Reviews (page 2 of 15)
There’s few things better than Nick McCabe’s other worldly guitar playing alongside Richard Ashcroft’s hooks. I saw them 4 times in total before they finally split. Some people prefer early Verve but I love that mix of poppy hooks tinged with psychedelic guitar, it’s the perfect blend for me and I listened to it relentlessly… and still do.
There were several albums that signalled the end of Britpop, but none was as obviously "post-Britpop" as this one. The long atmospheric passages, combined with the gorgeous string arrangements, and the psychedelic of it all really sounded like the future of rock music, at least 'critically acclaimed' rock music. Yes, it is long and overly dramatic at times, but that's exactly what you want out of something like this. Also, The Rolling Stones taking all the royalties from "Bittersweet Symphony" over a sample you can hardly find in the source (which wasn't even in the original song anyway) was bullshit move. Classic album. Currently underrated. Key tracks: Bittersweet Symphony Sonnet The Drugs Don't Work Catching the Butterfly Space and Time Lucky Man
O waw, dons je očitno dan, ko bom prvič slišala več od tega banda, kot njihov najbl znan komad. S katerim začnemo, "Bitter Sweet Symphony". Mislim, da mi je tud če sm ga slišala že miljonkrat, še zmer všeč. (Sori, album je skor 76 minut?!?!) No, js sm presenečena. Dejansko mi je ful dobr album (sm pri "Catching the Butterfly"). Vidim velik primerjav z Oasis, kar se je valjda tud v moji glavi pojavilo, ampak dalj k poslušam, bolj se mi zdi to ne fer. Sprva, ja, valjda nardiš to povezavo, če ne druzga, zarad podobno zvenečega vokala in samega obdobja, ko je album izšel. I prefer this. (Ful, FUL hejta za Britpop v recenzijah, lol. Ne morm nič rečt na to, en album nazaj je bil moj most hated žanr, tko da...) Slightly predolgo, ampak enjoyable.
I liked it. Confident and consistent, with a hint of nostalgia running through it. When did this come out relative to Oasis?
Verve sucks. 5/10
Britpoop more like
A warm bath of nostalgia of an album which marked a particular time in my life. It wasn't my favourite album of 1997, but it was the most memorable for personal reasons, although I had likely not listened to it for a couple of decades. It's front-loaded with the songs I remembered, which suggests that even when it was in rotation, I probably found it too long, and it's still about 10-15 minutes longer than it needs to be, which loses a point. But as an evocation of a time and a place for me, and of a momentous event, it's hard to beat. I've loved being back there for a whole weekend, but it's time to move on. Next.
One good song on this album
This is not too bad if you compare them to a lot of the "Britpop era" bands. There's an interesting melancholy to it, and also interesting and innovative songwriting inspired by 60s psychedelia.
So close to a 5! To start with the overwhelmingly good, bitter sweet sympathy - personal top 25 song of all time for me, even as a 12 year I felt seen by his beautifully obnoxious crowded street bumps. The rest of the album is a perfect blend of everything Brit pop can offer, it nails that cigarettes are cool oasis vibe, in fact this would be my second favorite oasis album (cast no shadow btw is about these dudes or at least Ashcroft), plenty of stone roses like rhythm section grooves and even a spacey but rockin guitar hero Bends era Radiohead moments. However it’s 3 songs to long. Strong 4, might even spend 45 dollars or whatever to get the vinyl.
Bittersweet Symphony is such a ubiquitous song I looked this album up at one point. I was struck by The Drugs Don’t Work on that listen. But the rest fell away, the sad symphonic sounds of heroin, the street, and lost life that have been played and replayed for multiple generations at this point. Listening again today, I mostly felt that same sadness. It’s like there’s so much more that COULD have been done that wasn’t. 3 Boolean: True
More britpop. More than half of the pulling in this album is done by bittersweet symphony, if that song wasn't there this would be a very forgettable album.
Philosophy with guitars and multi tracked vocals. I'm in.
Love the big guitar textures. Very moody and quite catchy as well.
Rock - one big hit the rest are decent
Great 90’s album
iniciei quase em êxtase com a primeira música, o resto achei todas meio parecidas uma com a outra mas acho que gostei mesmo assim.
Veľmi dobrý album, ale neviem ho počúvať viackrát v krátkom slede.
A very good album, with a lot of fond memories. Several great songs.
Listening session: september 16th/17th, while getting ready in the morning Listened to before: listened to a few songs before Thoughts: the hit singles are really great, but unfortunately the rest of the album does not stand out as generic Britpop Favourite tracks: Bittersweet Symphony, Sonnet & The Drugs Don’t Work
It was the band’s 3rd album but the first time most of us heard of them. Bittersweet Symphony gets the lion’s share of the love (rightfully so) but Lucky Man is a sneaky banger.
eerste nummer is echt een classic. rest is leuk maar niet amazing
The Verve have somewhat unfortunately been relegated into that 'overplayed one-hit-wonder' territory with Bittersweet Symphony, but this understates the excellence of Urban Hymns, and how it fits with the progression of Britpop throughout the 90s. The albums feels like a weary goodbye to the genre, with lyrics detailing exhaustion and unrealised potential, with electronic sounds that point to the late 90s, alongside swirling synths of Baggy, essentially mixing in all the sonic touchstones of the 90s.
Fills a big gap in my knowledge of 90s music. Some kind of link between Oasis and Radiohead?
Nice bittersweet symphony and The Drugs Don't Work. 2 other good ones. But also lots of what I thought listening to Oasis would be like (annoying men moaning with their voices and such). It just gets a 3
Olin kuunnellut Urban Hymnsin kerran aikaisemmin ehkä noin vuosi sitten. En muistanutkaan kuinkabpaljon tällä levyllä oli psykedeelissävytteistä tunnelmointia. Kuitenkin neljä singlelohkaisua ovat ne parhaat kappaleet. Hyvä albumi, mutta pituutta olisi voinut karsia.
Only one good song ngl
Boring and uninteresting.
Song reviews: Bittersweet symphony: I’ve heard this song before I even played it on viola in an ensemble. A classic and I love it. 5/5 Sonnet: has its own unique feel. I love it. I can’t tell the verve is musical geniuses. 5/5 The rolling people: I love how everything on this album is so unexpected and every song has its own vibe. A longer song but I didn’t mind. 5/5 The drugs don’t work: I love the chords. Feels really raw and emotional. 5/5 Catching the butterfly: I love the drums. Feels almost nostalgic. 5/5 Neon wilderness: feels magical. Just felt like it didn’t really go anywhere and I could imagine it being hard to listen to in certain situations. 4/5 Space and time: solid. 4/5 Lucky man: feels like a good comfort song. 5/5 I think this album healed my mental state. I’m not sure if I’m being too generous with this but 5/5
Geht so, nicht so meines.
Never really understood the popularity of this band, they were just a moment in time. Even their most popular song is barely authored by them - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3QtMMFoYy8 - lol - I wonder how people may have walked down the aisle to the cheesy chimes of Bittersweet Symphony. Yuck!
I didn't like this when it came out, and though I felt like I was being open minded - I'm still not a fan. The Verve just never really interested me.
definitely felt like an album i didn't fully 'get' just heard a load of relatively pleasant british guitar music with a couple notable highlights, and i can't help but feel i'm missing something, if that something is there at all i could definitely pick out a couple songs i really enjoyed, but ig i just didn't particularly vibe with a good chunk of the tracklist favourite song(s): bitter sweet symphony, the drugs don't work, this time least favourite song: the rolling people
Listened before? Yes Thoughts: - I really enjoy the first half of this album. Bittersweet Symphony is the clear standout, but Sonnet and The Drugs Don't Work are also great songs. - The second half does get kind of boring though. All the songs started to feel a bit too long.
Boring shite
I love the sound but the lack of variety brings this one down.
A little but better than I remember. Enjoyed it.
Very good albums, a lot of amazing vibes
Very strong 3
90s britpop. Bittersweet symphony is the standout. Surprisingly diverse sound across the album.
