Up the Bracket [Single, Extra tracks, Import]

The Libertines | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (November 18, 2002)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Single, Extra tracks, Import
• Label: Spunk
• ASIN: B00007G73D
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (84 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #882,917 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Vertigo

2. Death on the Stairs

3. Horrorshow

4. Time for Heroes

5. Boys in the Band

6. Radio America

7. Up the Bracket

8. Tell the King

9. The Boy Looked at Johnny

10. Begging

11. The Good Old Days

12. I Get Along

13. What a Waster [*]

14. Mayday [*]

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Believe the hype machine, this is a great record!, May 9, 2003

By 

Cary S. Whitt "Tune Junkie" (Columbus,Ohio USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Up the Bracket (Audio CD)

Like everyone else, I've heard all the comparisions, all the hype, and definitely all of the vaulted expectations for this band long before "Up The Bracket" had a release date.

I'm here to put your worries to rest folks. This indeed, is a great record. Oh yes, they sound like The Jam one minute, Madness the next and sometimes even The Clash too, but don't let that make you put this album back on the shelf. There is enough depth, talent and fun to rise far above the imitations.

"Up The Bracket" is filled with your classic Brit-punk single fare. Time For Heroes, What A Waster and Boys In The Band, all fit this bill to a "t." Every song is well written with great, sing-a-long pop melodies and a touch of punk angst and matching tempo thrown in for good measure. I also love tunes like Vertigo and Death On The Stairs for their Smiths-like musings. Somehow, the band bring all these influences and attitudes together throughout the entire record with some help from great production, or lack there-of. It's this production (coming from Mick Jones of The Clash) that has enough attitude and raw energy to fill a Sex Pistol yacht party. Making "Up The Bracket" the latest great link in the Brit-Rock chain.

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This Is It, March 25, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Up the Bracket (Audio CD)

I had heard a bit about this band before I heard it playing in the CD store and impulse-bought it. Any given review of "Up The Bracket" compared it to the same set of bands: The Clash, The Jam, The Kinks, and The Strokes. As much as I loved the Strokes' debut album, The Libertines are doing it better...The melodies are more complex, the hooks are catchier, the production is rawer. This album will insinuate itself into heavy rotation on your stereo if you give it a chance. The faster, punkier songs will grab your attention at first, but it's the slower tracks that really stick.
Apparently there are two singers (though i can't tell who's who), and they are both big fans of degenerate debauchery. It sounds like they have to play this way or die, and its this urgency that's kept the best tracks on my iPod, and in my head, for the past week.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Stylish Kids, December 29, 2004

By 

Martin Dawson (Royton, Oldham, United Kingdom) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Up the Bracket (Audio CD)

Rock 'n' Roll Mythology. The Band as Mates. Albion. The Last Gang In Town. And so on...
Certain bands invite this. The belief that they are more important than just the music. We are talking lifestyle decisions, I suppose. Whilst The Clash obviously spring to mind in this respect (and courtesy of Mick Jones' production and the very nature of these songs I suppose they have to be the obvious reference point here in many regards...) it is equally as obvious that so do The Libertines.
This is rowdy, this is frantic rock 'n' roll and this is -crucially- about walking it like you talk it. "But I've never seen those flowers in the barrel of your gun" sneers Carl Barat poetically at one stage. Crucially.
There is nothing approaching a bad song, no filler, nothing less than rousing. Whether we're talking about Pete Doherty's perfect anthem of 'A Time For Heroes' where riots, "truncheons and shields", suspected infidelities and scenes of wasted youth meet and meld seamlessly or the song 'Up The Bracket' itself, almost tripping itself up in its running-ahead-of-itself frenzy what we are actually talking about is classic song after classic song.
The distinctions between pop, rock and punk are now so blurred that I didn't listen to this album initially and think 'oh, it's punk'. I thought 'oh my god, what SONGS!'. Things have moved on and there is nothing of the shock of the 'new' here - just quality songwriting. Which is more than enough.
'Vertigo' feels just right, just like it should as a dizzying opener and then 'Death On The Stairs' retains the air of bravado and so on...Each song a rush of adrenaline itself.
I sincerely believe that this is one of the best 20 albums ever released and am confident that it will last.
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of the band whose personal problems are well-documented. Sadly.
So...
The Libertines may well die. In the class they were born. But that's a class of their own. My love.