Courtney Emancipates Herself

ALBUM REVIEW

by Shardae Jobson

As the fourth full-length album of original material under the name Hole, Courtney Love remains as the only founding member in the group, as while Nobody's Daughter contains some decent tracks worthy of her comeback in the field that made her one of the most polemic figures in music history; it's taken quite a while to get us to hear her officially declare emancipation of personal and professional tribulations.

For any real fan of Hole's music throughout the years, the return of Love (musically) is one that will again titillate, once they push play on Nobody's Daughter, they'll also find themselves wishing that Melissa Auf der Maur would come back as the band's greatest replacement member, and Eric Erlandson, the quieter founding member of the band--though nonetheless sonically vital--would've returned and help create the kind of material that made Hole an underrated band of the '90s that always delivered landmark albums in rock music.

This latest record in the Hole discography, after the laudable gritty realism of Live Through This and glittery coolness that was Celebrity Skin (a fantastic follow up in which it's only main difference to the former was a more refined finish), Nobody’s Daughter is a slight mixture of both, but doesn’t really find its footing as another spectrum of the band’s progress. As a whole, it kind of just feels like a record of songs with no theme to each other. From first listen, you'll probably like it immediately, but you’ll only get to loving it with future listens after random decisions to give another chance one day.

Courtney’s voice sounds like it’s been through more hell on Nobody's Daughter than it did on Live Through This, but what she didn’t have in 1994 that she does in 2010 is a kind of resilience and acceptance in that she is the mess she proclaims, but she can still play the guitar. In 1994, she was searching for meaning as an emotionally discombobulated young widow—with a potty mouth. In 1998, she was a reborn glamour puss--with a potty mouth. In 2010, her feelings are up for grabs in the song “For Once in My Life”, just as she intended with the many outbursts of over-shared personal details of her life that seemed to come out the woodwork non-intermittently. Among her many publicized issues (especially when she released her iffy solo album America's Sweetheart, and a she recently referred to as "the Letterman years), it was a wonder if she would be able to rise again as a musician. It is evident she's still got it, but the weary of her woes has taken a toll as the luster she had as such a infamously eccentric figure seems to have rusted a bit. The album has some highlights of the old Courtney, and so reassuredly, yes, she was and always will be a ragamuffin talent.

The song "Pacific Coast Highway" positively gleams of “Malibu” from Celebrity Skin with a more stripped, acoustic sound, and bounces off what was left of the song before it,“Honey”, almost like an expansive look into the previous. "Letter to God" might as well be titled "Letter to Frances" in regards to her current torn relationship with her only child, and the first single (with no music video) "Skinny Little Bitch" is a classic loud, post-modern rock song for Hole but doesn't match their previous work. It's the kind of song that sounds better live, which is not exactly a bad thing. The last track, "Never Go Hungry" has got to be inspired by the character Scarlett O'Hara in Gone With the Wind when in the scene she swears on her life "she'll never go hungry again". In Courtney's world and in this time of her storied life, she'll never hit rock bottom (once more) again.

Nobody's Daughter wins when it stays along a sedate sound and perturbed lyrics of love and life gone wrong, such as the lucidly brash (bridge) lyrics of "People like you, fuck people like me" on the excellent "Samantha". The harder songs like "Loser Dust" are good, but sound a bit forced and just aren't the same without the chemistry she had with Erlandson and someone as swift as Auf der Maur who is like the Lita Ford of today's music.

With virtually new, unknown members in Hole, Courtney Love is more center stage than ever in the band, and has become a kind of Patti Smith rock icon in the microcosm of female rock stars. Yet, unlike Smith, Love yearns to be in the spotlight and be recognized as a student and purveyor of the music she creates. Love is still one of the most sincere artists in the genre. Her feminine growls have a twinge of ache in them now, but she's not going anywhere. At this point, she has nothing to lose, because she belongs to no one. The album as a whole doesn't really have a direction, but considering the facts, it's not so bad, and her vengeance is more melancholic and subservient than expected. You'll be alright, Ms. Love.

THE BEST: "Samantha", "Pacific Coast Highway", "Honey"

VIDEO: Hole performing "Violet" in 1995, and "Celebrity Skin" in 1998, (both) at the MTV Video Music Awards