Customer Reviews

We Love Life

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(17)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

In England, Pulp is known as the little band that could. After more than a decade of hard work & obscurity, they finally caught the public's attention with 1992's SEPARATIONS, coming at the start of the Britpop explosion Pulp helped gave birth to. Their subsequent albums were shining examples of the trend, but with leader Jarvis Cocker's highly original & biting lyrics to counter the infectious melodies. While bands like Oasis & the Verve relished in the excess that success brought them (and subsequently imploded), Jarvis wasn't impressed by it all, as albums like 1998's extremely dark THIS IS HARDCORE proved.

That album was an all-around stunner & one that following up would seem like a challenge. It sure turned out to be, for WE LOVE LIFE had originally been recorded (and almost completed) with producer Chris Thomas, famous for his work with artists like Elton John. At the last minute, Jarvis wasn't happy with the result & immediately returned to the studio to start from scratch. This time, the man in the producer's chair would be American-born British cult icon Scott Walker. As it turned out, Jarvis' change of heart was warranted, as WE LOVE LIFE manages to overtake even HARDCORE's genius & with a much lighter mood.

At first, the marriage between Jarvis' literate lyrics & Scott's Phil Spector-inspired production techniques would seem like an odd one, but as I kept hearing in the year after WE LOVE LIFE's European release, it worked surprisingly well. As songs like the 8-minute epic "Wickerman" prove, it sure did. The near-whispered vocals & alternately lush & dissonant music make for a spellbinding listening experience. I can just imagine Scott Walker's distinctive baritone singing a song like this.

But a title like WE LOVE LIFE indicates a much brighter affair than THIS IS HARDCORE & in some ways it is, with Scott's expansive production giving the songs room to move & definitely easier to listen to. The near-title track "I Love Life" is one that could have been released back in Britpop's heyday & easily become a hit & is the most obvious example of Jarvis' mellowing out without dulling his edge. "Bob Lind" (remember him from "Elusive Butterfly"?) has Jarvis regaining his dark humor for a song that looks at a musician long after his heyday has passed. Hopefully, Jarvis isn't prediciting his own fate, for I believe he still has a lot to say. On the other hand, songs like "Bad Cover Version" (which even features a subtle dig at Scott Walker himself!), "The Night That Minnie Temperley Died" & "Roadkill" are some of the most downbeat & shocking lyrics Jarvis has ever written, proving that the production may be bright, but the words can still darken.

While Jarvis still has some bones to pick in his lyrics, WE LOVE LIFE has hints of him finding some sense of peace, as evidenced by the nature theme of some songs. "Weeds", "Weeds II", "The Trees", "The Birds In Your Garden" (an actual love song!) & "Sunrise" have Jarvis seeing both the comfort & uncertainty nature & civilization bring. Again, Scott Walker's production is enough to warrant equal billing on the cover, but it doesn't result in Pulp simply singing on a Scott Walker album.

WE LOVE LIFE's recording history is certainly a twisted one, but that doesn't compare to its releasing. It came out in Europe in October of 2001, but nothing planned for an American release. I first heard in April of 2002, but then it kept being pushed back a month (distribution problems, I believe) & I wondered if it would ever come out in the U.S. at all. Well, it's here finally & I must say it's every bit of a tour de force. For a band that's been around for as long as Pulp has (more than 2 decades), such a classic would seem unlikely that late in their career. Yet it's worked for both Pulp & Scott Walker, who really ought to come out of the darkness & record more often. Scott has had an influence on singers like David Bowie, Nick Cave & even Jarvis Cocker himself, so let's hope an album like WE LOVE LIFE will help alert people not just to Pulp's talents, but Scott's as well & maybe even result in some recognition in his own right. There's no better time for it than now.

It seemed appropriate that Pulp should one day be produced by legendary pop recluse Scott Walker. Jarvis has always cited Walker as an important precursor, and Pulp's mix of catchy pop, big choruses, rich settings and dark lyrical content connects with the singer's late-60s, Jacques Brel-inspired output. The result is Pulp's most 60s-sounding album to date, a move away from the disco-John Barry melange that made them famous. This is not the hackneyed 60s of Beatles/Stones/Hendrix/Dylan that has become so wearyingly familiar, but the 60s of Phil Spector (the brittle, Wall of Sound production; the ringing bells of 'Bad Cover Version'), Brian Wilson, Nancy and Lee, Ennio Morricone (especially those ethereal backing vocals against a Western soundscape), the garage snarl of early Velvet Underground, the orchestral flourishes of Walker himself.

