Undoubtedly it is because I watched the film "Sylvia" last week, but when listening to "America's Sweetheart" it suddenly struck me that the story of Courtney Love and Kurt Cobain is the flip side of what happened with Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes. She is talented but he is more famous and her first great success is overshadowed by a suicide. You can read this as an argument that if Hughes had been the one to end his life that Plath would still have achieved prominence, because what matters in this world is that you get people to look at or listen to your work. It has been a decade since Cobain ended his life with a shotgun blast and Hole's "Live Through This" achieved acclaim as much through the notoriety of its apparent prescience as its powerful punk sound. Since then the widow Cobain's career has been a long line of tabloid scandals with not much to show on the musical side of the ledger. Well, boys and girls, that is all over now.

"America's Sweetheart" is available with both explicit and edited versions, but the idea of cleaning up Courtney Love's songs for public consumption is laughable. You think mommy plays the clean version for Frances Bean? More importantly, does excising a few bad words dilute the meaning of these songs? Right from the opening blast of "Mono" Love announces that she is back with a vengeance and the primary target is her dearly departed husband:

Hey yeah we had everything

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 her daughter she gives away the most sacred part of her life. But as the opening chords of "I'll Do Anything" pointedly remind us, "America's Sweetheart" always comes back to the specter of Cobain and as the lyrics of "Hold On to Me" prove you do not have to go digging far to get the point:

Hey, this life is never fair

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 on the same level of "Live Through This." 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. Plath never wrote another poem, but Love is going to have to follow up this album at some point. What was implicit in 1994's "Live Through This" is made explicit in 2004's "America's Sweetheart" but it is hard to believe she can really sing about him forever. She will never be as influential as Cobain (nobody that influential ever tries to be that influential), but 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.

It does not matter if you love her or hate her, Courtney Love has once again managed to create a great rock album. It's a shame that her exploits in life overshadow her music once again but if given the chance, this record will blow you away. This time around her lyrics have taken a slight turn. Instead of writing in her usual metaphorical pen, she has now tried a more literal style which still suits the music. Although some beautiful metaphors still manage to gasp for air- "If you want love so unconditional and real, you gotta ride that black horse through the depths of hell that I've been"- Never Gonna Be Te Same.

You'll enjoy her usual rock hitters in songs like: Mono, Almost Golden, I'll Do Anything, Hello and Zeplin Song (which is a hilarious song). The raw and heavy drags in All the Drugs and Life Despite God. Hold On To Me, Uncool and Never Gonna Be the Same are the definite rock ballads of the record. And of course, the super catchy garage rocker But Julian, and the amazing and epic Sunset Strip (note: the UK version of the record has the longer and better version of the song).

This time around she has detached herself from her former band Hole and has created music with an array of new musicians. This has resulted on a less "fluid" sound throughout the record. Each song is clearly a different universe unlike her other albums where the songs sound familiar and somehow glued together.

In my opinion, it does not contain the genius quality that is inherent in Live Through This and Celebrity Skin. But in comparison to all of the albums that came out in 2004, America's Sweetheart is definitely #1 on my list.

For even more music, get ahold of the Mono single, which features the b-side "Fly", a great fast rocker and the alternate version of "Mono" which sounds like Courtney playing with The Hives, much rawer.

This album is great. It is half way between grudge and punk. I was like everyone else when it came to Courtney Love, but then I happened to be bored one day surfing the web and saw that VH1 let us listen to the album for free the week before it came out. I listened to it, loved it and bought it the day it came out.

This is an album that you can leave in your cd player for a month or two and never get tired of it.

Update sept 5, 2004. This album is a rock and roll masterpiece. It is the best album of 2004 up to this date.

This CD picks up were Celebrity Skin left off, with one delightful surprise, it is twice as loud. Not since 1994's "Live Through This" has Love produced such a cd with both pop rock appeal and some guitar work loud enough to wake the dead. The songs are as well crafted as on "Celebrity Skin", and this CD seems to start where "Celebrity Skin" left off, with all the zesty appeal Celebrity Skin left us. The CD opens with "Mono" a sonic punch, similar to "Celbrity Skin"s opening track "Celebrity Skin". With the second track, it's another Sonic assult with "But Julian Im A Little Bit Older Than You". The next two songs "Hold On To Me" and "Sunset Strip" sound like they could have been on Celebrity Skin with that perfect mix of acoustic and electric that only Courtney Love really can pull off without a hitch. "All The Drugs" is another sonic tune your sure to groove to. "Almost Golden" is classic Hole - Love acoustic electric style song but with one catch, Courtney Love has evolved her style since Hole and you can appreciate it with this tune. The rest of the CD continues with this sweet and loud mix of stories about life and mixing up the acoustic/ electric and electric/sonic masterpieces. One of my favorites is "I'll Do Anything", a classic Courtney Love style song with sprinklings of Courtney's own self styled catchphrases here and there. This CD is strong, loud, superior, and consistant with its delivery from the first to the last track. Matt Serletic did a fantastic job of producding this album, it is as professional as any Led Zeppelin or Rolling Stones album. This CD is as loud as THE VOICE OF GOD! If you liked Hole, you will love this CD. If you like Courtney Love, you will love this CD. This is the most hip CD's of the 2000's, by all standards. Five Stars Courtney you came through for us yet again!

Undoubtedly it is because I watched the film "Sylvia" right before I first heard this album, but when listening to "America's Sweetheart" it suddenly struck me that the story of Courtney Love and Kurt Cobain is the flip side of what happened with Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes. She is talented but he is more famous and her first great success is overshadowed by a suicide. You can read this as an argument that if Hughes had been the one to end his life that Plath would still have achieved prominence, because what matters in this world is that you get people to look at or listen to your work. It has been a decade since Cobain ended his life with a shotgun blast and Hole's "Live Through This" achieved acclaim as much through the notoriety of its apparent prescience as its powerful punk sound. Since then the widow Cobain's career has been a long line of tabloid scandals with not much to show on the musical side of the ledger. Well, boys and girls, that is all over now.

Here we have the "clean" version of "America's Sweetheart," but I have to say that the idea of cleaning up Courtney Love's songs for public consumption strikes me as pretty absurd. You think mommy plays the clean version for Frances Bean? More importantly, does excising a few bad words dilute the meaning of these songs? Not really, but just on principle that has to cost this one a rating star. But even cleaned up for the kiddies it is clear right from the opening blast of "Mono" that Love announces she is back with a vengeance and the primary target is her dearly departed husband:

Hey yeah we had everything

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 her daughter she gives away the most sacred part of her life. But as the opening chords of "I'll Do Anything" pointedly remind us, "America's Sweetheart" always comes back to the specter of Cobain and as the lyrics of "Hold On to Me" prove you do not have to go digging far to get the point:

Hey, this life is never fair

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 on the same level of "Live Through This." 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. Plath never wrote another poem, but Love is going to have to follow up this album at some point. What was implicit in 1994's "Live Through This" is made explicit in 2004's "America's Sweetheart" but it is hard to believe she can really sing about him forever. She will never be as influential as Cobain (nobody that influential ever tries to be that influential), but 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.