Customer Reviews

Luxury Gap

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

On the Luxury Gap Heaven 17 made tremendous strides in production and arrangement from their first album. Honestly, a little bit of the soul of the band was lost in the process, but this record still sounds great. It has some of their best work, Let Me Go, which is probably their best known song in the US thanks to KROQ play. Temptation is their biggest UK hit and thanks to guest vocalist Carol Kenyon sounds nothing like the rest of the album. This album also has some of my favorite lesser known songs like Who Will Stop the Rain and The Best Kept Secret.
With this album the band moved firmly away from the technopop/synthpop that the Human League had embraced and into UK Soul/Funk/RnB. But in their own style. Have fun with it.

Every track on here is catchy yet quirky. They even improved a few ("Song with No Name" & "Let's All Make the Bomb") songs from their earlier 'Penthouse & Pavement' album with better arrangements. "Temptation," is one of the best 80's dance-tracks and far too good to remix. Glen Gregory's voice is at its best here. "Let Me Go" is still their best tune. This was before the got meandering and maundering on later albums (think of the wretched orchestral excess of "And That's No Lie," or the process cheese-loaf of "Trouble"). When anyone says "Yeah, that reminds me of Heaven 17" this is the album they allude to.

Nothing beats the extended mix of 'Let Me Go' Infact its better than the edited version. Both of which are found here and for good reason. 'We Live So Fast' is my favorite off the album. Its classic 80's dance music at its best!

A different music style in comparison to penthouse and pavement, but also a very great album. "Let me go" is one of the greatest pop songs in the synthie-era. But there are quiet a lot of other pearls of pop-history on this cd. Spend your time with "Lady Ice and Mr. Hex". Enjoy.

If you have listened to Erasure, Thompson Twins, early Depeche Mode, Yaz, then you must have this album. It's upbeat, with one or two nice ballads. Some of the tunes may be familiar to the US audience, in Europe it was big in the 80's.

A funk pop offering from a splinter of 3 off of the Human League with some great tunes and great lyrics. Remember the '80's? Remember Thatcher? Remember the Yuppies? All these things come back to the minds eye when hearing these tracks again.
The album may sound a little dated but its that very quality that makes it so memorable!

The new versions of "Let's All Make A Bomb" and "Song With No Name" that were included in the original cassete release in the US in place of "Who'll Stop The Rain" made this a much better listen than it's current format. Just a heads up if you, like me, have memories of this version rather than the version that is released here.

This CD contains some of the best dance synth-pop of the early 80's. In addition they write some very dramatic music here on tracks like "The Best Kept Secret". The sound is very rich and layered featuring horn sections, piano, guitar, string section, hand-claps and drum machine and some amazing synthesized melodies.

Not much material taken from this CD that appears on "Higher and Higher" is of much note here aside from "The Best Kept Secret", but on the other hand just buy "Penthouse and Pavement", "The Luxury Gap" and "How Men Are" and you have all the music that "Higher and Higher" covers.

The new versions of "Let's All Make A Bomb" and "Song With No Name" appear on "Endless" another best of collection covering their 3 first full-length releases.

This 3-star rating is based not only on the quality of the material ~ which would be more accurately presented as 4-stars ~ but also on the alternate product available that encapsulates most of the works on this CD.

...but adequate. Some songs (Lady Ice and Mr. Hex) are barely listenable in 2002, but they were catchy enough in their day. At core, if you were to buy only one Heaven 17 album, this wouldn't be it, you'd be better served by a greatest hits collection. On the other hand, there are a couple of good tracks (i.e. Temptation) that are among the best Brit-Funk of the 80s.

classic thats all i can say. every song is a winner from start to finish.

The Luxury Gap is not bad. There's some good stuff throughout. Heaven 17 plays listenable synth pop. The musicianship, songwriting, and production are solid. Some of the material is quite catchy. Glenn Gregory does well with the vocals, and the album also features some nice keyboard work. The songs on The Luxury Gap tend to be busier musically than the ones on Penthouse and Pavement. These songs have a little more meat to them. My favorite song is "Let Me Go." I believe that's the first song I ever heard from this group. It's really a cool tune. I also like the lyrics to "Key to the World." The Luxury Gap is worth a listen.