But it is the later, more intractable and experimental Walker that seems to govern the album. On initial listens especially, 'We Love Life' has an ugly, claustrophobic feel, short on the epic melodies and accumulative euphoria that made even Jarvis' more misanthropic outpourings so exhilarating. There are songs which sound like old Pulp - the long autobiographical narrative monologue 'Wickerman', the pop jangles of 'I Love Life' and 'Bob Lind'; but these have a tendency to collapse into listener-hostile noise: 'I Love Life' ends in an anguished Gothic scream; the double-bass pleasantly underlaying 'Bob Lind' soon swamps the song in dissonance; the spaghetti western epiphany of the bleak urban history 'Wickerman' is darkened by storm rumbles.

Subsequent exposure doesn't make 'We Love Life' any prettier or more accessible, but it does reveal it as one of the most remarkable albums in years (since 'This is Hardcore', probably). It is a concept album: like the Beach Boys' 'Sunflower', its theme is nature. Far from ecology or pastoral, however, Jarvis is obsessed with weeds, fungus, sprawling overgrowth covering the marks of neglected human activity, rivers dried up or running into sewers, as sterile and unrefrreshing as forgottin lives: 'You're in the land of the living, but there are so few signs of life'. Inevitably, the personal and private become political, but Jarvis' anger is never pompous or posturing, always focused and rooted. The distorted-Spector triptych of the lovely, theremin-humming 'Birds in your garden', 'Bob Lind' and 'Bad Cover Version' count as some of the finest music Pulp have ever written. I can think of no other artist - with the exception of Scott Walker - who have responded to popular acclaim with a genuine artistic adventurousness liable to alienate it. Welcome back Pulp. We missed you.

After their 1995 album Different Class practically defined the sound of mid-nineties Britpop, Pulp returned three years later with the grim, uneven, yet excellent This Is Hardcore, on which they branched out their sound a lot more. It can be seen as a transition album, but upon listening to it, it sounds like they didn't know which direction to take. In 2000, Pulp had the follow-up in the can, but decided ultimately to scrap it. There seemed to be so little focus that their future really looked seriously in doubt. However, their decision to collaborate with reclusive producer Scott Walker this year finally pointed them in the right direction, and 3 1/2 years after This Is Hardcore, Pulp has put out their true defining album. Sort of a combination of the themes explored on their two previous albums, We Love Life tackles both the social satire of Different Class and the introspection of This Is Hardcore, but this time around, the satire is less bitter, and their overall view of things is considerably more optimistic.

Pulp's sound is, and will always be, centred around the lyrics of singer Jarvis Cocker. One of the most talented lyricists in pop music today, Cocker's imagery and self-deprecating humour make each Pulp album more of an experience, like a Mike Leigh film or an Irvine Welsh novel, than a mere collection of tunes. From the music to the lyrics to the artwork, Pulp remain leaders in the the album as an art form, which, sadly, is a dying art.

'Weeds' and 'Weeds II' continue the sharp social satire where 'Mis-Shapes' and 'Common People' left off ("we are weeds, vegetation, dense undergrowth"), while 'The Night Minnie Timperley Died' and 'Bob Lind' are effective character sketches, and the gorgeous and funny 'The Trees' ("those useless trees, they never said that you were leaving") as well as the lush 'Birds In Your Garden' are love songs that only Cocker is able to write. The album's penultimate song, 'Roadkill', is the darkest song before the album closes with the soaring strings and choirs of 'Sunrise'.

By far the best song on We Love Life is the eight-minute masterpiece 'Wickerman', a spoken-word tale of Cocker's earlier life in Sheffield, centred around the river that runs through the city, "beneath the old Trebor factory that burned down in the early seventites...beneath pudgy fifteen year-olds addicted to coffee whitener". This is Cocker at his virtuosic best. 'Wickerman' also has one of the best samples I've heard used in a long time, a subtle acoustic guitar sample from the film The Wicker Man that, unless you've seen the movie, you'll hardly notice is a sample.

