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Monday, April 05, 2010

Laura Imbruglia - The Lighter Side Of...


When this reviewer was a teenager, he would buy an album on vinyl from his local record shop, then rush home and play it while studying every square inch of the cover and inlay sleeve. Nowadays, as most music is created to be consumed at the push of a button, being able to take joy in an album’s cover art is a sadly rare occurrence.

Hooray then, for Laura Imbruglia, whose long-awaited sophomore long-player comes complete with a mini, Mad-esque comic book, which, as well as being fun, is also a pretty decent indicator that the record is going to be a winner. Well, if she puts this much effort into the liner notes, then you just know the album has been lovingly created.

Indeed, two years in the making, The Lighter Side Of… is a fine offering. Throughout the country, power-pop and balladry there is an impressive emotional depth to Imbruglia’s subject matter, which often finds her lovelorn and melancholy. However, on this heartbreak-themed album, her typically witty lyricism is still evident too, like on her lament to dating an older man, “I can handle a younger man with a house that’s a bit messy/The trade off is his skin has elasticity.” Importantly though, the laughs are not throwaway, but rather her acerbic humour creates shards of light that make the darker moments all the more touching.

Emotionally weighty and sad, with healthy doses of laughter just at the right times, the sarcastically-titled Lighter Side Of… is a really well rounded album, on which Imbruglia proves herself to be rather wonderful at telling evocative tales of everyday heartbreak.

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