Customer Reviews

Rattlesnakes

5 star:		(33)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Rattlesnakes is a nearly perfect pop album. In the late 1980s, the time for singer/songwriters seemed past. But Rattlesnakes showed that lyrically creative material set to jaunty pop tunes still resonated. Whether it is a woman sharing with us the profound pick-up line "do you want to go to heaven, or would you rather not be saved?" or the ironic refrain of being "four flights up" and still feeling like "I'm underground", the lyrics transport us to places we often search out, and rarely hear memorialized in song. The Commotions provide a folk pop backing which is gentle and yet derived from the "rock" tradition much more than the soul or slick pop that would characterize some later Cole work. Cole's voice is expressive--alternatively exuberant, gentle or tinged with despair. With a dozen years' hindsight, we wish that Lloyd Cole's muse and the corporations for which he recorded had continued him down this path, and deflected him from some of the more "hip" and commercial paths he later tried to tread. Still, this is a great work of understated beauty. This album anticipates Duncan Sheik quite a bit, and yet is in some ways more boisterous and witty than Mr. Sheik's excellent first album (which it may well have influenced). If you do not have this one, I strongly urge you to buy it.

When "Rattlesnakes" was first released in 1984, just about every music critic around called Lloyd Cole "The Next Bob Dylan." Sadly, Lloyd Cole couldn't match Dylan's longevity. Still, he flirts with perfection on "Rattlesnakes."

The images are amazing: "She has cheekbones like geometry and eyes like sin," or the perfect simile: "She looks like Eva Marie-Saint in `On the Waterfront.'" Anyone who's seen that film knows how angelic a vision that was.

Some of the songs show Cole's dark sense of fun, sort of like his friend/competitor, Morissey. Still, when the final strains of "Are You Ready to Be Heartbroken" fade slowly away, you can't help but remember every ex- you've ever had, and wonder why you were ever surprised that relationships end badly.

Lloyd Cole showed some flashes of brilliance on his next two albums with the Commotions--especially on "Mainstream"--but he could never top "Rattlesnakes." Hey, who could?

While current popular music is stylistically very far removed from the tree Lloyd was barking up with Rattlesnakes, it is by no means any further ahead. Having listened to Rattlesnakes about 8 billion times in the decade following its release and having formed a very large part of my expectations of adulthood around its lyrics, I was shocked to find during a recent week of listening that it has held up remarkably well.

The album's timeless yet at the same time so firmly grounded in an era. Like almost every one of The Beatles' (yes, I'm aware of what I'm saying here) albums post-Help, Rattlesnakes could have only been recorded when it was and yet there is nothing dated about it. If I knew what it was that allows this to happen I would probably be able to describe it better but I can't. So I'll leave you with this: Rattlesnakes, from track to track, is probably one of the most coherent Albums I've ever heard. Each song is lyrically grounded and blends into the others to form a well crafted whole. Lloyd has written a valentine to the past while looking romantically out to the future. Buy the album, it ain't bad.

As good in its own way as Astral Weeks or Hatful of Hollow or Doolittle or Rubber Soul... Lloyd Cole's first record opened up new doorways and EVEN THOUGH commercial "alternative" music went down a different path, this record shows what COULD HAVE BEEN if we'd all been a little smarter and a little more receptive.

This is really a top CD which should be heard by anyone who have good taste. You like u2, rem, lou reed, suzanne vega? You'll like this one, and others of Lloyd Cole. I promise!

