release date: Oct. 1990
format: vinyl (ROSE 220 CD) / cd
[album rate: 4 / 5] [3,88]
producer: Jeffrey Lee Pierce
label: New Rose Records - nationality: USA
Track highlights: 1. "Humanesque" - 2. "The Straights of Love and Hate" - 3. "Emily's Changed" - 4. "I Hear Your Heart Singing" (4,5 / 5) - 5. "St. John's Divine" - 7. "Another Country's Young" - 8. "Flowing"
[ full album ]
5th studio album by The Gun Club follows three years after Mother Juno (Oct. 1987) and it was originally released on Fire Records. The album is the second in the new formation of the band after Jeffrey Lee Pierce had put an end to the band and initiated a solo career. As usual, Pierce is sole composer of the majority of the tracks, and this time he has put himself in the producer seat as well. The sound may not be impressive but the style is almost certified The Gun Club - a style connected so much to Jeffrey Lee Pierce, his poignant singing voice, his characteristic guitar-sound that no matter who he invites to play with him sounds crystallised as The Gun Club, and that is more than just sufficient. I've all ways linked The Gun Club with the music of Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds and all days found The Gun Club the more interesting band - or: showcasing a greater potential. In a contemporary perspective I didn't put this band among my favourites - I liked it, though, but may have neglected its qualities because of the lo-fi production, and the ever-present component of country. I think I might have put he band alongside artists like Adrian Borland, Bob Mould, R.E.M. etc [without comparison whatsoever!] had I acknowledged it as much as I do now. Fact is, I just listened to much else back then, and The Gun Club was somewhere in the background: interesting and fine, but not really 'it'. Today, I find that Jeffrey Lee Pierce definitely had 'it', and that he proved it over and over again. I have come to understand why he became a favourite of other artists and also a music critics' icon. This album doesn't contain obvious fillers, and in my mind and in a close race with The Las Vegas Story (1984), I find this to be the band's best.
[ allmusic.com 4 / 5 stars ]
[ collectors' item ]
