FEATURE:
Second Spin
Supergrass – Life on Other Planets
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IN this series…
IN THIS PHOTO: Supergrass in 2002/PHOTO CREDIT: Martyn Goodacre
I am investigating albums that were sort of overlooked or underrated when they first came out. Assessing Supergrass’ Life on Other Planets seems timely – the band are touring again (or will be soon enough), and there might be new material sometime in the future. Released in 2002, Life on Other Planets followed their 1999 eponymous album. There are several different phases to Supergrass’ career. Their first two albums are full of buoyant songs and energy; the songs are youthful, and they are considered their very best – 1995’s I Should Coco and 1997’s In It for the Money. Supergrass is a more calmed affair; more reflective in places. Although there was more critical love for the band’s first two albums, it is folly to ignore the following two. I think Life on Other Planets is a sort of return to flavour and spring of their first two albums. The band said that they were inspired to write the albhum following a working holiday in the Côte d'Azur, Southern France. Sam Williams produced Supergrass’ debut album; John Cornfield joined Supergrass in producing their next two but, by the time Life on Other Planets came along, the band felt that they needed more urgency and a different approached. They hired Tony Hoffer, who kept takes short and brought back an urgency that can be found early on in Supergrass’ career.
Although there are no big anthems like Alright and Going Out on Life on Other Planets, I think there are so many gems to be found. Za and Rush Hour Soul are a brilliant pair of opening tracks – the latter is one of the most charged songs the band ever laid down. Can’t Get Up is a highlight with a huge chorus; Funniest Thing is the band going about left-field, whilst Grace is the band in classic territory. Maybe there are a couple of filler tracks (Prophet 15 and Run is quite a weak way to end a wonderful album), but there is more than enough to make Life on Other Planets stay in the mind. The guys did recapture much of the energy they displayed in the 1990s but, as the scene was different in 2002 and things had moved on, maybe that accounts for a slightly meagre response to their fourth album. It is a shame that so many critics gave the album short shrift. I will bring in three reviews for Life on Other Planets: one that is positive and sees the whole picture; one that is constructive (I have highlighted the more negative aspects), and one that is quite negative overall. The former is a more current review, so it might be a case of the album growing in strength and sounding stronger further down the line. This is what AllMusic had to say when they reviewed Life on Other Planets:
“Supergrass makes music so effervescent and so effortlessly joyous that it's easy to take them and their skills for granted. Surely that was the case around the release of their third album, 1999's eponymous effort, which in its labored fun and weary ballads illustrated just how much hard work it was to craft records as brilliant as I Should Coco and In It for the Money. It suggested the group might have burned too bright and flamed out, but, happily, 2002's Life on Other Planets is a smashing return to form, an album giddy with the sheer pleasure of making music.
What makes this all the more impressive is that this is the record that Supergrass attempted to be -- a perfect balance of the sensibility and humor of I Should Coco with the musicality and casual virtuosity of In It for the Money. Where that album felt labored and a little weary, Life on Other Planets is teeming with life. The tempos are sprightly, the hooks tumble out of the speakers, the band mixes up styles and eras, and they never, ever forget the jokes (Gaz's fleeting Elvis impression on "Seen the Light," an allusion to Spinal Tap's "All the Way Home," or the chorus of "Evening of the Day"). Sure, it's possible to spot the influence all the way through the album -- most clearly T. Rex on "Seen the Light" and "Brecon Beacons," where Gaz's warble is uncannily like Marc Bolan's -- but it never sounds exactly like their inspirations -- it all sounds like Supergrass. And Supergrass hasn't offered such pure, unabashed pop pleasure since their debut; there hasn't been an album that's this much fun in a long time. Since they've been away for a while and have never broken in the States, Supergrass has been curiously overlooked, even though they're better than 99 percent of the power pop and punk-pop bands out there (plus, their everything-old-is-new-again aesthetic can be heard in such albums as the Strokes' Is This It?). But, as this glorious record proves, there are few bands around these days who are as flat-out enjoyable as this trio. The world is a better place for having Supergrass in it”.
I think the band themselves have sort of said Life on Other Planets is not one of their favourites, but I think it is such a varied and exciting album, one cannot ignore it. Drowned in Sound did praise aspects of Life on Other Planets, though they did highlight some flaws:
“The negatives first, then; ‘Evening Of The Day’ is the sort of sub-standard album filler that Supergrass should really have got out of their system by now. It is an annoying, lightweight, novelty song with a false ending, daft harmonies and comedy whistling. Stuck slap bang in the middle of the record, it does nothing except destroy the momentum gained by the opening five tracks.
The decision to recruit Tony Hoffer as producer for this record is an interesting one. Hoffer’s previous credits include work for artists such as Air and Beck, and it is clear he has gently attempted to bring a more experimental approach to this band’s notoriously traditionalist recording methods.
On ‘LA Song’ you wonder if it was worth him bothering. The track itself is not really up to much anyway - again it comes over like a badly thought out pastiche, Supergrass forcing their ‘wacky’ side upon us once too often. Add to this a load of unnecessary synthesiser effects that feel like after-thoughts, throw in some rubbish Buggles/Daft Punk-style solo parts, and it’s a proper old mess.
Closing track ‘Run’ is the only other song where you suspect Hoffer was really calling the shots. A thoughtful electro-acoustic piece, it sounds like Supergrass trying to sound like Air, and discovering, surprisingly, that it rather suits them.
Elsewhere, ‘Life On Other Planets’ is mostly conventional Supergrass. The singles ‘Grace’ and ‘Never Done Nothing Like That Before’, whilst being great on their own, fit snugly into the rest of the album, and listening to the latter is like hearing the teenage indie of ‘I Should Coco’ all over again, now fully grown up, more muscular and with hairs on its chest”.
It is a shame that the once-celebrated Supergrass found themselves on the receiving end of some negative reviews. Although 2005’s Road to Rouen gained back some of the critical praise, I think so many people were either unfairly comparing Life on Other Planets to previous Supergrass albums, or they were not listening long enough to give the album full respect. The Guardian reviewed the album in 2002, and had this to remark:
“Supergrass's role in the Britpop revolution should not be underestimated. Their debut, I Should Coco, was the work of assured young terriers who snapped at the heels of the bloated US grunge bands and made them go away. However, despite making their "mature" album with 1997's In It for the Money, the Oxford trio have never made the convincing leap from snotty-nosed racketeers to grown-up pop band. In a bid to halt the rot, Life on Other Planets harks back to the youthful effervescence of their debut - but the energy feels laboured. A bigger problem is the obvious lack of ideas: on three tracks, they sound like a T Rex tribute band.
As Gaz Coombes's muse flails around, mostly in the debris of the 1970s, occasionally they hit the spot. Grace is one of their most naggingly tuneful singles, and the supernatural revenge fantasy of Brecon Beacons has some intriguing lyrics. But the album predominately feels adrift and lightweight. Can't Get Up ("... no more") sums up their career”.
Though 2008’s Diamond Hoo Ha was the final studio album from Supergrass, one can never rule out another release from them. If fans had to rank their six albums, I guess Diamond Hoo Ha might be in sixth; perhaps Life on Other Planets is fifth; Road to Rouen is fourth, whilst Supergrass would be third; maybe In It for the Money is second, whilst their debut, I Should Coco, comes in the top spot. That might suggest the band got weaker as time went on, but I think that would do them a disservice. They were always evolving, and I have a lot of love for their later work. I would recommend people check out Life on Other Planets, as it is a much-underrated album that boasts some cracking tracks! Perhaps some of those critics who were a little unkind to Life on Other Planets when they reviewed it will listen again and…
SEE the light.