Sonnet new favorite song
Urban Hymns The Verve 1997 Genres: Rock Styles: Indie Rock, Britpop, Alternative Rock 1. Bitter Sweet Symphony (★★★★★) -Contexto: Construida sobre un loop de la versión orquestal de "The Last Time" de los Rolling Stones (arreglo de Andrew Loog Oldham). Ashcroft se inspiró en "La muerte de un viajante" de Arthur Miller y en su personaje Willy Loman —el hombre común que persigue el dinero y muere sin nada— para escribir sobre sentirse esclavo del dinero y de las convenciones sociales, y sobre la fragmentación de la identidad ("soy un millón de personas distintas de un día para el otro"). El uso del sample generó un juicio: los créditos de composición terminaron en manos de Jagger-Richards y la discográfica ABKCO se quedó con el 100% del dinero por regalías durante años. -Fav 2. Sonnet (★★★⯨☆) -Contexto: Tema más despojado que el anterior, con cuerdas y guitarra acústica. Habla de intentar seducir o recuperar a alguien siendo consciente de que uno mismo se está mostrando torpe o inseguro en el intento; se lee tanto como el comienzo como el final de una relación. 3. The Rolling People (★★★★★) -Contexto: Vuelve al sonido más crudo y jamero de sus primeros discos. Habla de las pequeñas concesiones y mentiras piadosas que uno hace para sobrevivir el día a día y llevarse bien con la gente. 4. The Drugs Don't Work (★★★★☆) -Contexto: Ashcroft ya hablaba de esta canción en 1995, explicando que consumía drogas aun sabiendo que lo hacían sentir mal, como forma de escapar del aburrimiento y la irritación. En la versión final cambió el pronombre "me" por "you", lo que generó especuladores que la vincularon a la muerte de su padre. El propio Ashcroft la definió como una canción de amor sobre cómo las drogas dejaron de "funcionar" como antes; el protagonista intenta escapar de su dolor hasta que ya no puede reprimirlo más. 5. Catching the Butterfly (★★★★★) -Contexto: Tema sobre sueños lúcidos. Ashcroft vuelve mentalmente a su infancia para "aprender" de su yo más joven al entrar en la adultez; se apoya en un recuerdo puntual de haber sido reprendido de chico por hablar fuera de turno. -Fav 6. Neon Wilderness (★★★☆☆) -Contexto: Interludio casi sin estribillo, pensado como contraparte de "Brainstorm Interlude" de "A Northern Soul". Lírica y atmósfera nocturnas, sobre la soledad; se lo lee como una continuación temática de "History", tema del disco anterior. 7. Space and Time (★★★★★) -Contexto: La canción más vieja del disco, tocada por Ashcroft en solitario mientras giraba con Oasis en Nueva York. Trata sobre un romance que no funcionó. 8. Weeping Willow (★★★⯨☆) -Contexto: Tema personal con alusiones a drogas y armas. Tiene un estribillo centrado en la necesidad de ser "salvado", un tópico recurrente en las letras de Ashcroft de esta época. 9. Lucky Man (★★★★★) -Contexto: Más simple y luminosa que el resto del disco. Habla del vínculo de Ashcroft con su esposa Kate Radley, con el cariño creciendo hacia el final de la canción; es de las letras más directamente felices/agradecidas del álbum ("la felicidad es solo un cambio en mí"). -Fav 10. One Day (★★★⯨☆) -Contexto: Balada donde Ashcroft se hace dúo consigo mismo (multitrack). La letra se inspiró en una nota periodística sobre un hombre que navegaba solo alrededor del mundo en un bote pequeño y que, borracho, se ató al mástil creyendo que iba a morir. Toca temas sobre el paso del tiempo y sobre cómo los adultos ya no encuentran la felicidad simple que tenían de chicos. 11. This Time (★★★☆☆) -Contexto: El protagonista repasa los errores de su vida y decide no lamentarse sino mejorar como persona ("voy a elevarme hacia la luz"), como declaración de superación personal sin atarse a una filosofía o religión concreta. 12. Velvet Morning (★★★⯨☆) -Contexto: El título es un homenaje a "Some Velvet Morning" de Lee Hazlewood. Habla de que nadie tiene una forma útil de arreglar los problemas del mundo. Para lograr una voz cruda como la de Hazlewood, Ashcroft cantó a través de un megáfono comprado días antes en un mercado de segunda mano. 13. Come On / Deep Freeze (Pista oculta) (★★★★☆) -Contexto: Cierre del disco, llamado así por la frase que Ashcroft suele gritar en vivo. Funciona como un "grito de guerra"; en la letra intenta contactar a Dios desde un locutorio telefónico. Termina con Ashcroft gritando "fuck you", que según el propio entorno de la banda no es negativo sino un grito de alegría/liberación. Liam Gallagher (Oasis) hace coros gritando esa misma frase. Aparece varios minutos después de "Come On" en silencio. Es un collage de ruido de radio, diálogo incomprensible, guitarra "jangly" y el llanto de un bebé; la propia banda se refirió a este tipo de material como "urban madness". -TOTAL = ★★★★⯨ (4,08)
There's something cinematic about the sound of the Verve. The song craftmanship -- the way it builds and is written -- is what makes the band for me. Most of the tracks are a little bloated, but I was surprised at how fast this hour+ listen went.
Great album! Some amazing tunes on here – Bittersweet Symphony, Drugs Don't Work, Lucky Man... but the rest is great too. I liked One Day, but just the general feeling of the album.
Something about this really isn’t for me. Other than a few really nice exceptions, the overwhelming feeling I feel throughout this album is boredom. The most notable exceptions were The Rolling People, Weeping Willow and Come On; three really good tracks. But still, I wouldn’t necessarily go back to them. On saying all of that, I think ‘Urban Hymns’ is a great name for an album. And I get that it’s got a meditative quality which was likely intentional; but it still hasn’t resulted in an album I enjoyed all that much.
I just don’t get it. I mean it’s good music, nothing terrible. But don’t get the hype. Is there even hype actually? I mean bittersweet is a cool song in some parts. But it sounds like a song that people who only listen to the radio think a “most amazing song ever” should sound like because it has strings and shit. Is this just a time and place album? Not being British and being a child at the time, did I just miss out? Was there lots of “the next Oasis?!?” With these guys? Cuz really when I listen to it - it just makes we want to listen to Oasis. Kind of bland Brit-pop that doesn’t get close to the big 4.
This was bad idk!!! Very very bland, watered-down squash grunge. I knew this from being a kid and the songs are famous but I guess I haven't listened to this album in full since I was in the car with my dad as a child.. and for good reason! No thanks to this!!
For me this album is peak late-90s mainstream British cultural stagnation made audible. Mid-tempo, smatterings of psychedelia but watered down for mass consumption, all focus on anthems for the lads but no substance underneath, way too long and self-indulgent. Don't get me wrong the music is *that* terrible, it has its moments maybe, but there's just something hollow here – the rot of Cool Britannia eating away at the core of 'indie' music and bloating it until eventually we reach the end-form of Coldplay and Snow Patrol and thus the apocalypse.
"Bittersweet Symphony" is an all-time jam, of course. That nothing else on this album measures up to that standard is not surprising. But the work as a whole is generally disappointingly predictable nonetheless.
Mys
Enjoyable
😴
Some good songs and some classics but overall very uneventful!
My biggest memory of thus band is them getting sued by The Stones for ripping off part of one of their songs for Bittersweet Symphony. It’s a mid album, at best.
I fear this is my shit, but it does get a bit repetitive at the midpoint :(
brilliance.
That one good song then the rest is just cheeks
Favorite track(s): The Drugs Don't Work, Catching the Butterfly Call this album the drugs the way it don't work.
Good, but long. Could have been 20 minutes shorter
Bittersweet Symphony is wonderful but the rest of the album sounds very generic.
some killer stuff but too long
I don't understand why I have to listen to this U2 cover band, Bittersweet symphony carries this star, cause the rest is garbage.
1-horrible 2-mediocre 3-regular/bueno. algunos hits, con produccion decente y algunas ideas interesantes 4-muy bueno/excelente. varios vits, mas ideas interesantes. 5-revolucionaria obra maestra. game changer este album se ubica en un buen album, algunos hits, algunas ideas interesantes pero por mucho tiempo me acorde de oasis, siendo de la epoca. por ahi le pifio me gusto
Peak Britpop. Smells like grass and bear. Favorites: Bitter Sweet Symphony, Sonnet, The Drugs Don’t Work, Weeping Willow, Velvet Morning
Sounded about how I expected it to sound. And that was fine. But it didn't wow me at any point. Best songs were Bittersweet Symphony and The Drugs Don't Work.
