Lovelife

Lush | Format: MP3 Download

Product Details

• Original Release Date: March 5, 1996
• Label: Reprise
• Copyright: 1996 4 A.D.
• Genres: Alternative Rock/British Alternative, Alternative Rock/Indie & Lo-Fi
• ASIN: B00122GDRY
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (26 customer reviews)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Off-The-Beaten-Path Album, March 13, 2003

By 

Randy Given (Manchester, CT USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Lovelife (Audio CD)

This is a great off-the-beaten-path album. Years ago I got this for one or two songs and I find that I play it quite often, usually from beginning to end. There are surprisingly few albums that I do that with.

Their is a fair range of styles, but it basically is a girl-voice band with attitude, but style. The name "lush" is appropriate -- for the style and the playing. Kinda a laid-back lush playing.

The album starts out with an in-your-face rejection of womanizers ("Ladykillers"), but realizes that both sexes are doing the same things to each other. "Heaven Nobodies" is almost like that -- something snappy but you almost forget about the title before the song ends. "Shake Baby Shake" is almost a Kate Bush simple tune (ala the movie "She's Having a Baby"). "I've Been Here Before" is almost a morning-after to the "Ladykillers" opening -- a realization of what is going on around the scene. "Papason" and "Tralala" are more mellow and evening songs.

If there is one song that I play over and over, it would have to be "Last Night". It takes me back to evenings of watching "Miami Vice" with the driving down slick streets in a fast, sleek car -- an absent-minded mood with swooping backups.

Only to be rocked awake with "Runaway". I think they could have ordered the songs a little differently. The same goes for "Childcatcher", a good song in its own rite, but it almost should have been on a different album.

Oh, "Olympia". Now, that is softer than "Last Night", especially with the flute intro. This is clearly my favorite song from this album (but second most played). Your heart cries with slight pain and slight joy, especially as the strings come in. You feel "Olympia" throughout your body.

Definitely an album to recommend, but fairly safe that others have not heard of it. Give it as a gift -- they may be pleasantly surprised.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars not alone?, April 3, 2004

By 

Saudade (Cebolla, Spain) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lovelife (Audio CD)

This is one of my top albums, after I first heard it on the radio I knew it had to be mine forever. It reflects perfectly the feeling that floats around girls in fear of becoming spinsters, or the contumacy for Saturday outings in the hope of coming back home not alone. It contains the quintessential British superficial-deepness, neither wanting to think about the problems, nor letting you explode with joy (because you know there is something else behind the dancing queen).

And, of course, the duet with Jarvis Cocker (Pulp) is one of those sexy duets that deserve a place in pop history (almost as a kind of Gainsbourg-Birkin duet with country arrangements). I think there is a connection between those two British groups (Pulp and Lush), but you can find similarities in other groups that combine that apparent carelessness with melancholy (...).

If you are fond of bittersweet-but-catchy melodies, this is your record, but listen to it only once in a while. It has the power of making you want to dance while you're listening to it, and make you want to sob when the music leaves you...alone. So don't listen to it before going to bed, but before going out, and put on your sexiest clothes!!!

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars IN THE AFTERMATH OF PAIN..., September 28, 2000

By 

EriKa "E" (Iceland) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lovelife (Audio CD)

This is an intelligible and mainstream departure from their previous efforts like Gala and Spooky. Those albums were landmarks in ethereal, lovely, layered noise. Lovelife goes in a direction that Lush started to go in their last album, very clear lyrics with universal themes and lots of guitars.

"Blondie was with me for a summer, he flirted like a maniac but I wouldn't bite. I'm weak and he was so persistent. He only had to have me cause I put up a fight..." in the excellent opener, "Ladykillers". "Ladykillers" is a song to which all women who have dealt with men who are "players" can relate.

The album is brilliant overall and definitely a move in the right direction for Lush, but I feel it falls apart with some of the songs at the end. Nothing comes close to the sheer force of "Ladykillers", although track 4, claiming, "I've tried to be strong, I've tried to be tough. I think that this time I've had more than enough. I've seen too much of your games and your immature stuff. You're a waste of time" and track 6 ("Single Girl" which tells a roundabout story of a girl who doesn't want to be single and alone anymore... but ends with her wanting to be single again-weighing the negative and positive elements of relationships within the course of a three minute song) are brilliant songs. Another superb addition to this album is a duet with Pulp's Jarvis Cocker called "Ciao!" which also takes a slight roundabout approach, with both parties in the song expressing their bitterness toward each other after their breakup. The song starts with each claiming to be so happy to be "rid" of the other, but by the end each is happy to be "over" the other one. Kind of clever and true-to-life... people tend to be bitter in the end of a relationship and throw barbs at each other, of which this song is FULL!

There are a couple of songs with dreamy, old "shoegazing" Lush stylistics. For the most part, though, this is a mature development for a great band.