Customer Reviews

Higher & Higher: Best of

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

 

 

I am a Heaven 17 fan from way back. I owed Penthouse and Pavement, How Men Are and The Luxery Gap on vinyl. The funny thing is I don't think I've ever met anyone else who owned them. Most people have barely even heard of Heaven 17. What a shame.
This greatest hits disc does a good job spanning the group's diverse, yet small catalog. Most likely, all the songs you are looking for are here. Heaven 17's work can be classified in two main categories. Some songs (e.g. Fascist Groove Thing, I'm Your Money, Penthouse and Pavement) are very techno/synth-driven. Other songs (e.g. Let Me Go, Sunset Now, Contenders) have more of a horn-based R

I cannot begin to tell you how long I've been searching for this c.d.Both Virgin and Tower could not order it. Imagine my delight when I saw it on Amazon!Heaven 17 has set presedence over some of the lame "electro" groups from the 90's and the last decade. Injecting real sound and voice and soul may I add, to a sometimes bleak and often dismissed sound of electonic music and lyrics. Songs like,"Penthouse and Pavement" and "Let me go", serve as a backbone to any group trying to fuse 80's electro and heartfelt lyrics and ryhme.

Mr Williams seems to be pursuing a typically north American right-wing agenda here. I'm a music journalist and H17 happen to be pals of mine, and a nicer bunch of blokes you couldn't hope to meet. They made some great records, and continue to with the new Before After CD, and happen to have fairly committed political opinions. So did Pete Seeger and Phil Ochs, The Weavers, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez and many more. Does he want to ban them too?

In the week after the London bombings when George Bush said the US would stand shoulder to shoulder with the UK while at the same time forbidding US troops to visit London from their outlying spy posts at Mildenhall et al, I have a few choice words for Mr Williams, and these are those: Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Chile, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Grenada...

Make reparations for your country's behaviour in those countries and then maybe you can start lecturing the rest of the world. Until then, button your lip and let the rest of us party to H17.

John Gill.

Mr. Williams can take his opinions to another forum for discussion. Cheers to you Mr. Gill. I really enjoyed Higher and Higher, and recommend it to all lovers of H17 and their songs. Some of their more political lyrics I might add are as relevant today as they were in the 80's. Fascism abounds today in the USA due in large part to the Neo-cons like Paul Weyrich, Rupert Murdoch, Richard Mellon Scaife, Richard deVos, Nelson Bunker Hunt, and Jeffery Coors, just to name a few, who have more dollars then sense to throw around to purchase and poison the public airways of Amerika with their vapid drivel. (Their fear mongering pap) So while US merchantilists, militarists, religious right fanatics, and their army of psuedo-intellectual apologists and social engineers prepare for Armageddon, the rest of humanity should just lay down and take it? I think not. I'll join with Mr. Gill and those of his ilk and dance and party to the tunes that helped me live through the beginning of the new dark ages under Reagan, looming ever darker now through GW.Bush. The cd is brilliant! Get it!!

I love Heaven 17! During the late 70's and through the 80's I was a nightclub DJ and later a club owner and played Heaven 17.

It is a shame the liberal political left is always so negative and miserable about everything. Just because someone is successful and happy in life that doesn't make them a facist. Relax and enjoy the music! This is a great compilation from a great group. It's a shame everything has to be political from the left.

GROW UP AND GET A LIFE!!!

i agree with mr. gill. couldn't have been better said.

and mr. williams, instead of having your children listen to H17 to "show them the emptyness on most of the politcal left", perhaps you should have them read howard zinn's peoples history of the united states, or any noam chomsky. perhaps they should be enlightened on how the powers that be will persuade them and use manipulative tactics to get them to go along with whatever the neo-cons chosen cause of the moment may be.

This band is worse than the Thompson Twins. It sounds like three kids in their garage whining about politics. I got the album to see what the original version of Temptation sounded like, since Cradle of Filth put a good version of it on their latest album, and am amazed that people would actually listen to that (or throw out a reminder that Heaven 17 actually existed). I am a big fan of the 80s, but not of bad music. Heaven 17 stinks. The fact that people would argue about their music is simply shocking.

I'm just writing about the group not really about this cd. I
remember quite well Fascist Groove Thang, and still listen to it
on a compilation cd I have. Isn't it just so funny that as youths we could listen to this and not really hear the words,
(i.e. "Reagan is President Elect, Fascists are advancing")? I play that song to my teenage kids now and show them the emptyness on most of the politcal left, and how they will use names like Cowboy (to Reagan and now Bush) and the ever popular "Fascist" when they've totally run out of real debate. Great stuff, my how little things have changed. I also remember the English Beat ("Stand Down Margret"), Phil Collins (had a video with a puppet Reagan pushing the button), Frankie Goes to Hollywood "Two Tribes", showing Reagan vs Breshnev or Gorbachav in a sand pit wrestling. Just really stupid things that in the long run made me wonder if there wasn't some manipulation going on with the record execs and the material they were/are (i.e Eminem) dictating what the masses should listen to. I know it's a business and all about the bottom line but still makes me wonder if something bashing the left would have 1: sold just as well (or as little cause Heaven 17 ain't no big success), and 2: been treated with the non eyebrow raising this stuff got (I see websites condeming nationalistic punk rock all over the place). I hope it makes you think.