Better Can't Make Your Life Better

Better Can't Make Your Life Better Artist: Lilys
Label: Che Records
Category: Music


Average customer rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Media: Audio CD
Number Of Discs: 1


UPC: 075596195621
EAN: 0075596195621
ASIN: B000005IR9


Release Date: 1996-09-10

Better Can't Make Your Life Better


Related Categories:

General General
Categories | Alternative Rock | Styles | Music
General General
Categories | Rock | Alternative Styles | Alternative Rock | Styles | Music
Indie Rock Indie Rock
Categories | Indie & Lo-Fi | Alternative Rock | Styles | Music
General General
Categories | Indie & Lo-Fi | Alternative Rock | Styles | Music
Dream Pop Dream Pop
Categories | Indie & Lo-Fi | Alternative Rock | Styles | Music
Shoegazing Shoegazing
Categories | Indie & Lo-Fi | Alternative Rock | Styles | Music
General General
Categories | Rock | Styles | Music
Pop Rock Pop Rock
Categories | Pop | Styles | Music

Tracks:

  1. Cambridge California
  2. A Nanny In Manhattan
  3. Shovel Into A Spade Kit
  4. Elevator Is Temporary
  5. Can't Make Your Life Better
  6. Who Is Moving
  7. The Tennis System ( And It's Stars)
  8. Daz En El Hogar
  9. Bring Up The Stamp
  10. The Sammael Sea
  11. Return Every Morning

Similar Items:

  1. The 3-Way
  2. Services (For The Soon To Be Departed) [EP]
  3. A Brief History of Amazing Letdowns
  4. Precollection
  5. Eccsame the Photon Band

Customer Reviews:

4 out of 5 stars It's the hit man.......2002-08-07

The hit album from Kurt Heasley and co. this one is a sure fire crowd pleaser and the beginners first and best way to get into the sounds of the lilys. An amazing departure from Eccsame the Photon Band, this album stood alone and made Kurt the semi-star that he is today. Don't be fooled by those who can only talk about Lilys if they mention the kinks in the same sentence - this one has a sound that is all its own. Highlights, in my opinion, include the always inspiring "Returns Every Morning" and "Elevator (is temporary)" A great album - but missing some of the stoner insight and melancholy that made the earlier albums so haunting and wonderful to listen to. This is as good as bubblegum gets.

5 out of 5 stars STILL one of the best albums of all time........2002-06-14

YES it's got an odd mix. YES the arrangements are bent, with cool meoldies skittering off into never-never land before the song's half-done. YES sometimes the vocals are sometimes a bit low (in someone else's opinion - they're spot-on for me.) YES the guitars are bright (and I do mean brilliant - as in smart, intelligent, etc.) and as you can see YES is the operative word here. Really one of the best pop rock albums ever created. Who cares if it sounds like the Kinks or the Beatles or whatever from time to time? The main point is that it always sounds like the Lilys. Period. I listen to this as often as any of my favorite records and then some.

1 out of 5 stars Big disappointment.......2002-03-05

I picked up this album on a whim because I like '60s-influenced stuff. Big mistake. These guys sound like a really bad parody of the Kinks. There are also some other problems:

1. As another reviewer mentioned, the guitars are too loud. Actually, it's not that the guitars themselves are too loud, but that the lead singer's voice is put way back in the mix. And the guitars sound too compressed and trebly. Maybe that was the idea -- to make it sound "garagy" -- but it doesn't work. Plus, if they're trying to imitate a '60s sound, most '60s garage bands had their lead singers way up in front, snarling like Mick Jagger. This guy's wimpy little voice sounds really sad by comparison (actually it might be a good thing that it's hidden way back in the mix, 'cause it's not much of a voice anyway).

2. The songs just don't have catchy melodies. A lot of times they'll start on a decent riff, but then when the vocals kick in it just starts going nowhere fast. And Daz en el Hogar is a good example of a song with a fun riff that, halfway through, gets completely off track and ruined by a lame middle interlude.

Yeah, there's the backing vocals going "la-la-la" in the best Beatleish fashion, there's the Kinks power chords, and there's the obligatory conciseness in song length (the whole album of 11 songs lasts only 37 minutes). But the backing vocals sound contrived, the harmony just isn't "there," the power riffs aren't even of Kinks B-side quality, and by the end of it all I was actually glad it only lasted 37 minutes.

Nice try, no cigar.

4 out of 5 stars Lilys are searching for a genre here.......2001-01-20

The Lilys burst onto the indie music scene in the early 1990s as classic shoegazers hiding behind walls of guitar chords and muddled lyrics.

As the decade rolled on, the Lilys traded their keds in for paisley shirts as they went in the direction of mid-60s psych/mod/pop, fashioning their tunes (at least on this record) right out of the Beatles' Rubber Soul days ("Cambridge California"), a 1967 Kinks single ("Who Is Moving"), or modern-day Elephant 6 band (Hear the Apples In Stereo in the CD's title track).

Unfortunately, someone forgot to tell the band that they no longer have to hide their vocals and blur (pun intended here) all the catchy guitar riffs that are part of cool 60s-esque pop into another shoegazer anthem.

Better production would have made this disc a stellar record with no weak songs. Still, the positives far outweight the negatives, and I play this disc quite a bit.

2 out of 5 stars The originals did it MUCH better.......2001-01-01

I bought this album with high hopes, after listening to a few snippets and reading the reviews. I love the great '60s sounds of the Who, Kinks, and the like, so I thought that any progression of that sound would be good.

The Lilys fall WAY short. The riffs are pretty good (though there is no absolute killer riff on any of the songs), but the melodies are very mediocre. The lead singer is also nothing to write home about. These guys seem to be merely copping a style rather than doing anything great with it or furthering it.

On top of that, the guitars are just TOO LOUD, and have a brightness to them that is very annoying. (Note: "brightness" does not mean "brilliant." This is NOT a compliment. If an instrument is too bright, it cuts through the rest of the mix like a knife through butter, and overpowers everything else. It also sounds like needles pricking your brain after a while. Ouch.)

Music Album:

  1. The Past That Decorates Me ~ Dezeray's Hammer
  2. Walking Home from Nicole's ~ Minor Majority
  3. Dutch April ~ George Usher
  4. The Angel of the Squared Circle
  5. Morning Macumba ~ Bikeride
  6. Witchdoctors a Go-Go ~ The Witch Doctors
  7. In and Out of Life ~ Maman
  8. Beat ~ King Crimson
  9. For a Better Tomorrow ~ Mad Science Fair
  10. "The Most Abused Word" ~ Countervail

Music Album

Music Album

Music CD

A Transparent Mask ~ Ken Nordine

The Other Side of Standards ~ Various Artists

Recit Proche ~ Eddy Louiss

Piano ~ Dave Lee

Duet for Eric Dolphy ~ Aki Takase

Legendary

Nippon ~ Tulip

Zoku ~ Yasya

Complete Best ~ Naoko Isamu

Sun Dance ~ Hikaru Nishida