Love and Rockets – Express [Reissue]
Posted on May 11, 2003
Love and Rockets is one of my favorite bands. It was started in the mid-80′s, following the breakup of Tones on Tail, which followed the breakup of Bauhaus. Essentially, Love and Rockets is Bauhaus without Peter Murphy, and with synthesizers. Despite this, Love and Rockets is (IMHO) underapprectiated considering their musical talents. But in an age of music-as-a-product (Britney Spears, Limp Bizkit, etc), it nice to listen to bands that make music for the sake of music.
Express, originally released in 1986, was the band’s second album, after Seventh Dream of a Teenage Heaven. The CD was remastered and reissued in 2001. As a side note, I must be such a fan that I didn’t notice the CD was reissued until 2 years later. The reissue CD has a different track listing than the original CD, with one section titled “Express” that presumably corresponds to the original vinyl, and a second section consisting of bonus tracks. The bonus tracks section includes Angels and Devils, Ball of Confusion (USA Mix), and Holiday on the Moon, all of which were on the original CD (with Ball of Confusion being an Extended Mix, rather than a USA Mix). Additional bonus tracks include a cover of Syd Barrett’s Lucifer Sam, a remix of Yin and Yang (The Flowerpot Man), and two songs innocuously titled B Side #1 and B Side #2. Another change from the original CD issue is the inclusion of an insert with liner notes, which finally allows me to understand what the lyrics are :-)
Most of the songs are very rhythmically driven. The best examples of this are Kundalini Express and Yin and Yang (The Flowerpot Man), which includes some fantastic drum work from Kevin Haskins. To show a softer, slightly more melodic side, there is the simply titled ballad Love Me and an acoustic version of All In My Mind. While I wouldn’t call their lyrics deep, there is a far amount of sarcastic social commentary, as exemplified by Life in Laralay, An American Dream, Holiday on the Moon, and Ball of Confusion. The songs B Side #1 and B Side #2 are previously unreleased, and would probably been better off staying that way. While I am not very enthused about the B Side tracks and ambivalent about the subtle remix of Yin and Yang (The Flowerpot Man), I think the CD is still fairly worthwhile due to the cover of Syd Barrett’s Lucifer Sam. I thought it was interesting that they covered a song by one of the founders of Pink Floyd, since there are some similarities between the two bands, musically and lyrically, IMHO.
Overall, Express is one of the best albums/CD’s in the Love and Rockets catalog, and the reissue could be seen as good or bad. Ironically, I paid about $3.00 less for the reissue, than I did for the original CD years ago ($12.99 as opposed to $15.99). I think the album is worthwhile for a Love and Rockets fan if they can’t find CD singles of Lucifer Sam or the Ball of Confusion and Yin and Yang (The Flowerpot Man) remixes. It would most likely be cheaper to get them that way. At any rate, those songs are worthwhile for the fan. So the next time you are in a media (record) store, check it out.
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