HOLE poll - Live Through This

violet is great and i adore courters for covering young marble giants but the killer here is doll parts

Never could and still can't really get into "Doll Parts," but I'm sort of obsessed with "Miss World" right now. I love the great up-the-stairs/down-the-stairs guitar riff.

One of the first 3 tracks. I saw Hole at Reading '95 where they opened with Plump & Miss World and they kicked ass, but then they just fell apart after those songs and the rest of the set was a shambolic mess.

Rock Star v. Credit in the Straight World. After the football I'll have to listen to this record again. Anyone ever done a Kurt v. Courtney thread? I'd so vote Courtney.

I haven't heard this album, but I've always really liked Violet.

Why isn't Olympia on this? Wait - was it a hidden track? I can't remember. Anyway, that's my favorite and I can't vote for it. boooooooooo.

I must begrudgingly admit that I like the riff on "Violet," but I strenuously doubt that Courtney wrote it.

Why isn't Olympia on this? Wait - was it a hidden track? I can't remember. Anyway, that's my favorite and I can't vote for it. boooooooooo.

― ENBB, Sunday, May 3, 2009 8:51 AM (15 minutes ago)

Actually, it is. Listed as "Rock Star" on the sleeve, though, due to a last second song switch before it was released (and I guess it's never been changed?).

The song is called Rock Star - there's an alternate version on the Miss World single, and it's still called Rock Star there. Unless that's a mistake as well.

o rly? I was just going off info from the wiki page. I should sooooo know better by now.

Ha, shows what I know. OK - voted!

"Olympia" (in reference to Olympia, Washington) ... To clarify, a song named "Rock Star" was removed from the final track listing and was replaced with "Olympia", but the artwork had already been printed. The original "Rock Star" can be found on Jabberjaw Compilation: Good to the Last Drop and various bootlegs.

^^^ wiki bit

Yeah I just read that - I guess they renamed Olympia as Rock Star which confuses the issue a bit. I'd never heard there was another song called Rock Star before.

The Rock Star on Miss World is definitely the Olympia one, cos I've got it.

The second side = victory lap.

for a few months after this came out i probably averaged listening to it twice a day. still love it. my first thought is "plump," but "softer, softest" and "gutless" tempt me too. and "olympia/rock star".

How on earth can some people still think she "stole" riffs or needed Cobain's help when Nirvana never produced anything this tight, smart, and intense?

this album is so gooood

Sure is.

when Nirvana never produced anything this tight, smart, and intense?

also that COVER

Pretty On The Inside is better

i probably like this better than any nirvana album, although it's a close (and unnecessary call). i definitely think that at their respective bests, courtney is a better lyricist than kurt was.

oops just ignore those parentheses...

also, the best 5 or 6 songs on celebrity skin are probably my favorite thing courtney's done, even though i think this is a better album overall.

I voted for "Violet", the one song that's a real keeper for me from this album; the rush into the chorus is still thrilling.

I just listened to this album all the way through for the first time in many years, and I guess it's tight, inasmuch as it bashes and yells without much variation. But after 12 songs the singing just bores me: the monotone talk-sing goes on and on, mostly flat, out of tune: maybe that's the artistic point, but it's not something I can love. The guitars and drumming don't redeem the poor singing, either.

I still don't get what happened (musically of course, I remember the rest) between this and Celebrity Skin, which I absolutely love and listen to all the time still.

definitely think that at their respective bests, courtney is a better lyricist than kurt was.

otm

'Doll Parts' has the most brilliant lyrics, imho.

'I want to be the girl with the most cake
He only loves those things because he loves to see them break
I fake it so real, I am beyond fake
And someday, you will ache like I ache
Someday you will ache like I ache'

i mean, 'i fake it so real i am beyond fake' is almost a stupefyingly good pop lyric.

i like it

it's an important step beyond teenage misunderstood misanthropy

violet is rly hard to fuck with here, but i agree that doll parts is as well -- the tired pain in the vocals is pretty jarring

i remember when i would put this on around my mom, she'd hear violet and go "really, don't you think this woman is a genius?"

aw i love this album

was just listening to "rock star" in the car.

soft spot for "jennifer's body"

i definitely identify people irl as wanting to be the girl with the most cake all the time.

maybe i will vote for "softer, softest"

fuck, apparently this didn't survive one of the cd purges of my poor student years. oh well a used copy should cost like 3 bucks right?

my first instinct on this poll is miss world but i want to hear the whole thing again.

love this album. am leaning towards 'softer, softest', although 'asking for it' is kicking my ass at the moment; this rarely left my walkman for a few months back when it came out, so listening to it again is like revisiting that era in a really vivid way. the chord-changes of 'asking for it' are really slaying me right now.