Positief verrast. 50/50 bangers en skips
I’m thankful to be 900+ albums into this list. It’s given me the context to know that Britpop was very much a product of its time and place, a ‘you had to be there’ genre. And this list has provided more than enough britpop to help me understand that this ISN’T the genres best offering. Most of the songs on here are wallpaper quality. The vocals are flat, the mix is thin, and the instrumentals are painfully bland. “Catching the Butterfly” is only remarkable for sounding like amuse lifting the hook from “Dancing Queen”. “Weeping Willow” and “This Time” were ok to my ears, they found a way to build some steam and make progress towards that y2k rock sound that Radiohead paved way for and acts like Coldplay would follow up on. But overall this is a tough 2/5. Not worth
4.5 one of my favorites so far
Better than oasis, it has the same late 70s pop rock influences but also has art rock and classic R&B references such as The Shangri-Las and Velvet Underground
“Bitter Sweet Symphony” had one of the openings that’s immediately recognizable. I like it, but don’t love it enough to seek it out; however, sucks me in each time I hear it. I hear “Lucky Man” on the radio enough that it doesn’t stand out to Me. “Sonnet” stuck with me this listen. Possibly, because I can imagine it being spun into a song by a singer where it lands on pop or country radio. The “Rolling People,” “Catching the Butterfly,” “Neon Wilderness” have more of the sound that hooks me. Might as well go in on the sound. Not sure why, but the “The Drugs Don’t Work” reminds me of Crowded House’s “Better Be Home Soon. It appears I’m not the only person who hears that based on Plamen Zahariev YouTube video. “This Time” does nothing for me. “Velvet Morning “ hooked me. Overall album was hit or miss for me.
I quite like The Verve but they are decidedly NOT a double album kind of band. A very generous 3 stars because it’s listenable the whole way through and has a couple real killer tracks, but only because I have Smashing Pumpkins the same leniency.
It opened with a banger and then just kinda fizzled out after. It all got very samesy and boring. The last song with 5 minutes of silent anticipation just to cut to baby crying noises was... something.
I love it when songs make me wait in silence for five whole minutes before cutting to a baby crying. Just what I needed, thank you. That being sad, this was quite boring aside from Bittersweet Symphony, and the voice of the singer got annoying after a while.
"This is a song for the people. This is modern day blues song." This is five stars.
Favourite Songs: The Rolling People
Richard Ashcroft is my cousin’s son.
I've had a great run of 3 star albums recently. Solid 3.5 stars for this.
hard album, nu is piese pe care neaparat le as asculta separate, dar ca album experience 5/5
Marko - 3.5 Sara - 3.5
Sterke start met ene banger van jewelste, daarna vooral saai, saai en saaier
Twaalf keer saaie britpop en Bittersweet Symphony, daarvoor toch net een 3.
Some great songs on here including a couple of proper classics, and some that were new to me (Sonnet was probably my favourite that I wasn't already familiar with). I do think it tails off a bit towards the end, and is quite similar in vibe throughout, so ends up being a little less than the sum of it's parts. Favourite: The Drugs Don't Work Least Favourite: Neon Wilderness Per-song ratings (not including the hidden track): 554542434333
Some really good songs and then some that just seem to drag on a bit. Hard to rate because the songs I enjoyed I really enjoyed, but most of it became background noise to me. Maybe it’s just one where I only really like the singles. Fav song: Bitter Sweet Symphony – I also liked The Drugs Don’t Work, Sonnet and Lucky Man Least fav: This Time
Some fab songs in here to be fair but nothing else in the album hits the heights of bittersweet symphony. Also what is going on with that hidden track nonsense. Felt like 5 mins od straight silence. I guess that’s one that may not have moved over from the cd age to digital well. Specific rating - 3.9 Fav song- bittersweet symphony Least fav- come on/ deep freeze
The first song is so good and there were a couple other enjoyable tracks but most of the album is completely forgettable. Favourite song: Bitter Sweet Symphony Least: One Day
Parents had this on CD back in the day. Of course, Bittersweet Symphony is the standout. Maybe a mistake putting it first on the album, as I never seemed to get passed it. Finally did now, and can't but think I am a little disappointed. Catching the Butterfly was a good listen to, as were a handful of others, but yeah. Low 4*, 3.65/5
I can understand why people wouldn't like this. There is a fair amount of padding. There's a number of excellent hits here though e.g. The Drugs Don't Work, which is the obvious selection but which together make it more than worthwhile. Plus the padding is a trippy, groovy, indie daydream. I really like it.
I was very much flipping back and forth between giving Urban Hymns a 4 or a 5 star rating but after enough thinking, i decided on the latter due to many reasons. I only knew this album from one of it's singles and that being the monster of a track that is Bitter Sweet Symphony but a lot of the other tracks sound very much like it and are still very good in all their own ways. I love all the orchestral elements in each of the songs and they are all elevated by the brilliant melodies and masterful production. I really cannot think of too many things that i can complain about when it comes to this album so i'll just say that it is an amazing listen and one that i'm glad i got for my 22nd birthday. Best Song: Bitter Sweet Symphony Worst Song: This Time
Bastante bueno
Man, Bittersweet Symphony takes me right back to 1997. I remember hearing it and seeing the music video all the time. I don't know what exactly it was about 1997, but there was so much amazing music out at the time. When I saw that this album was 75 minutes I groaned a bit, but it was actually really enjoyable.
I've never rated this album the same way so many people do. It's mawkish to a fault. Brit Pop has so many better elements to it than this. Someone in the reviews nailed it when they said that every song feels like it's from the end credits of a '90s rom com. It's well made and all that, but give me Suede or Pulp over this any day.
talk about a front loaded album. Bittersweet Symphony is real banger to start with but unfortunately the rest just cant measure up. Its not bad, just more of the same kind of generic rock coming out the UK at the time.
Bittersweet Symphony is a banger obviously, the rest of this album is decent but forgettable British indie rock. Has no place on this list
First of my albums where I already have one of the songs in my library!! Honestly this is a very strong album compared to the others it feels intentional with the sounds,( which I agree could come off as repetitive) and even though some songs are a miss for me, I do think this a solid album. Standouts for me are bitter sweet symphony and the rolling people
Okayy. Knew one song
The drugs don't work
hmm I dont know, okay+
Urban Hymns has long been one of my favorite albums of the 90s. Listening again, the whole albums flows as a whole. The jams jam and the bangers bang. I should be sick of Bittersweet Symphony, but I'm not.
8/10 bittersweet symphony is one of THE songs for me 5eva, the relaxing 90s garage rock feel is a vibe for all the songs despite their variety
5/5 nae danger. Just a candle of my youth.
I'll admit it: I didn't really get Bittersweet Symphony when it came out. I still don't really, though I've grown to appreciate it. The repetition, the small small vocal range, the heroin chic of Ashcroft bumping into people all down the sidewalk. It did nothing for me. It's still a weird single that would have gone nowhere without a lesser known Stones sample. You've gotta wonder if it was worth it, given how much they absolutely would have probably paid in royalties. What got me instead was eventually coming around to The Drugs Don't Work. That, ironically, opened up to me as a friend brought the mood down with it at a Karaoke night. It was the right kind of beautiful hopelessness, the thing BSS could only replicate with someone else's strings. But even then, it wasn't something that made me want to follow up on Urban Hymns. You sort of forget how huge a thing really was when you try to ignore the hit, tho. But it's also just such a long album. It's over an hour long before you even get to the artificially elongated, secret-track containing final song. Individual songs are not much better. Bittersweet Symphony obviously loops on for six minutes, we all have experienced that, but it's not even the longest song on Side A. Three of the first five tracks are over six minutes long, and five of the first seven are over 5. It's a lot of concentration to expend at the start and still have half an album to get through. I'd still say that The Rolling People is one of the better songs on the album, and if Catching the Butterfly was a little less snooze-a-delic it could have been too, but thr latter especially could have ended two minutes sooner. There's a whole ass ending there! Overall though, the Long Section has redeeming bits throughout, short of the albums briefest song, Neon Wilderness. But ultimately this always feels like something else. Bored Oasis? More self-aware Stone Roses? Depressed Pulp? The back half, by comparison, speeds through but leaves little impression. I guess this makes a light ⭐️⭐️⭐️.
Why does a band called The Verve have such lifeless music?
I will start off by saying that this review is certainly going to be biased, as I used an instrumental version of "Bitter Sweet Symphony" as my floor routine music in high school gymnastics; it has since become "our song" in the eyes of my mom and I. All that aside, this album is pretty classic Britpop, with very clear influences from U2, Oasis, and Radiohead. At several points, I thought about how I easily could have been tricked into thinking these were U2 songs if I didn't know any better. A little slow, a little boring at times, and overall pretty middling. Favorite tracks: Bitter Sweet Symphony, Catching The Butterfly, Lucky Man
Bitter Sweet Symphony The Drugs Don't Don't Work Lucky Man
8/10 I love bittersweet symphony, and I really enjoyed sonnet and lucky man!! The other songs kind of feel like regular britpop so I probably would’ve loved them if I were born 25 years earlier, but I don’t mind them. Good album.
4/10 = very britpop 90s bucket hat lets do drugs and try look like liam gallagher type album, bittersweet symphony very memorable obviously but none of the other songs really spoke to me at all, if it was on in the background of the pub (which it probs will be) then i wouldn't mind
Lots of good songs. One hymn, what do you want more?
