Love and Rockets

Love and Rockets
Studio album by Love and Rockets
Released	4 September 1989
Genre	Alternative rock
Length	41:44 (original), 127:20 (reissue)
Label	Beggars Banquet/RCA
Producer	John Fryer, Love and Rockets
Professional reviews
Allmusic link
Love and Rockets chronology
Earth, Sun, Moon (1987) Love and Rockets (1989) Hot Trip to Heaven (1994)

Love and Rockets is the fourth album by the British band Love and Rockets, released in 1989 on Beggar's Banquet.

Love and Rockets dismissed Earth, Sun, Moon's folk sound in favour of a stronger rock & roll sound. Hints of the band's former psychedelic and gothic rock sound remained. Chief songwriters Daniel Ash and David J had begun concentrating strictly on their own material (rather than writing together) on Earth, Sun, Moon. By the time of Love and Rockets, their creative partnership had clearly all but dried up, as the album lurches back and forth between Ash's tech-savvy modern pop and J's bluesier, grittier experiments.

The album featured Love and Rockets' biggest hit, the Ash-penned "So Alive". The song was a surprising #3 hit on the Billboard Hot 100, and stayed at #1 for five weeks on the US Mainstream Rock chart. Because of the popularity of the single in the US, Love and Rockets became the band's best-selling album in America.

After the release of the album, the band embarked on a long worldwide tour. Afterwards, instead of recording a new album and a follow-up single to "So Alive", J and Ash both focused on their solo careers, continuing in the directions represented on this album. They each released two solo albums in the break (with drummer Kevin Haskins working primarily with Ash) before returning as a band to record Hot Trip to Heaven in 1994.

In 2002, the album was remastered and expanded into a double album. The bonus tracks featured a single remix, three b-sides, all five songs from the aborted Swing! EP, and a radio session. The Swing! project was to be an outlet for some of the band's stranger output, but the material was never released, except for "Bad Monkey", which ended up on the Glittering Darkness EP in 1996.

"The Purest Blue" is a radical reworking of "Waiting for the Flood" from Earth, Sun, Moon, and "**** (Jungle Law)" was later reworked as "Bad Monkey", recorded as part of the Swing! project.

Track listing

Original release

1. "**** (Jungle Law)" – 4:32
2. "No Big Deal" – 4:56
3. "The Purest Blue" – 3:43
4. "Motorcycle" – 3:31
5. "I Feel Speed" – 3:24
6. "Bound for Hell" – 6:01
7. "The Teardrop Collector" – 4:09
8. "So Alive" – 4:16
9. "Rock and Roll Babylon" – 3:22
10. "No Words No More" – 3:50

2002 reissue

Disc one

1. "**** (Jungle Law)" – 4:32
2. "No Big Deal" – 4:56
3. "The Purest Blue" – 3:43
4. "Motorcycle" – 3:31
5. "I Feel Speed" – 3:24
6. "Bound for Hell" – 6:01
7. "The Teardrop Collector" – 4:09
8. "So Alive" – 4:16
9. "Rock and Roll Babylon" – 3:22
10. "No Words No More" – 3:50
11. "Bike" – 3:54
12. "Bikedance" – 7:07
13. "No Big Deal (Remix)" – 7:11
14. "Dreamtime" – 8:41

Disc two

1. "Wake Up!" – 3:58
2. "Cuckoo Land" – 2:48
3. "The Early Worm" – 2:13
4. "1000 Watts of Your Love" – 2:48
5. "Bad Monkey" – 4:20
6. "Intro" (Radio Session) – 0:58
7. "1000 Watts of Your Love" (Radio Session) – 3:08
8. "No Words No More" (Radio Session) – 4:11
9. "Interview" (Radio Session) – 34:19

Personnel

• Daniel Ash — guitar, saxophone, and vocals
• David J — bass and vocals
• Kevin Haskins — drums and synthesizers