Burn the witch...the witch is dead...burn the witch....just bring me back her he-eeee-ead!!!

Wait, Rock Star isn't really Rock Star? I didn't know! That's my fave moment on the album -- WE EVEN FUCK THE SAME -- so I guess I'll vote for faux Rock Star.

i probably like this better than any nirvana album, although it's a close (and unnecessary call). i definitely think that at their respective bests, courtney is a better lyricist than kurt was.

― would you ask tom petty that? (tipsy mothra), Sunday, May 3, 2009 9:18 AM (7 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

oops just ignore those parentheses...

― would you ask tom petty that? (tipsy mothra), Sunday, May 3, 2009 9:18 AM (7 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

also, the best 5 or 6 songs on celebrity skin are probably my favorite thing courtney's done, even though i think this is a better album overall.

― would you ask tom petty that? (tipsy mothra), Sunday, May 3, 2009 9:19 AM (7 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

QFT... strenuously hoping we'd disagree on best 5 or 6 songs on celebrity skin just because otherwise i can delegate all future posting to you

prolly Asking For It or Softer, Softest...

ah fuck it, definitely Asking For It. entire song it OTM.

Everytime that I sell myself to you
I feel a little bit cheaper than I need to
I wiil tear the petals off of you
Rose-red, I will make you tell the truth

Was she asking for it?
Was she asking nice?
Yeah, she was asking for it
Did she ask you twice?

Everytime that I stare into the sun
Angel dust and my dress just comes undone
Everytime that I stare into the sun
Be a model or just look like one
Well Ill rock it to the end
Do you think you can make me do it again?

Was she asking for it?
Was she asking nice?
Yeah, she was asking for it
Did she ask you twice?

If you live through this with me, I swear that I will die for you
And if you live through this with me, I swear that I will die for you
Was she asking for it?
Was she asking nice?
Yeah, she was asking for it
Did she ask you twice?

ps is this the thread where we anticipate nobody's daughter some more?

ha i was going to ask what the 5-6 best songs on celebrity skin are. would probably vote "awful" in that poll. that would be an easier poll.

"i tell you everything / and hope that you won't tell on me" is a great lyric. <3 courtney 4eva.

celebrity skin
awful
malibu
reasons to be beautiful
boys on the radio

maybe?

lol I agree completely. add "heaven tonight" if we go to six.

i was going to say!

upon reflection, i would be a much awesomer ilx0r if I delegated all of my posts to you and tipsy mothra

johnny fever, you're officially on the hook for celebrity skin and america's sweetheart polls after this

I've only heard the singles from Celebrity Skin, and I've never heard America's Sweetheart or any of the Nobody's Daughter demos, so one of you guys can handle those.

I never cared to check out any album tracks off this one, but I'll use the results of this poll for a few recommendations.. I certainly hope the top 3 doesn't turn out to be "Miss World" "Violet" and "Doll Parts" because if that's the case I won't bother.

(and really, is it that hard to write a song in the Nirvana style?)

And do it just as well? Absolutely.

I got a free copy of the 33 1/3 book and gobbled up every word in spite of not really wanting to relive those days.

I'm guessing it was made during a couple of years that were as tumultuous as what produced Exile, Tusk, or other similar albums.

I dunno about that but it was a rough time to be a young woman.

there's a 33 1/3 about live through this? i need to get that!

Ohh, thanks for the heads up. I've been on a huge Hole kick the past couple of weeks. Especially playing the hell out of that Courtney single from last spring.

For the longest time 33 1/3 ' s weren't available for nook and kindle, but it looks like they are now.

Patty Schemel's new memoir Hit So Hard is really good. Has some new nuggets and insights into early days of Hole & last days of Kurt Cobain (specifically the March '94 intervention), but mostly it's a really great exploration of addiction and recovery. The rockstar largesse may be familiar but Schemel is candid and blunt in a way that other recent rock bios & memoirs I've read haven't been.

I thought you revived the thread to post the Bowie/Love story.

Yeah, the addiction aspects of that book....man.

Eventually I'll write a review of this and make the point that this seems like a book kids should have to read in high school as an object lesson about how drugs can really crater (and erase stretches of) one's life.

otm. so much more to the point than other similar addiction & recovery books - Scar Tissue, Duff's book - there's absolutely no glamorizing it. I really like that she dives right in, the first chapter is about how her family hosted AA meetings in their living room. "I've always been in recovery." No romance at all.

I thought you revived the thread to post the Bowie/Love story.

― morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn)

Go on...

