So Alive

Performer: Love and Rockets
Distributor: Select-O-Hits

Notes: Personnel: Daniel Ash (vocals, guitar); Kevin Haskins (drums); David J (background vocals). Recording information: The Palace, Hollywood, CA (12/05/1987/03/23/1996); U.C. Irvine (12/05/1987/03/23/1996). So Alive is Love and Rockets' first proper live effort, an electric look and listen at select tracks from the trio's tours from 1987 and 1996. It's also a greatest-hits collection of sorts, well-suited to any loyalist and newbie. On record, Love and Rockets were much more strained and literate, but they were explosive and artistically experimental in a live setting. Daniel Ash's swagger as a performer and singer is perfectly frank. From the guitar blast of "Ball of Confusion" to the tragic love poem for an electronica enchantress (ex-Transglobal Underground vocalist Natacha Atlas) on "Natacha" to the dirty version of the band's only Top Ten hit, "So Alive," one cannot help but to be awestruck by such a dynamic arrangement. Relying on a heavy mix of guitars, synthesizers, and drums doesn't always call for a big production; however, Love and Rockets manage to pull things off without an extravagant system. The only thing pompous is Ash's attitude. Other highlights featured on So Alive are the campy "Sweet Lover Hangover," "No New Tale to Tell," and the seven-minute guitar haze of "Seventh Dream of Teenage Heaven." ~ MacKenzie Wilson

Many a sad goth mourned the loss of Bauhaus in the early 1980s, but guitarist Daniel Ash and the Haskins brothers carried on without Peter Murphy, first in the short-lived Tones on Tail, and then, in 1985, with Love and Rockets. More pop-leaning than their earlier bands, they were still considered part of the burgeoning "alternative rock" movement that was gathering steam thanks to new mainstream outlets. A pair of charting hits in the U.S. and U.K. resulted in unprecedented fame for Ash and Co. After a five-year break, the band was dropped from their label, but returned in the mid '90s and released three more albums that featured a new electronic/dance bent. They quietly broke up in 1999.

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