Love Story

Lloyd Cole

Product Details

• Audio CD (October 3, 1995)
• Original Release Date: October 3, 1995
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Rykodisc
• ASIN: B0000009PV
• Also Available in: Audio Cassette  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #174,707 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

No one begrudged Lloyd Cole for breaking up his great British pop band the Commotions and moving to New York to make American rock, although his subsequent solo records appeared to stray further and further from the facile songwriting that had early on made Cole so cherished. With this 1995 set, however, Cole settled back into doing what he does best, offering his best music since the Commotions' debut, Rattlesnakes, over a decade ago. Love Story returns to the colorful neobeat, English-major lyric style Cole developed as a young postgrad, though his writing is tempered now with the graceful maturity that graying hair, a marriage, and a child inevitably bring. Back are proper nouns, pop culture references, and clever quotes ("Penny walked in with that 'Love in Vain' look, said 'Every last man should be hanging from a meat hook'"), plus a subtle beauty in even his most basic lines ("She loves you best/And I love her nonetheless"). Restored as well are the tender accompaniments of acoustic guitar strums and tasteful lead lines, with a moody backdrop of light keys and strings. Like the smartest of love stories, the music is happy and sad, whimsical and doleful, never tired and often touching. --Roni Sarig

From the Label

"My goal this time was to sit down and write a quintessential Lloyd Cole record," explains Cole. "For the last five or six years, I've been seeing how many things I can try my hand at, things I don't normally do. Now I've come back to the attitude I started making records with -- and to what people might have liked about me in the first place."

LOVE STORY is the kind of Lloyd Cole album that Cole hasn't made in a long while. Without sacrificing the emotional range of his more recent experimental work, he's returned to the inimitable qualities that first won a devoted audience for Cole and the Commotions' 1984 debut RATTLESNAKES: classic-pop songcraft and soaring melodies combined with the smart and perceptive lyrics he's been writing all along.

Fans will also notice a more emotionally direct turn in Cole's songwriting. "The title LOVE STORY has no irony, and that's a new one for me," he laughs. "It's different from something like 'Perfect Skin,' which had so many layers in it." While the opening "Trigger Happy" wears its fatherly heart on its sleeve, the album's moods range from the wryness of "I Didn't Know You Cared," to the gorgeous melancholy of "Sentimental Fool," to the uncharacteristically carefree "Let's Get Lost" and the upbeat first single "Like Lovers Do."

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Music that can't be contained on a simple, plastic disc., December 31, 2003

By	Timothy Karlberg (Minneapolis, MN) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

When I bought this CD on a whim, I had never even heard of Lloyd Cole. Suffice it to say that I introduced myself to Cole when I was still thoroughly naive of his incredible talent; this was back when I would've thought The Commotions was some kind of debilitating illness, and not his former backup band.

I fell in love with the CD in a slowly-progressive manner similar to the way innocent crushes are formed. To say that I was overwhelmed with admiration from the beginning wouldn't be accurate. Rather, I casually figured this was an album to keep around and spend some time with in the future if the mood seemed right. Soon, I found myself spending more and more time with "Love Story" and before long, there came that pivotal moment in many a CD's lifetime when I "heard" the album for the first time. That's when my devotion to "Love Story" and, more broadly, to Lloyd Cole's music in general, emerged.

After more recent purchases of Cole's though, I can confidently say that "Love Story" is more the exception to his style, than the rule. Certainly, familiarizing one's self with Lloyd Cole by means of "Love Story" is like being introduced to U2 with the "Pop" album. It simply wasn't a portrayal of the past, and this, I believe, is what made some longtime fans look elsewhere, while simultaneously turning some window shoppers like me into dedicated listeners. Where much of Cole's previous projects are guitar-driven, bold works only sparsely tempered by the occasional reflective serenade, "Love Story" is quite the polar opposite. From beginning to end, this is a nocturnal delight, blatantly engineered for the immediate pre-dawn hours. Which is not to assert that this is music to sleep to. On the contrary, the vast majority of these songs are gently melodic, lushly acoustic, and delicately formed within the womb of Cole's undeniable emotion; this disc belongs in your insomnia first-aid kit, next to Everything But The Girl's "Amplified Heart."

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Lovin' That Lloyd Cole, July 30, 2000

By	Compton Roberts (Hamilton, Ontario, CANADA) - See all my reviews

This is the solo album that fans of Lloyd Cole & the Commotions had long hoped he'd make. After some interesting false starts over the years, Cole finally seemed to be revisited by his songwriting Muse. This isn't "Rattlesnakes", but there is an austere beauty and musical commitment present on every track of this lovely CD. In some ways, it reminds me of vintage Van Morrison or even a Frank Sinatra recording from the 1950s--it is romantic yet knowing, musically well-conceived giving each song just the right instrumental treatment and, as a collection of songs, it has a cohesive mood and tempo. "Love Story" contains what I feel is some of Cole's most intimate singing and his lyrics are wry and sophisticated. Musically, this is probably Cole's finest hour as each song has a memorable melody line and pleasing chord changes. Songs such as "Trigger Happy", "I Didn't Know That You Cared", "Love Ruins Everything" and "Like Lovers Do" get under your skin very quickly and very smoothly. This album won't knock you out at first, but really grows on you after repeated listens. It will receive heavy rotation in your CD player because it lifts, soothes and heals in ways to which the pretentious Lilith Fair set can only aspire. An overlooked gem!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A good record, same old style, new beautiful songs, January 28, 2000

By	Claudio (Milan, Italy) - See all my reviews

I must say I was expecting a disappointment when I bought this CD, instead it sounds very good, good lyrics, great songwriting, as usual with Lloyd Cole. The songs are nothing new, they resemble a lot the ones in rattlesnakes, but they are very good to listen when coming back home on a sunday evening, looking at the sunset colours. "Happy for you" is a great song, really sad and about something which every man hopes never to go through but knows it will happen sometime in life. Similarly, "I didn't know that you cared" is a pretty little song, as is "trigger happy". A record which will never stand out as a "great" record, but a beutiful record which is difficult to get tired of.