Dont you hate it when everyone else says in their reviews what you are thinking? But its true! Now, I dont know about you but in my minds eye, an album from 24 years ago should be by the Beatles or the Doors or something, I mean 24 years!! There are women on the telly I find attractive that weren't born when I bought this album. Sigh. Yes, its all true. This is perfection, this is one of "those" albums (mental note, must make a list). It sounds like it could have been recorded last week, the songs are busker friendly guitar strummers. And it is just so great. I mean note perfect. How many times have you bought an album on the strength of a single or a review and found it contains 4 good tracks, 3 ok ones and 5 fillers? On Rattlesnakes, the great songs keep on coming and coming. Look, if you have heard it, you wont need me to tell you this, if you have not, what are you wasting your time for reading this? Just go and buy it. Just one more reason, this album has magic powers. Once in a pub in rural Shropshire in 1990, I said to a girl at the bar "You`ve got cheekbones like geometry" and she replied, "And Im sexually enlightened by Cosmopolitan." And it turned out she was! Thats how good this album is. Try doing that with Silent Alarm by Bloc Party!

I can't imagine my world without this album. The song "Are You Ready To Be Heartbroken" first tickled my ear in a mixed tape a friend in middle school made for me. The first time I heard it I felt a little older. I guess it's hard to explain...it's just one of those songs that grabs you by the throat (and heartstrings). It is still in the top ten of my favorite songs...EVER.

The rest of the album is totally stellar. "Forest Fire" is another favorite of mine. Lloyd Cole's voice is so sexy and desperate and fierce all at once. I love the line "there's a forest fire every time we get together." It is an odd despriptive lyric of something so tangible. And that's what so great about Cole's songwriting. It seems like he has a cynical angle on love, but still admires the experience. I think that's true for a lot of people, right?

"2CV" is great too. He has such a tongue-in-cheek style of writing here, decribing the demise of another failed relationship. My favorite line in "2CV" goes "we were never close, if the truth were told, all we ever shared was a taste in clothes." Sometimes his lyrics remind me of Morrisey's work in The Smiths, but a little more down to earth (and a little less dramatic).

The thing that is great about Rattlesnakes is that the sound is so timeless. Considering that it was released in 1984, it coupld have easily sounded like mindless overproduced guitar pop. But it steers way clear of the trappings of most music from that era. It is so simple and modern and totally refreshing.

It makes absolutely no sense why Lloyd Cole isn't totally huge. His subsequent albums with the Commotions were equally brilliant (especailly Mainstream), and he has been consistently recording amazing music for the past 15 years on his own. The only explanation that I can conjure is that Cole's music is so hard to pigeonhole, people didn't know what label to put on it.

Either way, you're a FOOL if you don't know who Lloyd Cole is and don't already own Rattlesnakes. You can redeem yourself buy purchasing it now. Enjoy the heatburn...

Many things come with time: reflection and realisation are not the least of them. Listening to Lloyd Cole eighteen years after the original release of Rattlesnakes brings nothing but pleasure and warmth of memory. The album, like so much of Cole's work, is poised somewhere between absolute emotional torture and the panic of love. Every lyric tells the story of yet another painful four-minute love affair which crosses back and forth between love and excitement, fear and adrenaline.

There has yet to be a lyricist to come close to capturing such confusion, and the voice of Cole spreads a dark light over the words.. All this to the backing of delicate guitars (see Are You Ready To Be Heartbroken) and driving melodies (Perfect Skin). After eighteen years, the only realisation is that I should have kept listening.

Though this probably sounds trite, mere words cannot do this album justice. Despite being 15 years old, this album contiues to sound fresh, new, and vibrant. But that's the least of it....... Lloyd Cole seamlessly blends beautiful rythmns, melodies and heart-wrenching lyrics. The album is a siren, once you've listened to it, it is impossible to resist. The more you listen to it, the more it becomes a part of you. Like a beautiful girl, this album will make you smile.........while it breaks your heart.

One can listen to "Rattlesnakes" in 2004 and not realize that the album was made twenty years ago. The music, although "pop", seems so timeless that in another 20 years it will also seem to have been recorded just a few months ago. The lyrics, too, dealing with love, loss, relationships are timeless. A long time ago Lloyd Cole and the Commotions have managed to achieve a perfect gem, a minor miracle, and to this day it is a joy to listen to.