Resurrecting the Album Club

[Barry]

What an excellent review! Despite in general liking the album, I chose DF as I knew it was imperfect, so would be suitable candidate for discussion in 'The Album Club'.

Your response is perfect. Thanks for taking the time to do so.

Would you be willing to choose another album for us to discuss?

[Pete The Cat]

The House Of Love – ‘The House Of Love’ (aka ‘Fontana' aka 'The Butterfly Album’)




Label: Fontana – 8422931
Format: LP, CD Cassette, Stereo
Country: UK
Released: February 26, 1990
Genre: Rock
Style: Indie Rock, Alternative Rock

A1 Hannah
A2 Shine On
A3 Beatles And The Stones
A4 Shake And Crawl
A5 Hedonist
A6 I Don't Know Why I Love You
B1 Never
B2 Someone's Got To Love You
B3 In A Room
B4 Blind
B5 32nd Floor
B6 Se Dest

Written By – Guy Chadwick

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzMW...rrq71rvPsOwnjV

My single twenty-something self played this album to death at the time. Since then I’ve moved from place to place, got married and had a family grow up, and I don’t think that I’d played it this century until yesterday! So this Album Club selection has been a chance for me to rediscover it.

Cast your minds back to before so-called ‘indie’ became mainstream, and you’d find The House Of Love trying their best to break through but usually stalling in the lower half of the singles chart. They were one of the great examples of nearly. After being played by John Peel they released their first album in 1988 on the influential Creation label, then signed to pseudo-independent Fontana. Confusingly both their 1988 debut and this 1990 album are titled ‘The House Of Love’, so the latter is often referred to as either ‘Fontana' or ‘The Butterfly Album’ (my preference) in order to distinguish it.

The band was led by Guy Chadwick, who was somewhat older than the others including lead guitarist Terry Bickers who was being lauded in the media as a major talent in his own right. The recording was troubled by arguments which culminated in the departure of Bickers - you can usually read something into it when a record gets through four producers. ‘The Butterfly Album’ was well received by the music weeklies (NME 8/10, Sounds 4 stars) but in spite of another strong effort with their 1992 follow-up ‘Babe Rainbow’ the wheels kept falling off and the band ceased to exist for a decade until a rapprochement between Chadwick and Bickers in 2005 and the occasional release since.

Back in 1990 I was taking a lot of train journeys and ‘The Butterfly Album’ was a constant on my Walkman. I just sank into it for hours. It’s quite simple in some ways and several songs have lyrics about love that would normally lose my interest, for example on paper ‘Never’’s rhyming feels a bit lame, but what spoke to me most were the melodies and the maturity of the arrangements compared with their peers. Even though I had been too young to experience the end of the sixties, Chadwick drew me right in with ‘Beatles and The Stones’ - if I ever compile my list of favourite songs it’ll be on there. The album starts with its least engaging track but after that each one has a strong hook and, aside from the obvious singles, deeper tracks such as ‘In A Room’ and ‘32nd Floor’ stand out. My sixty-something self finds that it’s still a great companion and I really must dig it out more often.

Deserved to be bigger or fittingly in the bargain bin? Your feelings are welcome…

[Lawrence001]

I remember that album. My circle of friends at school was based around listening to alternative music and dressing differently. I was into heavy metal at the time (also classical music but listened on my own) but 2 of them were into indie (one into The Cure, The Smiths and Nick Cave, the other was into The Wedding Present, but they both loved this album).

I got into Shine On a bit later when I got into indie, and I'm sure I've got this on vinyl somewhere, but I need to look. In the meanwhile I will have a listen on Qobuz when I get some free time.

[Alex_UK]

Bit late to the party here, but I tried Double Fantasy a couple of times, and agree with Pete, that the Yoko tracks were more interesting. It’s not going to be an album I will likely ever buy or play again, but it was an interesting listen. Thanks Barry.

[Alex_UK]

Now trying The House of Love…. I remember the name, may have a track or two on compilation albums? Let’s see. [emoji846]

[Alex_UK]

Goodness - how could I have forgotten Shine On (early onset dementia) what a track, worth the admission price alone!

[Pete The Cat]

Stepping back a page onto the subject of John Lennon and Yoko Ono, there's a film doing the rounds of random cinemas this month called "One To One". Having dipped my toe in to Double Fantasy and Plastic Ono Band recently I saw it the other day.

It's a documentary about their time in Greenwich Village between (I think) 1970 and 1973. It uses footage from the TV as the political and social backdrop to things that they were doing at the time, and includes a whole raft of interviews/phone call recordings of them. So, there's plenty of Tricky Dicky interspersed with Lennon trying to arrange benefit gigs. The story culminates in a concert for mentally handicapped children. There are various live clips from that concert but overall the music is a small part of the film.

It left me with the impression that Lennon was searching for his purpose at that time. He was aligned with plenty of causes (and you can tell that his manager Klein was a bit wary of him getting too deeply involved with some) but, a bit like the abortive Twickenham rehearsals that later became Let It Be, without most of it coming to fruition.

A pleasant enough couple of hours although Lord knows how film-makers get the investment to make these things - there were no more than 6 people in the audience!

[Macca]

It's had very good reviews.

I think Lennon had to deal with the same issue all very successful people do in that he felt obliged to pay something back, to use what he had for a greater cause.

It rarely works out well and if he'd just kept his head down and made some music occasionally he might not have died so young. Sure do some charity work, give generously, but his whole 'world peace' crusade was a bit naïve and attracted the wrong sort of attention to him.

[Pete The Cat]

Yes, the film shows that he became a magnet for anyone from progressive liberal to out-and-out nutcase, and supports the view that he was monitored by the authorities as a result.

If you're the sort of person who likes reading old copies of The Word or Mojo then it's an interesting watch.