970s and '80s -- some are brilliant reinterpretations, such as their take on Echo & The Bunnymen's "Killing Moon" (which opens the album) and "Dance With Me," from Lords Of The New Church, which are recast as introspective cabaret ballads. There are other surprises, such as a coy music-hall rendition of Billy Idol's "Dancing With Myself" that actually manages to invest the song with a resonant emotional core, or their spin at U2's "In The Name Of Love," a song that's easy to despise if you lived through the early years of MTV and Reagan-era Top 40 radio , but here is a pleasant sort of a lark. The novelty wears off mid-album, though, and some listeners will be forgiven for thinking this is an idea best taken in moderate doses - in a college radio freeform mix, for example. All in all, nice, clean fun, with the best songs front-loaded in the first half of the album. (DJ Joe Sixpack, Slicpue music reviews)

Not sure if I just don't like the songs they've chosen to redo here so much, or if the problem is that nothing interesting or new has been done with them. Either way, I only end up listening to "killing moon" "Bela Lugosi's dead" and a couple others. The self-titled album was great throughout.

Nouvelle Vague's laidback versions of everyone's fav 1980's pop are irreverent and sly. My fav is the Cover of Billy Idol's "Dancing with Myself." Their fun cover of Idol's song is the theme for TLC's hit show L. A. Ink. Sassy!

I am familiar with about 95% of the original songs on this album, so I went into listening to this with the usual scepticism. Turns out though, this album both pays homage to the originals, yet makes them their own. The actual music on this recording is extremely well played/recorded & you can hear all of the little nuances. Sometimes the singing & the music get a little washed out by their use of ambient noises, but all in all, it a well done album.

I saw one reviewer saying all his female friends like it & I can see why it would be considered more of a "chick" album, but I think their are enough guys who can relate to the original (mostly from the 80s) songs & appreciate this album. It's not for everyone. I am the first to admit that it can grate on my nerves sometime in the fluffy washy kind of way the voice sings, but that's why I have so much music to choose from.

In general though, I am glad I got a random point in this direction.

I was waiting for a new Nouvelle Vague record, the first one was a rare, original and yet classic animal, and there are'nt that many gems like that.
This disk has the same sonic qualities, but it lacks the edge the first one had, the songs are'nt as energetic and plane not as good.