Customer Reviews

Wild

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If there was one word to describe Wild! it would be "lush". Although everything is still 99.9% electronic, there are samples of pianos, strings and other "real" sounds to give the album a fairly organic and natural feel - at least in comparison to the analogue blips and bleeps that would be the trademark sound on the following albums.

What makes this album so great is that it is perhaps Erasure's most diverse collection of songs yet everything flows together in a coherent way. From the silly pseudo-Latin pop of "La Gloria" to the amazingly beautiful ballad "You Surround Me" to the dark and minimal "Piano Song", every song stands apart from one another but yet fits together nicely. A common complaint about the album is that while there are some great songs there's quite a bit of filler as well. I was one that once agreed with that sentiment, but over the years I've grown to appreciate every single song on the album. It is not as strong as The Innocents, Chorus or their self-titled album, but it is a classic in its own right. My only real complaint is that it's rather short - roughly 35 minutes. If they ever re-release it with some of the great b-sides off the singles on that album (Paradise, Dreamlike State, etc.) as bonus tracks, then I'll give it 5 stars, but for now, it'll be 4.

"Wild" is the followup to international smash "The Innocents," and while it's no instant winner like its predecessor, it's certainly a step forward for Vince Clarke and Andy Bell. There's the gorgeous rush of "Blue Savannah;" the synth bleeps of the catchy "Brother and Sister," and the touching love ballad "You Surround Me." While "Wild" went to No.1 in the UK, the CD stalled on the US charts and was ignored by fickle fans who wanted a sequel to "Chains of Love." However, it's become a fan's favorite and deserves a spin on your CD player.

Excellent CD. Great to work out to. Great to just leave on repeat.

I saw Erasure on the Wild! tour and it was one of the best concerts ever with a great stage show! This is one of thier top 5 CD's too. Vince and Andy throw down some wicked dance grooves and some memorable slower tracks as well. The surreal dreamy lyrics are ever present of course.

My favorites are: "Blue Savannah"/ "Drama!"/ "La Gloria"/ "You Surround Me"/ "Brother and Sister"/ and the brilliant "Piano Song."

This is smooooth!

this is their most musically mature and therefore their best album. erasure seemed to have reached the pinnacle of their career with wild. cuz everything after that has gone downhill. way down. ever noticed how the synthesizer sounds really wimpy after this album? and the singing has regressed, too.

This one's a toss up for me. While it contains some of their best singles ever ( Blue Savannah, You Surround Me, and Star ) it also has the "is it camp or it is not camp?" of the song Gloria, with its ill-advised attempt at Latin rhythms. Also, Drama, while once one a favourite of mine, I now see as the overwrought expression it is. And the lyrics are just incredibly heavy-handed.( "The infinite complexities of life"....INDEED). 2,000 Miles and Brother and Sister are two more songs that reach for greatness but ultimately fail, due to the lyrics. Seeing as the best of the songs on this cd were released as singles, and therefore included on the POP! cd ( their first, and best, "BEST OF" ), I can't really see the necessity in owning this one.

Obviously tired of the confines of mere synthesizers, Vince Clark made "Wild!" into the most organic and lush sounding Erasure album to date. While not as instantly hook laden as "The Innocents," it has stood the test of time better than most of Erasure's catalog. As a songwriting team, Clark and Bell also managed to pen a trio of classic singles with "Drama!," "Star" and the magnificent "Blue Savannah."

They also began to test the limits of their lyrical concerns, as "Crown Of Thorns" takes a bitter look at the future of England before the album winds out with "Piano Song." Andy seems intrigued by the chance to perform a more expansive set of songs; save for "Chorus," this is the best sung of all the Erasure albums. Listen to the difference between the operatic campiness of "Drama!" as compared to the deeper coloration of "How Many Times." Not like all is changed, the dance grooves of "2000 Miles" and "Brother and Sister" cook. In fact, the only real dud here is "La Gloria," where the experiment in Latin rhythms misses the target.

Out of the many Erasure albums available, "Wild!" is one of the few I can recommend as a whole album.

This album is 15 years old(!), but has aged fairly well. After they hit their stride with The Circus and The Innocents, Erasure became hugely popular in the U.S. (at least, among lovers of New Wave/Postmodern music) with Wild! Vince Clarke, in one of the interviews on the 2nd disc of the Hits! DVD said that he wanted Erasure to be remembered as great songwriters. On Wild!, there are a lot of great songs, with inspired lyrics and killer hooks.

