Sound Bets: The Verve, 'Love Is Noise'

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Here's something I wrote in July 1995:

Moving away from the trippy atmospherics that made its debut one of the best of 1993, Brit-rock quartet The Verve opts for big rock sounds on its sophomore album "A Northern Soul." Vocalist Richard Ashcroft graduated cum laude from the Mick Jagger School of Pouts, but flunked Pop Star U.'s lyrics course; Ashcroft's lyrics leave no romantic cliche unturned. But guitarist Nick McCabe is still a master of both edgy blues riffs and stratospheric psychedelic pyrotechnics.

All of this still holds true of The Verve, which just released its comeback single, "Love Is Noise." It's a virtually faceless alterna-rocker with a dancey drumbeat and shiny production values straight outta the dregs of the mid-1990s.

That's right, Ashcroft, I'm calling you out again — mostly in hopes of being able to write another follow-up like I did the next time The Verve came to town, in November 1997:

"So, we get into town — Washington, D.C. — tired from touring, and I pick up Washington City Paper and see this, this Christopher Porter writes that we don't know how to rock 'n' roll," spits "Mad" Richard Ashcroft, lead singer of the Verve. "Is he here? Is he here? Well, why don't you come up here and show us how to rock 'n' roll, then? Come on! Come on and show us how to rock 'n' roll," he screams, psychotically pounding the stagefront pillar of the old 9:30 Club as the band kicks into one of its epic jams. Needless to say, I leap onstage and knock out Ashcroft with a swift right to his bony little head. Then the band and I break into "Tutti Frutti," and let me tell you, we rocked and we rolled.

OK, the part about me boxing Mad Rich in his cheekbones isn't true, but his rage-rant from the old 9:30 Club's stinky stage? Straight-up truth. More me:

But 1995's tour was tough for Ashcroft; drugs had made him and his insanely great group just plain insane, and soon afterward the band derailed in a train wreck of comedowns and breakdowns. Two years later, the Verve has reformed and recorded "Urban Hymns," a collection of songs that charts the band's tumultuous journey. With Ashcroft now writing the majority of its tunes (mostly ballads and lighter rockers), The Verve doesn't play up its strengths: McCabe's sprawling, psychedelic guitarscapes and the band's mastery of organic improvisation.

I still listen to The Verve's awesome initial singles and EPs, as well as its fab first album, 1993's "A Storm in Heaven." And anytime Sirius's Left of Center channel decides to blast "Slide Away" when I'm in the car, I go into full-on air guitar mode. (D.C. area motorists, if you see a guy who looks like a paunchier version of Josh Homme flailing away in a gray Mitsubishi, buckle up and hammer the gas.)

But 1995's "A Northern Soul" (much of which I like, especially "This Is Music") and 1997's "Urban Hymns" ("Bittersweet Symphony," anybody?) comes from a different headspace entirely than the group's acid-fueled early works.

All of which I can understand, because I believe it when Ashcroft later sang "The Drugs Don't Work."

But as a singer-songwriter, Ashcroft's rote rock balladry and cringey lyrics leave much to be desired. His solo career was a flop artistically and, for the most part, commercially, and even with The Verve reformed, and McCabe's guitar back in the fold, "Love Is Noise" has all the imagination of a coked-up crooner in a club-stage rant.

(All that WWE stuff said, I sorta enjoy "Love Is Noise" because Dick Ashcroft is a fine singer. And I truly look forward to the next time the great-in-concert Verve come to town, even if it's only to get my ass kicked, once and for all, by my nutty buddy.)