Holding the entire album together is the great work done by Walker. This Is Hardcore was all over the place in its musical styles, but here Walker reins everything in, creating a full, warm sound, with lovely orchestral touches, but never overdone.

One could argue how much better Different Class is than We Love Life, but a good part of the success of that album was its lightning-in-a-bottle timing. We Love Life won't generate five hit singles like Different Class did, but it's a more mature album, more optimistic, hence the title. If you're still doubtful, dear reader, read this classic Cocker line from 'Bad Cover Version', and try to spot the hilarious Scott Walker joke: "It's like a later 'Tom & Jerry' when the two of them could talk, like the Stones since the Eighties, like the last days of Southfork. Like 'Planet Of The Apes' on TV, the second side of 'Til The Band Comes In', like an own-brand box of cornflakes: he's going to let you down my friend." This album won't let you down, though. It's one of the very best of the year.

Beginning with a dash of introspective, pretentious and introvert albums
(It, Freaks, Separations), delivering the explosion of their pure
Pop soul on His'n'Hers and the brilliant Different Class,
passing through sofisticated, pompous and dark-decadent expressionism of This is Hardcore,
'Jarvis Cocker and his guys' have recently bloomed into their ripening opera: We Love Life.
This 12 songs collection is a clear demonstration of the great pop music
writing and playing ability of the band from Sheffield: a simply outlined instrumental carpet
and the direct words of Cockers
perfectly capture a mood of consciousness about their new vision of life.
No more twisted between the research of an astonishing arrangement of sounds and breathtaking
lyric sceneries, which absolutely made their effect and mean in the past years,
We Love Life represents the culmination of PULP's excellent Pop career: caught, as usual,
between their 'sex painted' souls (always recalled by Cocker's wry and marvellous lyrics)
and the agening process of their music sensibility.

The Album starts with Weeds, a modern and for more sensitive and careful listener
version of Mis-shapes, that pounds on the Jarvis frequent anguish about the British classes
differentiations.
Then Jarvis starts singing his way....
With The Night That Minnie Timperly Died, that will likely become a single
and whose subject is clearly disclosed by the title,
Cocker begins his vocal trills that make PULP music so different and weird:
Oh, Minnie I can feel the pain. Oh, Minnie I can feel the pain, pain, pain, pain.
...And the Album unfolds hits core with The Trees, Wickerman, I Love Life,
Birds In Your Garden, Bob Lind and Bad Cover Version:
the pieces that will probably mostly remain in the fans minds.
In none of these songs PULP seem to be aggressive against the listener, with a new way to
face the musical and Lyrics contents: a softener one, a simplier one and more communicative
one. With Jarvis hanging onto his vocal ability to share with everyone who's
listening his new maturity, his new personal redemption.
Roadkill and Sunrise close the album, a kind of sweet and fair closing scenery to the ones
who saw the highlights minutes before.

Maybe the album never take off, but once you've listened you've acquired
the new PULP sensation: new ways, new reasons to Love Life...wiping away the
'hollow feeling' of past times.

This is the CD that is going to confound and confuse quite a bit of Pulp's core audience (see some of the reviews already attached here), but this is Jarvis Cocker & Company at their finest. Sure, the trustfund slackers who didn't realize that "Common People" was making fun of them are probably not gonna get this, but (with the band getting the heave-ho from Island) if this is their final statement, it is a truly grand and staggering one from Pulp.

The first thing you notice: this is a guitar record. Mostly gone are the gurgling synths and disco beats of DIFFERENT CLASS and HIS 'N' HERS. Gone also is the dense electronic murk of HARDCORE. Richard Hawley's guitar comes up front and center in most of these songs.

Secondly--this is the record where Jarvis Cocker finally embraces the frequently invoked image of him by the press as "The New Ray Davies". The social commentary in songs like "Weeds" and "Wickerman", the storytelling of "Minnie Timperley"...these are lyrical concerns that pick up where VILLAGE GREEN PRESERVATION SOCIETY and ARTHUR left off.