If Erasure is only remembered for a couple of songs, Blue Savannah deserves to be one of them (A Little Respect would be the other choice). A friend of mine in high school said that she felt chills up her spine when she first heard the album version of the song. On the radio, the beginning part, with Andy humming/crooning, was cut. I was really stunned when she told me this, because that's exactly what happened to me the first time I heard the album version! Part of the bliss of Erasure is that a song with such an obscure title as Blue Savannah could be one of their greatest hits.

After the euphoria of Blue Savannah come the high of Drama! In my mind, this is perhaps the most "operatic" of Erasure's songs. Aside from the aggressive energy created by the synthesizers, there is the "guilty" chorus, which reminds me of opera. Too bad another reviewer here finds it distracting; I find it to be pure genius! Equally as thrilling are the lyrics, such as, "God only knows the ultimate necessity of love." Sadly, this song didn't get airplay in the U.S., since it rates among their very best.

After the thrilling Drama! comes How Many Times, which is quite the opposite in mood. Another personal favorite, it has Andy singing in a lower register, which produces a "seductive" mood. The song itself, though, is very melancholy and nostalgic in tone. Next follows Star, which is another stroke of genius. As most people know, this song is about the atomic bomb. For me, though, it also is critical of televangelism, and the era of Jim and Tammy Faye, with their pleas for "Love Gifts" by mail, among other things. Their humorous treatment of both topics is the essence of Camp, something Erasure understands quite well. Even the music is campy, galloping along, like a horse in the Wild West.

After so many successes, Erasure misfires with the cringe-worthy La Gloria. This song is embarrassing in so many ways, where do I begin? The music is stupid. It could be taken for a joke, except that they pushed too far. If you want a comparison, Madonna's song I'm Going Bananas is kind of similar to this, but hers is more tolerable. Furthermore, it could be labled as racist, except that I truly believe that Vince and Andy are not racists. In short, it is a caricature that makes you wince. Why this made the cut for the album, and Supernature didn't, is beyond me!!!

Thankfully, you can skip over this song, and enjoy the rest of the album, which lives up to the success of the first half. You Surround Me is another single that got no airplay, but is one of their most sensual. Unlike How Many Times, the mood is not only evoked by Andy singing in a lower register. This time, the lyrics help drive the point home. I like the line, "I love you with all the joy of living, 'til the lights go down in NYC..." Another classic.

Brother and Sister is another turbo-charged track, the "Drama!" of the second half of Wild! That computer voice saying "rocket" at the beginning is wonderful. Like Drama!, it is also very operatic in nature. The lyrics are rather cryptic, in a good way. It's almost post-apocalypic, which is interesting, because if you really think about it, a recurring theme throughout the album is the nuclear age.

What follows next is 2000 Miles, which is rather shocking in its acid tone, very different from most Erasure songs. Take, for example, the line "don't go beating me like that, I won't be coming back". What makes the song great is that, for it being so nihilistic, Erasure still throws some camp in for good measure. One example is the "whoo, whoo" sound after Andy says he won't be waiting at the railroad station. Another is Andy singing the "na na na" from Heart of Glass, the Blondie classic, at the end of the song, as it is fading out!

Crown of Thorns maximizes the gloom-and-doom theme. Another seemingly post-apocalyptic song, it spells out a bleak future for England.

The album ends with Piano Song, which I'm sure was a working title that they tried to rename, but couldn't really come up with any other title that worked. Compared to the synth feel of most of the album, it is elegantly spare, a remorseful, eloquent song, sung in an emotional manner.

For all of these reasons, Wild! captures Erasure at the height of their creative powers.

For all it's worth, I have to diss any critic that complains that Erasure are nothing but a sub-standard verse-chorus pop band. After just releasing the succssful "The Innocents" album and "Crackers International" EP, Erasure decided to experiment "a lot" with their next album "Wild". I admire Erasure for doing this, but yet I was disappointed when I first heard it. Many people I know that like Erasure say this is one of their favorite albums. I have it say it's not one of mine. However, there are some great songs here. And like always, the songs I like the most weren't released as singles. My favorites are "Brother & Sister", "How Many Times?" and "Crown Of Thorns". So if you like Erasure and just think "POP" represents their best, know that you are missing even better music on all of their other albums. Yes... better songs. Can that be possible? Yes it can.

I bought this for my wife. She seems to be quite happy with it. It came pretty quickly to, so fantastic!