SOOOO good
Probably one of the best releases in 90s British Rock. So many great tunes on here.
Making this a double album was inexcusable, it was bad enough that they got a whole album with only bittersweet symphony.
Bittersweet symphony: muligvis en af de bedste rocksange, genial britpop. Desværre er resten af albummet for langt og kører meget i den samme rille.
Britpop hit hard during my youth. Used to love this album and it held up suprisingly well. Love the spherical sound that sprinkles some U2 into Oasis at times. Many banger songs on here. Strong 4
The more closely I listen to Urban Hymns, the less convinced I am that its greatness lies principally in its songs. That sounds odd for an album containing “Bitter Sweet Symphony”, “The Drugs Don’t Work”, “Lucky Man” and “Sonnet”, but several become surprisingly slight when reduced to voice and acoustic guitar. Anyone who has played “Sonnet” knows the feeling: remove the strings, the scale and Richard Ashcroft’s conviction, and suddenly you wonder whether the underlying song can really support all the emotional weight we attach to it. The answer is that it doesn’t have to. With The Verve, the song is the armature around which the recording is constructed. Backwards guitars, strings, slide, delay, reverb, tiny electronic transmissions and Ashcroft’s ghostly double-tracking are not decoration; they are part of the composition. Urban Hymns is an album where production becomes meaning. That is why I think of it as an impressionist record. It doesn’t have the intellectual architecture of OK Computer, or even The Bends, and it doesn’t particularly want it. Radiohead make you consider propositions; The Verve create weather. Ashcroft’s lyrics often mean something and don’t mean something at the same time, assembling roads, heavens, tears, butterflies, corridors, love, medication and dreams until emotional recognition takes the place of literal interpretation. Nick McCabe then creates the environment in which those images shimmer and change colour. This also resolves what can look like the album’s great structural problem. It appears to contain two records: the accessible Verve Britain fell catastrophically in love with during 1997, and the old psychedelic Verve, full of repetition, altered states and vast washes of guitar, fronted by a man practising what can only really be described as Wigan quasi-Rosicrucianism. I now think those are not two competing albums at all. Ashcroft needs both languages. The quieter songs seek connection; the psychedelic songs seek transcendence. One asks whether another person can inhabit your experience; the other asks whether you can briefly escape the boundaries of experience itself. “Space and Time” may be where the two meet most completely. It is one of the stronger conventional songs here, but the backwards guitars quietly unmoor it while Ashcroft arrives at one of his simplest and best formulations: “we have existence and it’s all we share”. The mystical Ashcroft keeps searching for transcendence; the human Ashcroft keeps searching for companionship. Here he seems to realise they might be the same search. Ashcroft himself is crucial to why any of this works. Around 1997 he acquired a strangely iconographic quality: all cheekbones, upward gaze, private suffering and apparent revelation, something between a secular Sacred Heart and Saint Sebastian with the arrows still in him. “Eyes open wide, looking at the heavens with a tear in my eyes” from “Sonnet” feels less like a lyric than the passport photograph for the whole album. At times Urban Hymns resembles stained glass more than narrative. Ashcroft is the fixed icon and the production is sunlight passing through him, forever changing colour. McCabe prevents all this from becoming unbearable. His guitar continually introduces friction, ambiguity and physical pleasure. “The Rolling People” has a seductive loping gait, layers of delay and reverb, delicate picked filigree and then a great pharmaceutical onslaught in which the band seems determined to dissolve its own boundaries. For a few minutes The Verve sound like the psychedelic Rolling Stones the Rolling Stones themselves never quite managed to become: not Their Satanic Majesties Request, but the filthy momentum of Exile on Main St. projected into a cosmic dreamscape. That psychedelic side matters because it prevents the reflective half of Urban Hymns from settling into tasteful adult rock. Had the album consisted entirely of variations on “Lucky Man”, “Sonnet” and “The Drugs Don’t Work”, it might have become a late-90s The Seldom Seen Kid: beautifully made, humane and slightly too respectable. Instead, “The Rolling People”, “Catching the Butterfly”, “Neon Wilderness” and the final swampy dissolution of “Come On” keep opening trapdoors beneath the polished surface. The acoustic songs made The Verve legible to millions; the psychedelic songs ensured that what those millions encountered was still The Verve. Britain happened to be unusually receptive to that contradiction. Britpop had plenty of drawbacks and ultimately hardened into formula, but its great achievement was not necessarily what it sounded like; it was what it aspired to. The ambition was not simply to recreate 1966, but to insist that contemporary popular music should possess the cultural ambition of 1966. By 1997 that idea had escaped Britpop itself. Radio 1 could put the Spice Girls beside Babybird and nobody thought it strange. OK Computer, Spiritualized, The Chemical Brothers, Cornershop, Fatboy Slim and The Verve could all inhabit the mainstream. Britpop could be conservative in vocabulary, but its consequences were expansive: it restored the idea that interesting music was entitled to be culturally enormous. Into that environment came “Bitter Sweet Symphony”. Cultural overexposure has somehow failed to kill it. The string motif supplies relentless forward motion while tubular bells, odd electronic tweets and Ashcroft’s ghostly self-harmonising suggest another frequency operating around it. “I’m a million different people from one day to the next” still seems central to his worldview, and by the final great cry about taking you down the only road he has ever been down, reflection has become manifesto. Then, at the end of August 1997, Britain’s emotional climate changed abruptly with the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. I mean the subsequent national grief strictly as a sociological observation, not something I personally shared; from outside it, the sudden transformation of tabloid gossip into national mourning seemed febrile and deeply strange. Nevertheless, the cultural phenomenon was unmistakable. “The Drugs Don’t Work” arrived on 1 September and the coincidence was almost grotesquely exact. “Bitter Sweet Symphony” had spent the summer gradually becoming ubiquitous; “The Drugs Don’t Work” went from zero to number one immediately. A new record about death, helplessness and necessary medicine finally being unable to save somebody appeared at precisely the moment when much of Britain was searching for a language of grief, and the country absorbed it almost instantly. Nobody could possibly have engineered that fit. For roughly a year, The Verve occupied that strange position where success becomes symbolic importance. I saw the apotheosis at Haigh Hall in May 1998, when around 30,000 people gathered in Wigan for what felt like a small Woodstock for Greater Manchester. Beck was supporting, the BBC treated the main set as a national event, the egress afterwards was almost biblical, and during “The Drugs Don’t Work” the field became so astonishingly herbal that one half-expected the Grateful Dead to emerge through the smoke. When Ashcroft sang “I just can’t make it alone” during “Space and Time”, tens of thousands of people answered him. Sometimes the language of transcendence is justified because sometimes the thing actually happens. That same impulse explains why “Come On” is the perfect ending. After all the bruised ballads and stained-glass mysticism, The Verve refuse a tasteful conclusion. Ashcroft moves through God, spirit, pills, pain and exhortation until “come on” stops functioning as language at all. It means yes, keep going, everyone in, let go, fuck it, this is happening, beautiful. The band disappears into a swampy psychedelic freakout while Ashcroft howls that there is only one life and offers one enormous “fuck you” to whatever requires one. That is why Urban Hymns remains a five-star album for me. Not because every composition is equally strong, and not because its two musical personalities fit together neatly, but because those apparent weaknesses are inseparable from its achievement. Slight songs become enormous environments; contradictions become a coherent worldview; simple language acquires weight through performance; production becomes meaning. The historical moment explains why Urban Hymns became a phenomenon. It does not explain why the record still works once that moment has gone. The stained glass remains, and Urban Hymns still makes its own weather.
Kinda mopey album
Some classic britpop anthems mixed with their previous stock psychedelic shoe gaze. Personally I find it a little heavy going but no questioning the strength of 4 hit singles and the impact of this album in the UK.
A bit of meh. You can see why in the US they were a one hit wonder
Bittersweet Symphony is great of course, wait was this a Fifa song?? Crazy. Just a class song. Makes you feel things. Excited to hear the rest of this. It's long as fuck though. Some nice britpop that actually sounds good. The Verve ran so One Direction could walk. Limp really. The rolling people?? Where are they rolling to. Wait they're cooking though. Thats crazy. Ok so sharp decline. Let's get back on track here team. Hmmm started off very strong but falling off I feel. Not enjoying this as much. Hmm strong third act though I'm back to rocking with this. More introspective and personal now. Big fan. Favourite: Velvet Morning Least favourite: The Drugs Don't Work
This is #day734 of my #1001albumsyoumusthearbeforeyoudie challenge, and… here's to my second and final album by The Verve represented on the list, aka the one boasting one of the most iconic album openers ever. This record is a little more accessible compared to the more psychedelic and experimental A Northern Soul. But only at first glance. There are tracks like "The Rolling People" and "Catching the Butterfly" to prove otherwise. "Sonnet" is one of my favorite cuts of theirs, not to mention "The Drugs Don't Work" or "Lucky Man." I like The Verve. This is another 5 out of 5. Go check out Forth if you haven't already. Looking forward to #day735.
