In the grand tradition of opening album tracks (Teenage Wh*re,Violet, and Celebrity Skin), Courtney starts her new album off with a bang. "Mono" is the first single off of her amazing new album.The sad thing is, it won't really be heard here in the U.S., we're still hooked on Avril and the like, and its a shame...C.Lo still has some of the best lyrics and vocals in rock these days."Fly" is a great non-album track, which is worth the price of admission alone.Also, there is an alternate version of "Mono" on this single, with a rougher, more garage feel.Thank god Courtney's back...

I just recently found out about the Single to this song. Back when this album was released I came to a hault on CD purchases for a while and I was downloading music from various filesharing programs. So much has happened since then and I refuse to download for FREE or even Purchase MP3's by my favorite artists. Not because I'm ANTI-FREE-MUSIC or anything like that, I just realized after downloading so many songs I was missing out on the TRUE CD quality of the music which is much more brilliant in sound. I figured this out after hearing a real CD in comparisson to an iTunes download that I owned. I noticed that the download wasn't picking up on all the elements of the songs, Even some background vocals were nowhere to found on my MP3 versions of particular songs, So I encourage evey and anyone- If you're a big music fan and you have a trained ear you may N'JOY the actual CD- You get more volume & bass and depth in the sound. I forgot what actual CD's sounded like for a while because I adapted to the sound of MP3's. Not all, But Majority (93%) of MP3's are compressed. As for this CD single, It's fantastic. The Alternate version of MONO is how it would sound if she did it with HOLE. 'Fly' is another power-rock track, The chorus is fantastic but the verses are mediocre. Other than that I love the Mono video and the artwork.

"Mono" is the first track on Courtney Love's ironically titled album "America's Sweetheart," and right from the opening blast the widow Cobain announces she is back with a vengeance and the primary target is her dearly departed husband:

Hey yeah we had everything

Vinyl in mono

And we looked the other way man

We were so dumb

Is this the part in the book that you wrote

Where I gotta come and save the day

Did you miss me

Did you miss me

By the time Love howls in the chorus "Oh god you owe me one more song/ So I can prove to you that/ I'm so much better than him" it becomes clear these songs are going to wallow in the wretched existence that has been her life for the past decade. She might be hurt, but she is also angry, and she proceeds to eviscerate just about every aspect of her "pornorific" life from to the "hard drugs and bad luck" to the "lots and lots of meaningless sex." The only thing she does not touch upon is motherhood, which simply proves that that by not singing about Frances Bean she telegraphs what is the only inviolate part of her current existence.

The alternative version of "Mono" is interesting and it is always nice to have a music video, but the main attraction for this CD-single is "Fly," which was not on the original "America's Sweetheart" album but is included as the last track on the extended edition (but if you have the original album it makes more sense to pick up this single than buy another version for just one song, unless you bought the "clean" version, in which case the question is what were you thinking? Excising a few bad words does not because to dilute the visceral lyrics of these songs). The opening lyrics of the song again make it clear there is one major topic on Love's agenda:

Look at me, I'm alive

I wanna jump but I don't know why.

Don't wanna live, don't wanna die,

Just wanna see if I can fly.

I'm desperate, I'm glorious

I'm going down with a vengeance

Hold onto me, hold on tight

And let's just see who gets out alive

Obviously she wins that one on default, but you can understand the larger meaning involved. Working with songwriting collaborator Linda Perry the sound of "America's Sweetheart" is not as raw as what Love and Hole produced for "Live Through This." But the music just provides the energy for Love to get through the public exorcism of these rambling lyrics whose coherence comes primarily out of her personal pain. This is not surprising given that she has had a decade of being beaten over the head with the reality that she is the Jackie Kennedy of the Grunge generation, so it is not like there is any place or any reason to hide. Now she has found a note of grace in having produced an album that I think is on the same level of "Live Through This" she can make the case that her talent is not a fluke, just her fate. The question is now whether she has anything to say beyond what is fueled by the anger at her husband's betrayal. It is hard to believe she can really sing about Kurt Cobain forever and if she really wants to be more than a musical footnote to his legacy the next album is going to be the one that decides if she has any sort of chance.