Thirdly--for a band that has historically written insanely memorable hooks, Pulp do a neat trick by burying them here. To be sure, the hooks *are* there, but it'll take three listens to figure out that the reason "Weeds" or "Bob Lind" is going through your head all day is that cool guitar lick that Hawley plays on those songs...or, you suddenly hear the way the string section swells and carries "Bad Cover Version" to the same gorgeous heights this band only visited in the past on a song like "Something Changed". These songs are amazing, beautifully subtle, sneaking up on you and then crushing the happy places in your mind like a ton of bricks.

Finally--the three songs that end the album proper ("Bad Cover Version", "Roadkill", and "Sunrise" end the record, although both bonus tracks that follow on the US version are top-notch, too) are the three best closing tracks in recent rock and roll history. "BCV" boasts some of the most funny and incisively hurtful lyrics Cocker's ever written, marries them to one of his finest melodies, and sounds like a hit beamed in from some alternate, more wistful dimension. Following that, the quietly intense "Roadkill" is goose-bump inducingly beautiful, the kind of timeless song that Cocker's producer/hero Scott Walker would have loved to have written. Finally, "Sunrise" closes the album with a cathartic blast of guitar, strings, and chorus that revs up and goes over the cliff not once, but twice, in one of the most brilliant musical displays of this or any year.

An utterly fantastic record, this edged ahead of Spoon's KILL THE MOONLIGHT and Wilco's YHF to top my favorites of 2002 list.

I disliked 'We Love Life' the first time I listened to the album. I missed the old Pulp. I really hated "The Trees." The album was relegated to collecting dust. On a whim, I popped the album in a few months later and was blown away. We Love Life is a sublime listening experience - and easily worth 5 stars (and not many albums are...). Jarvis's lyrics are subtle and just as clever as before - but you have to listen. The high point of the album is the spralling and beautiful "Wickerman." This album is the best of 2001 and 2002. Treat yourself to what may be the last Pulp album.

When I first put on this CD, there was a smile glued to my face. Not only did I find the idea of a song about Weeds entertaining, but I'd been waiting for a new Pulp album for 3 years. Let me tell you that right from the beginning, this album is 10 times better than "This Is Hardcore" ever was. Aside from the fact that there are no equivalents of "Like A Friend", "The Fear" or "This Is Hardcore" here, we are presented with a much finer sounding album as a whole. "The Night That Minney Timperly Died" quickly became a favourite song of mine, as did "Bob Lind (The Only Way Is Down)". "We Love Life"'s first single "The Trees" is a very slow-paced, orchestral tune, but I dare say I love it. From the lyrics "..." to the violin sounds throughout, this is a brilliant song. The second single, "Bad Cover Version" is perhaps the most disappointing song on this album, but it's still very clever and a fun listen.
All in all, there is not a bad song on here (Unlike "Different Class"), but there is no "Common People" or "This is Hardcore". For smarter music listeners, I must say.

Beware those who only know Pulp for "Common People".

Pulp is one of the best pop/rock bands around, no doubt, and I would buy everything they have, especially His N Hers, which is their best. This latest effort doesn't have a bad song on it, but it also doesn't have any songs/lyrics that are truly memorable. Previous Pulp records have had such delicious songs, which showcased Jarvis Cocker as a British version of Prince, or a 90s version of Morrisey. Listen to the lyrics on His N Hers and you hear fascinating short stories. It is about character development there. Musically, His N Hers is stronger as well, more dense and accomplished. Hardcore and D. Class aare uneven, but at their best are musically and lyrically superior to this one. In sum, We Love Life is a good Pulp record, sincere, dark, musically appealing (I hear R. Stones, World Party and P. Weller)and if you like Pulp, buy it. If you don't know Pulp, get His N Hers, a true classic of crazed dark pop.

Too bad this album will undoubtedly get overlooked as it is probably Pulp at their musical best. Much more interesting and lighter than their previous efforts, Pulp here show their knack for writing perfect pop songs. It holds up better than Different Class on repeated listenings and it flows much better than This Is Hardcore. Give this album a chance and you won't regret it.

This takes a little longer to get into than previous albums, but once you're in, your whole heart's in there. Start with Birds in your garden, it's a sinister-sexy love song like other Pulp classics Underwear, Pencil Skirt, Have you seen her lately. Someone said to me that what makes Pulp special is their songs climax. The tracks on this album are phenomenal live.