One of the best British albums of all time
4/5
Bardzo miła, przyjemna płyta, porządny brit-rock i tego nie można im zabrać. Bittersweet Symphony jest równie przeklęte co Wonderwall, pa.
I never quite understood the hype that was generated ahead of this album. The singles are great, but beyond that is all fairly mediocre and Richard Ashcroft’s vocals are hardly great. I’s a shame Lucky man is buried down at track 9, as i’d long lost interest before then. It would be far better replacing the rolling people and then you could just switch it off. Four songs do not a great album make
Beyond the singles off this album, I’d never, to my knowledge, heard anything by The Verve - my expectations, given the era and the genre, therefore, were low-to-middling for this album. I never learn. This is an incredible album - especially the first half. I love the strings that are used wonderfully throughout, with “Bitter Sweet Symphony” the daddy of them all. That intro is genuinely iconic at this point; I dare anybody who was breathing in the 90s to not recognise it. “The Drugs Don’t Work” is a gorgeous song - it has absolutely stunning lyrics that always make me a bit teary-eyed. For me, it’s the best track on the whole thing. The other singles (“Sonnet” and “Lucky Man”, in particular), unsurprisingly, are also brilliant. I don’t think an album track, except maybe “This Time”, comes close to matching the quality of those singles, but that’s merely a reflection of their strength - the “filler” here is still pretty strong. I think the album loses some quality around the halfway mark, which stops it getting full marks. I also could’ve done without a 15min closer - of which almost half was silence - on an already pretty long album. But bloody hell, it exceeded my expectations and then some.
This album outstayed it's welcome for me (and I didn't even listen to the 2 hour 35 minute deluxe version the generator linked to!). Richard Ashcroft's voice over a full 75 minutes was a bit much, and I think the songs were a bit inconsistent. Although that might have something to do with how many singles were released and how ubiquitous those singles were. Bittersweet Symphony is the obvious, and massively successful, one of those singles. It's a great song*. Probably my favourite song off the album, though I do also like The Drugs Don't Work a lot. Another middling mark from me: 3/5 * Anyone reading this who hasn't seen Ren's YouTube live version of Bittersweet Symphony with his own lyrics, you should watch it. He's an amazing story teller.
classic
Love their sound! Very London Underground 90's sound and feel. Gives 90's-00's Teen Movies and the Fall
Throwback med första låten, rätt okej skiva. Tycker däremot den här skivan är lite för lång, det mesta flyter ihop lite och det blir inte så mycket intressant efter man lyssnat 30-40 min. 5.5/10
Marks a particular moment in time - the end of Britpop. Otherwise, not that interesting
There’s a good selection of really good songs from this album but there’s also a good selection of super mediocre songs This is album is too long Deep freeze is so lame like I get the idea but I don’t want to listen to that 3 or 3.5/5 Favorites: weeping willow, bittersweet symphony the drugs don’t work
I hate the opening track a lot, such a shitty epic riff Will I listen to again: 0%
The album Oasis tried and failed to make the entire second half of their career. Bittersweet Symphony might be one of the best songs this little island has ever produced. And it opens the album. Also I literally cannot make it through The Drugs Don't Work without getting emotional. Thought I'd nailed it this time but nope, right at the outro, blam, surprise leaky eyes.
I can see why they were popular but I find it all quite boring.
I like Bittersweet, but the rest is kinda catatonic.
delight
"Another artist/record I've never heard before. I wonder what this will be like." Is what I thought before that dang violin started playing and I was transported to a 2000's car commercial. Jokes aside a pretty decent record.
Welp, I am going to have that fucking violin in my head again for the entire day... I was expecting before hand to hate this album but it was actually pretty good. All pretty standard 90s pop but it is actually good. It is clear that it had a strong influence on a lot of later 90s and 00s pop that came after
It was a really good album! They were a staple of the 90's British Rock Scene along with Oasis, Blur, Radiohead, and more! The music is kind of experimental, which I like. It adds a nice touch to the album. Amazing!
Saai album. Heel overrated 🥇sonnet . 2 1. Klassieker maar kei overrated 2. Leuk liedje. Auto muziek 3. Krachtig leuk rock lied. 4. Nogal saai lied 5. Repetitief saai 6.
92/100
2.5 I feel like it alternates between songs I kind of like and songs I hate.
Much better than the other album of theirs we listened too. Still way too long though.
2/5 so repetitive and boring after about 4 songs
i guess it's alright, just a tad underwhelming
Britpop Boss-level meh
Bittersweet Symphony is a phenomenal opener, and the rest of the album flows beautifully from that tone-setter. I'll return to this one. 7/10
muy weno, tiene canciones míticas y no sabia que era esa banda. Muy lindo
The Drugs Don't Work
I loved this album back in the day. I hadn’t listened to it in ages. I still love it. I didn’t realize how much Oasis sounds like them. These guys have a bit more depth, but Oasis is a little edgier musically.
It was okay, LONG. Not a lot of choruses. That one hit then it kinda puddled. I likely won't reach for it again.
Trippy alt rock. Might have a few tiktokable tracks, but not for me.
I get why Bittersweet Symphony is there only hit. The rest aren't bad just boring.
Lost a star when it just kept going…
Enjoyed this though wasn’t completely blown away. Probably unfairly, I’d never really listened to the Verve and lumped it dismissively with the britpop label. More depth than I was expecting, Can see me potential revising this score upwards after repeated listens but for now a very solid 3.
Album 58/1001. Listened 8/28/2026. It's okay, but this kind of British rock band doesn't really jive for me.
I don't like Bittersweet Symphony. I don't hate it, but it's overplayed and overhyped, and here it is in your face as track one on the album. In fact the album's very much front loaded with singles, which arouses suspicion. But while Sonnet and Drugs Don't Work are lovely songs, tracks that might be described as "filler," like Catching the Butterfly and Neon Wilderness, really make the soundscape of the record, and I'd forgotten how good some of the other songs are. I might have a bias towards late 90s British music, but knowing that isn't going to stop me giving this the rating it deserves.
Bittersweet Symphony is a classic and I've never heard another song from this album which is a shame cause while it's more easy listening than I usually choose, they are some chill vibe songs. Just took a night time stroll while listening and decided this is an album for a chill walk which is not something I typically listen to music for, but for this album I'd make an exception.
For the first time, I am stealing wholesale from another review... "Bittersweet Symphony overshadows the rest of the album, which comes off as sleepy and uninteresting. It doesn't even have the decency to be short." If it was 50% as long, it might be a 3.
Okaaayyyy, this was once a great hit. But imho it did not age too well...
when Urban Hymns reaches its peak—“Bitter Sweet Symphony,” “Sonnet,” and “The Drugs Don’t Work”—it achieves something very few rock albums do: it makes intimate emotions feel genuinely monumental. Urban Hymns isn’t just an album about sadness. It’s an album about dignity in the face of sadness. That’s the subtle difference that separates it from many of its imitators—and why it still resonates nearly three decades later.
blah britslop. fun memories i suppose - and the unexpected last 90 seconds of the hidden track are almost enough to earn this album another star - but im fine without it tbh
I can see why this was a hit record. It sounds familiar. In fact, the whole record is derivative of the Brit-Pop or U2 sound. It’s predictable and safe. While it’s far from unpleasant, it’s certainly not original or “must hear” in any way for me.
it was interesting i kinda liked it.
"Urban Hymns" by The Verve is a great album from 90s era. I found this album has whole 90s era vibe. The production level and vocal and instruments performance is wonderful in this album. The album start with their signature track "Bitter Sweet Symphony". This is one of the best songs from the 90s era. Another song that is wonderful which is less talk about from the album is "The Drugs Don't Work". This is one of the saddest songs from the album with wonderful vocal performance. Other standout tracks are "Sonnet", "The Rolling People", and "Lucky Man". But I have find the album is quite too long for about 1 hour 15 minutes which kind of kill the whole vibe of an album. There is too many tracks that should not have included. Some of the tracks I found weaker are "Neon Wilderness", "One Day", "This Time" and "Come On". The last track "Come On" also feature hidden track which makes this song over 10 minute long which I feel is useless too. Overall great album to listen.
Better than I expected knwing only Bittersweet Symphony (which I consider a good hook but ultimately too little idea for one song).
