The House Of Love - Babe Rainbow

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I was lucky enough to find a second-hand CD copy of this 1992 album by The House Of Love. It's currently out of print, which is a shame as it's such a strong album. Universal own the rights to this, but instead of trying to promote it they have deleted it. Now they want to acquire the EMI catalogue, but what's the point if they cannot promote what they have already? As it happens, bleeding chunks of this album are available on the double CD “The Fontana Years” which is a patchy but cheap release. Songs common to both albums are “You Don't Understand”, “Yer Eyes”, “Crush Me”, “Feel”, and “The Girl With The Loneliest Eyes”. Completists will need both releases as the compilation includes rare B-sides etc.

The album kicks off with the crazy and weak intro to "You Don't Understand", released as a single in 1992 when it scraped into the Top 50.  A strong, catchy song, it should have been bigger.  Next track is "Crush Me" where the guitars while subtle, are quite overwhelming.  The effect is quite beautiful and this is my favourite track on the album.  It was also the fourth and poorest-selling single from the album.  More shimmering and psychedelic guitars adorn "Cruel", making it a wistful, world-weary song but one which I love.  At times it reminds me of The Beatles in their Indian period.  "High In Your Face" is rockier, driven around an insistent bass line from Chris Groothuizen and incandescent guitar.  "Fade Away" is quieter, folky, dreamy and closes Side One of the original LP.
  

"Feel" opens the second side.  Sometimes referred to as "You've Got To Feel", this was the biggest of the four singles from the album.  Indeed, I used to have it on a CD single (actually an EP) but where it went to, heaven knows.  It's not the strongest track here as that accolade falls to the next song "The Girl With The Loneliest Eyes".  This is a pop classic if I ever heard one!  Guy Chadwick sings and plays this track beautifully, although as a single it fell on deaf ears, not even reaching the Top 50.  At the time, the band blamed the record company Fontana/Phonogram for poor distribution of the release.  Seems fair to me!  Next up is "Burn Down The World", a very English track despite some nagging rockist piano.  "Philly-Phile" is obviously American and a little doomy, featuring some interesting drumming and some more rockism in the shape of the closing guitar parts.  With four different guitarists featured on the album (as another line-up disintegrated) it's hard to know who's playing what here.  Closer "Yer Eyes" re-runs some of the subtle lyrical and dreamy themes of the album.  Indeed, to the casual or first-time listener some of the tracks here could seem repetitive as Guy seems to be forever singing about feeling and eyes!  

It's easy to detect some cynicism in the songs here, but really the album is something of a lost masterpiece.  This album will repay the effort you will need to make to find a copy.  It doesn't even seem to be available as one of those crappy mp3 downloads.  In fact, it's not available at all legally.  Well done, Universal!  Now That's What I Call Business Acumen...