Fire of Love [Original recording reissued]

The Gun Club | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (January 16, 2001)
• Original Release Date: 1981
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Original recording reissued
• Label: Rhino / Wea
• ASIN: B00004YLBI
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Audio Cassette  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Music
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (40 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #156,214 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #79 in Music > Alternative Rock > American Alternative > Psychobilly

Track Listings

1. Sex Beat

2. Preaching The Blues

3. Promise Me

4. She's Like Heroin To Me

5. For The Love Of Ivy

6. Fire Spirit

7. Ghost On The Highway

8. Jack On Fire

9. Black Train

10. Cool Drink Of Water

11. Goodbye Johnny

Editorial Reviews

The Gun Club, Fire of Love

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars ESSENTIAL May 27, 2004

By Chauncey Gardner

Format:Audio CD

"Gonna buy me a graveyard of my own
kill everyone who ever done me wrong
gonna buy me a gun just as long as my arm
kill everyone who ever done me harm"

Quite possibly one of the most perfect albums ever. From start to finish every track reeks of originality. Even their interpretation of PREACHIN THE BLUES swaggers and stabs at your ear. Los Angeles owes a debt of gratitude to THE GUN CLUB, X and countless other bands from the late 70's and early 80's. They've allowed a city steeped in musical fad to retain an aura of credibility. This album, like countless albums from the GOLDEN AGE at SLASH remains timeless and influential.

In the new garage rawk era of WHITE STRIPES, YEAH YEAH YEAHS and other standard bearers, FIRE OF LOVE proves just how far ahead of the curve JEFFREY LEE PIERCE and company were. I've owned this album for three decades now, and I still come back to it several times in the course of the year. The songs on FIRE OF LOVE remain raw and fresh, holding up remarkably well. For any fans of THE BIRTHDAY PARTY, X, BEASTS OF BOURBON, THE SCIENTISTS, CRAMPS, etc. Your LA Underground education begins here. BUY THIS RECORD NOW!

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Never too late to start now August 25, 2003

By Greekfreak

Format:Audio CD

I must admit having discovered Jeffrey Lee Pierce and the Gun Club far too late in life; hell, I was only six when this came out, but true "punk" should never be overlooked as this band has been.

"Sex Beat", "Cool Drink Of Water Blues", and "She's Like Heroin To Me" are on constant rotation where I'm concerned, but this is high art at full throttle going downhill into oncoming traffic. It hits as hard as any mainstream punk or metal album of the day, and as such, deserves to be heard by all who care.

15 of 18 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Punk-Blues Pinnacle February 6, 2003

By Maria H. R. Souza

Format:Audio CD

Gun Club manages to melt punk rage, blues-drenched despair and schizophrenic psychobilly on their unforgettable, fantastic debut. Drived by Jeffrey Lee Pierce sneaky, eerie voodoo-howls, the wailing, bleak, storming up tempo guitar of Ward Dotson and the fierce manic beat of Rob Ritter-Terry Graham rhythm section, the band delivered their songs - haunting tales of sex, terror, damnation, violence & desperate love - with harsh, passionate abandon. Pierce's career was short and tragic, but he had the firepower to lead this fantastic combo through the recording of an album of timelessly roughshod and unruly psycho-punk-blues, perhaps the first - and easily the best - of its kind. "Fire of Love" is bona-fide rock'n'roll bliss, an album that defies time idyosincrasies and music ephemeral fashions.

14 of 18 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Essential for any respectable rock and roll collection. June 6, 2005

By Bachelier

Format:Audio CD

The greatest rock and roll album ever made. With the standard makeup of vocals, guitar, bass, and drums, The Gun Club stripped away the fluffy production of the 70s that had infected even LA Punk bands and reached through the fog of corn whisky to the very swamp culture of depravity that inspired rock and roll in the first place. This is the album Panther Burns and Alex Chilton hoped to record, but never approached, and only the Cramps ever become a worthy satellite of. This is the Elvis we all always knew was underneath the jumpsuit when he said his backup singers "smell like catfish." Let us hold in abeyance the current faux-worship of Jeffrey Lee Pierce that has become a pedestrian given for dead rock figures. On the internet he has been elevated to the Jim Morison Throne of insightful poet. He never was, and I could care less, for the raw animal sensuality that the simple lyrics, beat, and illustrations Fire of Love offers are the only poetics one needs. Here is the invitation to the Bacchanal, with both Ivy and wine present, a mystery religion whose rites are held in the dark, we are lured there by the sounds of the lyre and drums of animal skin, but it all ends in a primal scream, and is as inevitable and as welcome as our own death.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Classic Punk Blues December 19, 2001

By R. Edward Poole

Format:Audio CD

Nowadays, punk-twinged blues acts like The Strokes and White Stripes are getting a lot of ink in the music press -- and deservedly so, as "Is this It?" and "White Blood Cells" (respectively) should make most "Best of 2001" lists that are soon to shower down. (to be fair, The Strokes owe more to Iggy, Lou Reed and The Wedding Present than they do to MC5 and the Gun Club -- but the punk blues influence is there, too.) In this atmosphere, music buyers would do well to check out some of the source material.

Undeniably, "Fire of Love" is one of the classic punk blues records. From Jeffrey Lee Pierce's wailing pleas (and pleading wails, for that matter) to the driving beat and sharp (Telecaster?) jangles of the guitars, this is a powerful and raw burst of creativity and passion. The band never regained this form -- as Jeffrey Lee numbed himself with drugs, the "Fire" went out of the band. Unlike Kurt Cobain, who went out with a bang (ouch, sorry for the bad taste pun!) after putting out the rawest work of his life, Pierce and the Gun Club (version 17) went out with a whimper (his trashed body gave out after surgery) after putting out the weakest and least inspired music of his career. Still, the sad real life tale of the Gun Club only heightens the emotional impact of "Fire of Love" -- for me, anyway. If you like classic punk rock, with a blues flavor, you owe it to yourself to pick up this album. ...

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Gonna buy me a graveyard... July 20, 2006

By G. Mitchell

Format:Audio CD

Simply put, this is one of the best albums ever, and save for THE CLASH's LONDON CALLING, I think THE GUN CLUB's FIRE OF LOVE just might be the best rock album ever, hands down, no contest. As a matter of fact, SEX BEAT just might be the best rock-n-roll song ever recorded, summing up the raw, ragged, sexy, unholy power of rock past, present, & future in under three minutes - but isn't that how the best of rock should be? I mistrust the current Jeffrey Lee Pierce idol worship circa 2006 - all I know is, I got this LP when it first came out on Slash in the early 80s as a teen and haven't stopped playing it since - it's almost three decades old and still puts most everything else in its path to shame. JLP and THE GUN CLUB never quite managed to scale these heights ever again (even if parts of MIAMI and LAS VEGAS are nice) - if you don't own this, you don't know good music, period.