Enjoyed some of it, although at times they sounded like an Oasis tribute band. A few songs stick out as being top quality, but a lot of the albums is forgettable, but not necessarily bad. I probably won’t listen again in full, but some songs might stick in my rotation.
Just for Bitter Sweet Symphony, it's worth 4 stars. The rest of the album is pretty solid
3⁵
Абсолютно скучный, однообразный альбом, сдесь хороши несколько первых песен, концовка хороша
I remembered the three hits, Bittersweet Symphony, The Drugs Don't Work and Lucky Man, but none of the album really stands out. The Verve were never really a big deal for me. I remember buying this album for the singles and being disappointed that the rest didn't deliver. It's also too long.
Sem dúvida, um dos meus top 5 da década de 90. Adoro como o The Verve mistura rock psicodélico, guitarras, momentos acústicos e letras extremamente emocionais neste aqui, tudo muito conectado à atmosfera do Britpop daquela época. E sou completamente fascinado pela voz do Richard Ashcroft, que tive o prazer de ver ao vivo no show do Oasis no ano passado. Um disco que continua me encantando a cada audição.. é como se eu sentisse algo diferente cada vez que eu escutasse. The drugs don’t works e sonnet são minhas prediletas, e são absurdamente incríveis.
Bitter Sweet Symphony is so good, and most of the rest of it is so not. Just way too long Favorite Songs: Bitter Sweet Symphony, The Drugs Don't Work, Come On/ Deep Freeze
I listened half asleep on a train home from someone I visited and could not stop thinking about so much of the album went somewhat unregistered...
It’s nice I guess, but it’s not memorable
Great album and overcame initial expectations that I had. I hadn't listened to this album in full, it's great, you can feel the intent on every song, and how it feels overall. Their musicality isn't comparable to any other band, the singles are amazing, and gave me a new feel on every one of them.
Was kinda dreading listening to this after the last verve album and it was about what I expected
I kinda enjoyed the sound. It is VERY 90’s sounding in some way though, which is not my favorite. It also had a couple songs a little too reminiscent of Oasis.
I really loved this - the vocal sound is so aggressively nineties that I couldn’t get all the way there, but the sounds are often gorgeous.
Good so goes but not a fan of the whole project.
This is so of its time and place. I am 16 and this is is everywhere, it reminds me of the World Cup in 98 and Chris Moyles. I was a child of britpop and owned this album so i can sing this back word for word in most parts. The singles may be played to get me out of a coma. I know that it drags towards the end and its drenched in 90's tropes and i hold that against equivalent 80's albums but i enjoyed it. If it was a true 5 star i'd have not stopped listening to it, but i have, and i can see why. but its still a banger.
Good, but goes on too long and becomes more average the longer it goes.
Is this the Verve or the Verve Pipe ... I'm confused. Does it really matter ... its just another one hit wonder 90s albums that somehow made this list.
I'd heard of the album before this, but wow this is great!
It was okay, first song incredible, didn’t make it to the end of the album
Solid 90s rock. BSS still rules
LOVE IT
Omg I did not know that Bitter Sweet Symphony is that song - the tic tok one - very good, tho i do have to say overrated since i have heard it everywhere. Sonnet is very good too. Lucky man is really comforting, a song for a cloudy weather. Space and Time is great - it has different tempo and vibe than the rest i think. After having a look in the reviews of other people, I am suprised how divided the listeners are - either one/two stars (an extra one for Bitter Sweet Symphony) or five stars and retelling half of their childhood stories that they vaugly conected to this album. I don't think my neighbour likes this album, he has been knocking on my wall. Personally I happen to think that this is a very good album, I have no problem with melodical repetitions in songs since it gives me rather comforting vibes for a UK-like weather with lots of rain and clouds. I don't believe that in order for an album to be good it has to have individual song that always come grabing at your attention. This album is something that you play in an autumn afternoon after a long day of work, curled up in your favourite armchair while drinking tea and looking at the rain. Listened to: Bitter Sweet Symphony, Sonnet, The Rolling People (a bit whiny), The Drugs Don't Work, Lucky Man, Catching The Butterfly (as the rolling people - overall very nice tho has its whiny moments, nothing tho that would put John Lennon to shame), and the rest of the album
vibeddd
Soooo bad. This era of music should be forgotten. There’s one song on the album and the rest are bad copies of it. Doesn’t belong on this list. 0 stars
Did enjoy Bittersweet Symphony and The drugs don't work.
hat mich auf dem falschen Fuß erwischt
I’ve never been big on The Verve. I can accept that their biggest hits form an irremovable part of the tapestry of 90s music but I’ve always found them quite blasé and droning. Just fine on a full listen, but possibly still my least enjoyed flavour of Britpop which I already have little time for.
Although the verve were never my favourite britpop band, i must admit that this album in particular has a bunch of great tracks (not just the ever-so iconic bittersweet symphony, although it surely helps)
good songsb
I could see how I never heard of their other songs. They were just not very remarkable. Bitter Sweet Symphony is obviously a timeless classic but everything else is kind of forgettable. 2/5.
I'm not a huge bittersweet symphony fan, so wasn't looking forward to this. Ended up being pleasantly surprised and know there was a time in my life where I would have enjoyed this album more. This album has a few songs that really seem at home as the soundtrack to a wrapping up/moving on montage for early 2000s network dramas, which sounds like an insult but isn't. The album did drag on a bit at the end and soured the review a bit, but overall more listenable than a lot of the albums that have been served up.
other than the first song (amazing) this album was mad boring to me unfortunately. i gave it many listens too off of the strength of the intro song but nah
Fine listen, but outside of the hit song from this album there were no other stand outs.
Utterly uninteresting to me. Just couldn't get into it. The famous singles just irritated me - I tried to listen with fresh ears since they are so often played but I really couldn't hear much to care about. I thought maybe I liked 'drugs don't work' but in this context I found it pretty dull. Second half of the record sometimes went a little psychedelic, but nothing really grabbed me.
4.3/5 - Pleasant music. Strings give off a beautiful vibe. Fav Track - Sonnet Reference: 1 = Dislike, nty 2 = Not my taste, objectively pretty good though 3 = Fine, tolerable BG music but not preferred 4 = Pleasant BG music, but not necessarily top preference 5 = Liked this, might listen again in future
I had never heard this band before and I liked the album a lot. I added “Lucky Man” to my playlist.
364/1001 The Verve - Urban Hymns Heard before? ❎ Revisit? ❎ I've never liked the Verve nor understood their reputation. Over the course of an hour and 15 minutes, it's the same awful whiny dirge. Terrible.
Alright, so I kinda dismissed this album before I actually listened to it. We know this list has a British bias, so I expected this to be here solely on the strength of “Bittersweet Symphony”, but that's not totally true. In the Brit Rock hierarchy, I’d put this under Oasis but probably on par with the Blur record on this list. Maybe slightly higher.
when you really need some background noise to cover people murmuring as they browse the mall
Did we really need multiple Verve albums on the list? Britpop rock like this and Oasis are always just fine. It's not great, but it's not bad either, it's just something inoffensive to put on. The Verve isn't reinventing the wheel or doing anything interesting here, it's pretty much just generic 90s rock fare. 'Bittersweet Symphony' gets all the attention here, and nothing else really rose to that level. A perfectly average 3/5
there are some beautiful songs on this album.
Ok this is all about Bitter Sweet Symphony obviously - everything else is just like "la la la I am addicted to pills" while a guitar plays with a wahwah pedal in the background. Bitter Sweet Symphony so good. In my memory it was kinda bloated and overproduced but it was really working for me today. It's so crucial that his voice sounds like he's too cool to try and he doesn't give a shit while the music is off doing some nerd shit. This creates a dialectic by which the cool dude (the singer) and the nerd (the writer, who happens to also be the singer) fight it out and arrive at a really good song on an otherwise boring as fuck album.
I think the songs would improve if I gave them more time and grew to fully understand the lyrics. Otherwise they all kind of sounded the same - pleasant enough, but nothing fully grabbed me.
Other than Bitter Sweet Symphony (which is funny since I thought at the time was an Oasis song), the rest of the album is nondescript.
The singles still sound great and take me back to university. Bitter Sweet Symphony remains iconic despite massive over exposure. I can take or leave the album filler - pretty generic stuff.