Holy fuck is Malibu an amazing song. Violet too. just saying, at this point.

Go on Alfred...

Yeah I love Malibu but I’m partial to any song that invokes California

I'm pretty drunk rn and forgot who encouraged me to listen to this but it is fucken amazing and better than any Nirvana album

It is both of those. Just listened to it again recently too, what a record.

GUT
LE-AHH-ASS

the greatest song of all time "softer, softest"

additionally, "i think that i would die" deserved 30 votes

GUT
LE-AHH-ASS

― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn),

i think if i voted i voted for softer softest, but the whole album is phenomenal

Softer, softest deserved more than 1 vote but I’d still have voted Violet. Having said that it’s one of the few albums I can listen to all the way through

Oh please, hating on Courtney Love doesn't make on a misogynist. Nobody really thinks Kurt wrote LTT; if he did, it would have been a lot better.

Gonna listen to some Bikini Kill now.

The second side = victory lap.

― I'm crossing over into enterprise (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, May 3, 2009 9

Everyone's the same
We look the same
We talk the same yeah
We even fuck the same

i walked into work (restaurant job) one day recently and someone had put this album on while we did sidework. i thought i was having a stroke for a sec until i adjusted, then i loled when two mature ladies walked in when we opened at 4:30 while Courtney screamed THERE IS NO MII-IIIIL-HILK a couple of times before someone put on the regular playlist.

i had a serious moment there for a sec

got it when i was 12 so it's hard to listen to objectively, but yeah it really holds up

i do wish that 20 Years in the Dakota was on here though - i would replace Plump or Gutless with it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVBzC7zL-OI

love that particular growl that's all over this album too where it's like the sum resonant frequency of her whole body or something

whenever i hear it i have vivid nemories of it blasting out of my dorm neighbor’s nearly-empty dorm room the day before semester holiday, echoing off the walls down the halls & playing it on repeat we sang at the top of our lungs as we packed up our stuff to go home foe holidays —- but i also realized the production has that great echo on it already so the whole album ~actually does sound like~ it’s bouncing off brick walls anyway

such a magic album, just wakes up your whole body with the first bar

It’s still a great album but it hurts to listen to in full - I do that rarely, because it jolts me back to a very specific moment of youth, a naïveté, a different person. (I was a junior in high school.)

No Nirvana LP hits me like this record does.

otm

i feel the same way, part of my reasoning is nirvana was already sort of trapped in amber by the time i heard them and hole was something that i could discover that was really striking (i knew violet, but to find out that there's a whole album of songs that are just as good??). but i also think the two big hole records are just better, full stop.

I do too. I'm a Nirvana fan — I saw them in concert! — but with the possible exception of Unplugged I've never worn out a Nirvana album the way I've worn out LTT and Celebrity Skin. (And also I think poor Eric Erlandson doesn't get enough credit for that, since his name is on most of the songs.)

Adding to the chorus that can't believe Softer, Softest got one vote.

I listened to this album constantly for a year or two in high school and bonded with it intensely, and then hardly ever again. Just got it out of my system (I rarely listen to Nirvana either).

I saw Hole at Lollapalooza 95, but never got to see Nirvana live.

Xpost

Chris L, I can kinda relate. The music meant so much - so much! - at a certain time.

Doing a live conversation about this record tonight for an event at the local “record bar,” will report back

bookmarked

I've been playing this record a bit after only knowing the hits.

I love how she has 4-5 different voices she employs here, slipping from one to the other on a dime.

Well I went to school oh.

I introduced a younger friend to this recently and she was like amazed by how visceral it is, and I was like, isn’t it fucking great?

Well I went to school oh.

― Benson and the Jets (ENBB),

ha ha

:)

this album is always like sonic smelling salts for me, just wakes me right the fuck up <3

i love it SO MUCH

lol same -- i also cannot listen to it idly, i have to pay attention and fully give in

has anyone listened to the BBC podcast CL did? a friend told me it was great but i haven't listened yet.

I kind of want to listen to it but also listening to Courtney talk is a little exhausting. Reminds me of some no-filter easily-diverted friends of mine, fun for a bit and then it doesn’t end.

Unlike this admirably succinct album! (Or compact disc, you could say.) No skips, banger-banger-banger, perfectly chosen cover, in and out in 38 minutes. Just so good.

i havent listened yet, but i really need to!

GUT
LEEEAAAHHHSSS

― first I think it's time I kick a little verse! (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, September 11, 2013 12:26 PM

Tipsy says it well. I’m interested in what Courtney Love thinks about things, but I’d rather read the transcript. (See also Paul Schrader, for slightly different aesthetic reasons.)