Urban Hymns I haven’t listened to this in a long time, and I was slightly trepidatious after revisiting A Northern Soul the other week and it not being as good as I remember. And while this definitely has a few dips it is clearly a far better proposition than ANS, with a far stronger set of songs, even if it still doesn’t quite move me the way it did when I was 18. I _loved_ Bittersweet Symphony when it came out, but it has been battered by ubiquity and by ITV over the last 30 years. Listening properly today though it is of course still a superb song, deserving of its longevity. The other singles are also great and more than stand up too, Sonnet, The Drugs Don’t Work and Lucky Man in particular I still love. Those singles work brilliantly with the other excellent album tracks, combining the psychedelic drone rock of their first album and some of ANS with a harder, more focused edge on tracks like Catching the Butterfly, Come On and The Rolling People, and the breakout into widescreen, sweeping embracive and melodic rock brilliantly on things like Space & Time, One Day and Velvet Morning. They don’t go full Coldplay or U2, but this must surely have been an influence on Chris Martin and co. Similar to previous albums McCabe’s guitar is excellent throughout, he must be one of the least talked about guitarists of that era, I suppose due to him being in and out of the band, but his playing really is fantastic, adding delicate touches with a sense of otherworldliness and dreaminess that is very appealing. On the negative side of the ledger though it is too long with too many 5 minute+ songs, and with a couple of songs that are a level or two below the rest; Neon Wilderness feels aimlessly dirge-like and I’ve never been a particular fan of This Time. On first listen I was thinking this was a 4, the lengthy nature of the songs and the whole album putting me off a little, but on repeat listens I started to fall for it again, making it a 5. 🏙️🙏🏙️🙏🏙️ Playlist submission: Could be many, but Space & Time grabbed me today.
'Bitter Sweet Symphony' is the obvious anthem, but there is barely a dud. 'Weeping Willow' a structured groove with an earworm chorus; 'Velvet Morning' a slow, atmospheric powerhouse. Then there are the more focused songs: the big singles, but also the superb 'Space and Time' and 'One Day' - led by Ashcroft and his acoustic but given understated power by the band. But 'Sonnet' is the ultimate. Wrapped up in nostalgia and gets me in the feels every time. The combination of Ashcroft’s melodies and McCabe’s atmosphere sets this a million miles from its predecessor. A huge album and a bedrock of 90s British music.
Not really for me. Too much ballad rock and kind of forgettable songs except for Bitter Sweet Symphony of course.
I'm biased, mostly because this is basically just the exact kind of music I'm into. That's how biased works, I think. Bittersweet Symphony is an all-timer and is a forever staple on my personal playlist. Other tracks on this album, like The Drugs Don't Work, Velvet Morning, and Come On were also super enjoyable. This one is just rad overall. I will not apologize for being a basic bitch.
So many great songs on this album
Snooze-fest throughout honestly. Just kinda forgettable outside of the major hits and overstays it's welcome by half an hour. Fav. Songs: Bitter Sweet Symphony The Drugs Don't Work
I had kind of dismissed this album, never really got into it but it’s actually pretty solid. Catching a Butterfly is a lovely song.
I didnt finish alllll of this but i thought it was decent
I do enjoy that their only good song was determined to be a ripoff of the stones, and they couldn't earn money from it for along time. It is a pretty good song, of course. The rest of the album is just meh.
I like Bittersweet Symphony a lot, but the rest of the album is just a drag.
Bitter sweet symphony is overrated but a banger nonetheless. Drugs don't work was my favourite. 7/10
A bit better than your average pub rock.
The British Invasion of the 90’s. Some of these tracks could have been by oasis or blur. That being said, the opening track is amazing and stands the test of time
This album has that one very well known song. However, I don't think that said song justifies having this album on the list, as it is pretty long and mediocre.
They’re a one hit wonder in my opinion, first song was great and I’ve heard many times before. Every other song felt bland in comparison and just got progressively worse as the album went on. Also what was the like 7 minutes of silence on the last song??
This album was pretty much Bittersweet Symphony and then an hour of lesser songs. The other songs were okay and weren't offensive or anything, but they were so overshadowed by the one huge hit on this one that they were completely forgettable. One hit albums are not my favorite, and I don't see wanting to revisit this milquetoast music at all.
While I didn't find most of the music on this album to be particularly groundbreaking, I appreciate the use of orchestral melodies and the influence of different genres on some of the songs. Bitter Sweet Symphony is an obvious hit with unique orchestral sampling, but songs like Velvet Morning feature unique instruments like slide guitar to give it a sound that separates it from other tracks on the album. The use of different sounds and rhythms keeps this album sounding fresh and it's clear why fans of this band/genre would hold this album in high regard.
Interesting, Bitter Sweet Symphony has come up in playlists before but I had not associated an artist with it. A number of these have worthwhile characteristics. However Richard seems to think that repeating the same phrase over and over during a track makes a lyric more meaningful when, in fact, it simply makes this listener want to shout “enough already, we get it, move on!”
Not exceptional, although definitely capturs the sound at the time. Surprisingly large number of singles on that one album.
Ok I guess
7/10 - Some classics I've heard before that I've enjoyed but listening to the album was a pleasure.
Overall solid - really good instrumentation throughout 4
Britpop came into my life like an avalanche. I was introduced to Oasis, Blur, Pulp and Suede at the same time, but Bitter Sweet Symphony was by far the most inescapable song of any artist in that list (Wonderwall was on the way out more or less). This album has several songs that are just as grand as BSS that I'll treasure forever. The rest of the album is good within itself, but nothing extraordinary. In terms of album content pound for pound I'll say Pulp>Oasis>The Verve>Blur>Suede
Of course I’ve heard THE song before but never really dived into this album. Was pleasantly surprised at how trippy it was. There’s some cool sounds in there
Bittersweet Symphony is just so so good. Their breakups and makeups was a train wreck to read about.
#50 Standard 90s Brit-Pop, nothing too exciting or innovative. A pretty easy listen, but it also drags on a bit too long. Very top heavy; the 3 best songs are Bittersweet Symphony, Sonnet, and The Drugs Don't Work, and they are all excellent songs. After that much of it runs together and isn't memorable. 3.5/5
Rings of U2 and Oasis alternately. Really like their sound, though some of the songs didn't stick in my mind.
This rings of my adolescence
Britpop, indie rock, orchestral rock, psychedelia, post-Britpop.
Not nearly interesting enough to be anywhere near as long as it is. Baffles me that this is over an hour long. Just doesn't do anything interesting enough to justify its length.
Done quite a bit of fingering to this album back in the day given its ballad content so it has to get a full extra point. 4.2 / actually 3.2
The hits are brilliant. Fades a bit in the second half. If this had 15 mins or so of filler shaved off it, it would be in 5 star territory.
Ah, more of this kind of bullshit, huh? I guess I shouldn't hate this as much as I do, because when I was a kid I loved Bittersweet Symphony. Man, when that video popped up on VIVA I was like, hell yeah! And it still (like the rest of the album, sounds very Full. It's the strings, I think, but also the mid-90s boingy noise that for some reason shows up here, too. But the songwriting is embarrassingly maudlin, and I can't get past it. Also as a kid, it reminds me of when my classmate wrote a love note to some girl in class that was just the lyrics to this album's contemporaneous Savage Garden's Truly Madly Deeply and she had no idea who he was or what the note was and it was very public and almost 30 years later I'm still getting second hand embarrassment. That's what it's like listening to this.
Britpop/Neo-Psychedelia Favorite Song: Bitter Sweet Symphony Least Favorite Song: Come On I’m gonna keep this review short: while it sounded pleasant enough, and while Bitter Sweet Symphony is a really good song, I find the album to be kinda boring. That’s how much investment that I have. 6/10.
Some standout tracks. 3.5.
Songs that hit me: BSS (of course), *Sonnet, The Drugs Don't Work, *Catching the Butterfly, *Weeping Willow, *Lucky Man, *One Day, *Come On. The best album of the 5 I've heard so far. Awesome songs across the entire album. A few I'll skip but they're not bad, they just kinda hinder the overall vibe i'm getting from the album.
The Verve or sort of unfairly regarded in the U.S. They're more than a one hit wonder. I've never listened to this all the way through before, but Richard Ashcroft is a good songwriter and this is a good record. "The Drugs Don't Work" is a phenomenal track. Let's call this a 3.49.
references to Britpop all over the reviews. Yes, this album has some influences from, but ,the Verve were never really a "Britpop" band. They were a band that released some albums, and had their most commercially successful album, at the back end of the britpop era. That's it. Now that i have this off my chest. It is an album I own, and not a bad album, but much like a Northern Soul, it never quite stood up to their debut. I also always felt it was very much a front loaded album. it just never quite builds to what the first half is. Drugs don't work was always the better of the three big hits, and a fantastic song. Weeping Willow is by far the worst song and sounds like an oasis song (maybe they were influenced a little bit by what was happening around them). My standout song is shared between Rolling People and Drugs don't work, but Come on finishes off the album beautifully too. First half is 4.5 stars, second half is 3.5 stars. 4 Stars overall
just 1 hit
I hate it. Bittersweet Symphony is a song I’ve never understood. It never earns its triumphant sound. The closest it gets to interesting is the I can change part but it never soars above that. The rest of the album is bloated and boring and is the culmination of all of britpops worst excesses. Bombastic and long without being memorable.
A : 1, Hidden Track ( guh ) JL : 1, The Drugs Don't Work
Not a fan
Absolute mediocrity.
3.7 it was almost a 4 as i was intrigued enough by it that i wanted to listen again, but i never did
Good singles
One of my top 10 albums ever. The lyrics are so personal to me.
Fantastic, I felt the 1st half was stronger, but overall very enjoyable.
This was better than I expected. I have always loved “bittersweet symphony” but somehow didn’t expect too much from the rest of the album. Reminds me of Stone Roses a bit. Some trippy songs like “the rolling people” are very good. Sags in places but I wouldn’t call it boring.
Well an absolute classic, you can’t say much more than that, Richard Ashcroft is his classic prime, beautiful lyrics over most amazing music - this album is class.
Better than Coldplay
A medicore Britpop album. "Bitter Sweet Symphony" is the highlight, but it's all downhill from there unfortunately.
This album is revolutionary; to me The Verve is a "one-album-wonder." They made it virtually impossible to ever be able to top Urban Hymns because it's so innovative. This will be the shortest hour and 15 minutes you've ever listened to because the music is just soooo good; it sucks you right in. I could honestly rave and gush about this album for hours; it's the type of album that has me standing up and screaming "I love this song!!" after every track.
Standouts Bittersweet Symphony The Rolling People Lucky Man
Put all the 90s Brit pop band sin a blender. It's fine but feels a bit generic after a few tracks.
bem decepcionante no geral. esperava algo com vida, emoção, que nem o oasis, mas sao apenas musicas genericas e sem vida nenhuma na voz do vocalista, alem de o violao ser igual em todas as musicas. a unica faixa q eu tirei de boa do album é lucky man, de resto, o album inteiro é bem forgettable. nota 4,0
Some actually nice indie rock. It goes a little long though.
I think I only know "Bitter Sweet Symphony" by this artist and I'm not a fan of it. I've never listened to this album though. I enjoyed the more groovy tracks more than I expected I would. They should stick to that stuff and drop the ballads. Also, why _did_ "Bitter Sweet Symphony" become such a hit? It's just boring and not a good example of the rest of the album. In the end, I'm happy this list made me listen to this album because it changed my opinion on the group.
Excellent album with bangers all around. I only really knew bittersweet symphony beforehand, the rest of the album is equally good if not better.
bastante olvidable de una banda one hit wonder
Bittersweet Symphony is by now a parody of itself. The rest of the album is 90% good but not really memorable. I revisit it once in a while.
I quite enjoyed their mix of alternative and psychedelic. Their lyrics really lean into the social ennui of the 90s gen x’er.
Really good, want to shoutout "The Drugs Don't Work" specifically. Just listening to this album on one listen made me get in the mood for Oasis Britpop. 4/5- It could definitely climb on more listens
not bad, 3? didnt listen to all of them
Not terrible. Prefer this over most Blur or Oasis.
Gagged des premières notes omg… c'est tellement série des années 2000 coded, l'impression d'être dans un épisode de the OC genre YESSSS Honnêtement TOP je m'attendais pas mais au final j'ai beaucoup aimé l'ensemble. C'était très cohérent et harmonieux à écouter d'un seul trait.
Inoffensive, but bloated and baggy - a few solid songs, and the rest sort of just washed over...
This album is one generational song followed by truly meaningless crap.
Really nice
In a review of this album, NME, which was truly the leading British music magazine at the time, not a collection of gossip columns, wrote that the first five songs there pound all other guitar albums of 1997 — bar Radiohead's 'OK Computer' — into the ground. I would have laughed at that once. The Verve? What do you mean? They're a one-song band, and they didn't really write that one. Surprisingly, the journalist was right. Urban Hymns turned out to be an album that took the best of Britpop and thereby put a bold end to the genre. The epicness of Oasis, the looseness of Blur, the sensuality of Travis, the airiness of Lush, and even the psychedelia of Kula Shaker — all are here at their finest. The top five are truly bulletproof, and there are also the incredible, albeit very different, Weeping Willow and Lucky Man. An excellent album, and while not as successful as its peers, it's arguably the best in the genre.
n/a
One of the best albums of 1997, let alone the 90's. This album is packed full of great songs. For a band that, at this point, was having problems staying together, I am glad we got this collection of songs. I remember thinking I sounded like Richard Ashcroft when I would sing this while listening to it, especially on Lucky Man, which was my favorite song for a very long time, and still is right up there. Anyway I can ramble on about my childhood but the fact is this album inspires you, brings you down, and then picks you right up again. It's a good album to get lost in. Biggest Hit - Bitter Sweet Symphony Biggest Miss (if I had to choose ) - This Time Not So Hidden Gem - Velvet Morning
well, of course I knew bitter sweet symphony, so cool to see the other songs on the album.
el mundo no es perfecto una prueba es el britpop, eeee chevere pero no para mi no lo escucharia enel auto
Haha no
Would I listen again: yeah I mean there’s some bangers on here. But it did start getting a bit samey and britpop warmly over time. Can’t beat bittersweet symphony though
This is a classic album from start to finish. Five stars.
One of the best songs ever being the opener of your album definitely sets expectations high… but unfortunately the rest of the album is kind of unremarkable
One of those times where a mostly pretty good album gets overshadowed by one incredible track. In this case, it's Bitter Sweet Symphony, an all-time great Britpop ballad that manages to feel epic in scope without devolving into corniness. The rest of the album is a mix of soft-rock sentimentality and swirling psychedelia, heavy on atmosphere and light on compositional variety. This approach mostly works for the band, with their talented playing and dense layers of instrumentation allowing the listener to easily sink into the sound. Sometimes, though, the lack of variety get a little too noticeable, especially as the longer songs tend to trail off in a way that loses my attention. There are some other smatterings of greatness sprinkled throughout the tracklist, particularly The Drugs Don't Work and Neon Wilderness, but that opening track is still the clear standout.
Like most people my familiarity with The Verve ends after Bitter Sweet Symphony, so I was curious where else they'd take me. At first it seemed veerrryyy Oasis to me, regardless if they were first or not. Then are we got more into it their psychedelic influences really started to shine through. Really interesting and spacy, but not ground breaking. Split between and 3 and a 4 here but I think I'll have to go 3 because it dwindles on a little too long
This list is testing my patience with this one, I think because of the overabundance of Britpop. I am certainly no Britpop hater, but Urban Hymns suffers by comparison.
Да, первую песню я знаю, но даже её не готов слушать на повторе, как и все остальные
01) Bitter Sweet Symphony - 10,0 02) Sonnet - 10,0 03) The Rolling People - 9,0 04) The Drugs Don't Work - 10,0 05) Catching the Butterfly - 8,5 06) Neon Wilderness - 8,5 07) Space and Time - 9,5 08) Weeping Willow - 9,0 09) Lucky Man - 10,0 10) One Day - 9,5 11) This Time - 9,0 12) Velvet Morning - 8,5 13) Come On - 8,5 TOTAL: 9,23 (92/100) Current ranking: 41/952
Fishmans vibe. Bittersweet symphony ofc goated. Pretty nice but bit repetitive and boring.
3.5
Overrated band. A couple of good songs on this album.
13 bittersweet symphonies
Zaczyna się od hitu, kończy na niczym. Bardzo przeciętne, encyklopedyczne wręcz w swoim braku wyrazistości. Nigdy nie wyjeżdżają za linie, a to wcale nie jest zaleta. 6/10
Loved this album back in the day, but it really hasn't stood up to the test of time.
Once, as a young, stupid, extremely drunk 18 year old, I happened upon a lively karaoke bar and signed myself up. Wanting to keep the party vibe going I chose perennial rocker 'Proud Mary' by CCR. Can't go wrong. Whilst waiting for my call up I decided, in my ever more inebriated wisdom, to change my choice. What, dear reader, did I chose instead to belt out at this upbeat, good time karaoke bar? The Drugs Don't Work by The Verve. Yes, 5 minutes of the most buzz killing solemnity ever cut to wax. I am also a terrible singer. Undeterred by the boos I warbled my stupid way through, feeling like I was absolutely acing it. When the song mercifully finished I sauntered over to the bar, ready for my accolades. "Mate, that was fucking shit" said the man next to me. Decent album though.
Ef ég yrði spurður hvernig 1997 hljómaði myndi ég líklega benda á þessa plötu. Fyrir utan Bittersweet Symphony. Það er timeless.
Some great songs on here, I think it was too consistently melancholy for my taste. But still a good album