It’s not an overtly political album, but the undertones are undeniable. CHVRCHES, however, doesn’t purely focus their energy there: instead they use those challenges to propel them into searching for strength and the human connection.
Chvrches may declare that love is dead; but you just fell right back into it. You won’t shake this record for a very long time. When you close your eyes, you’ll forever be able to trace the outline of its face.
From the opening synths of ‘Graffiti’, this is a record that goes for the jugular.
Love Is Dead shows the Glasgow indie electro three-piece super-sizing their synth-pop, adding a surprising aggression to boot. Don’t be surprised if Love Is Dead seals their superstardom.
Not exactly a faultless record, by any stretch of the imagination, Love Is Dead nonetheless confirms that The Bones of What You Believe was far from a fluke effort and that the band, regardless of the success found in the intervening years, are still capable of delivering exciting, engaging and boundary-pushing synth-pop when it really matters.
‘Love Is Dead’ manages to balance hopeful, utopian pop with a darker, gloomier undercurrent.
For all the venting of psychic turbulence, Love Is Dead has a joyfully defiant feel, as if singer Lauren Mayberry is busily converting all the negativity in her life into sparkling, irrepressible pop melodies.
It goes without saying, CHVRCHES’ pop leanings have been given the A-List treatment, meaning that ‘Love Is Dead’s trojan horse is all bejewelled and fancy on the outside but on the inside its weapons’ are drawn, ready to attack.
The most impressive thing about Love is Dead might be that as big as its sound gets, Chvrches never lose touch with the humanity that's at the core of their music.
Love Is Dead is by no means a bad record — even in nitpicking its problems, I find myself drawn back to it time and again. So much goes right here, but in scrubbing their songs of imperfections, they've also magnified their flaws.
Chvrches are at their finest when they're adding dabs of holographic highlighter to structures built on New Wave's buzzy bliss and post-goth's gloom.
Mayberry searches relentlessly for light in the dark. Her insistence on standing for what is right and never turning a blind eye also reads as a fight to resist desensitization, a powerful theme for a pop record. But Love Is Dead often sounds desensitized, unyielding, and defensive.
Love Is Dead isn’t a bad album. It’s flawed but flecked with great moments.
Love is Dead fits the complaints of its narrative, sketched above and elsewhere. It is often not as exhilarating as other moments in Chvrches’ breadth.
Love Is Dead is not a bad album, it's just that this felt like CHVRCHES' time for a great one. Love Is Dead is not that, either.
Love Is Dead is not a terrible album and it certainly has its moments, but it’s not as engaging or interesting as its predecessors.
Love Is Dead is a collection of songs about grand concepts like openness, heartbreak, disappointment, and generally growing up. But without the benefit of specificity or a sharp perspective, the result is that it may be the most impersonal record that CHVRCHES have ever produced. Pain without specificity sounds a lot like numbness.
On their third album, Love Is Dead, they reach a sweet spot in balancing the chasm between what is charming to niche dance music fans and what is necessary to penetrate the Billboard charts, but then they keep going.
With Love Is Dead, Chvrches further chisel away at any remaining stray edges of their kaleidoscopic pop; all that remains is a reliable, airtight formula.
These rare reminders of Chvrches's capacity for poignancy and nuance only make Love Is Dead's overarching push toward generic melodrama in the name of accessibility seem all the more vacuous.
CHVRCHES bout to make history:
THE FIRST ARTIST TO RELEASE THE SAME ALBUM THREE TIMES.
Gotta admire the ambition...
CHVRCHES have the CHVTZPAH to swing for the top of the CHVRTS - but have they sacrificed their distinctive CHVRMS in CHVSING a mainstream crossover? I just don't want this to sound like CHVINSMOKERS.
[Actual Review]:
This is absolutely the album the singles advertised: Chvrches as their hugest and most anthemic, making "music for the masses" that betrays a fairly low opinion of the mainstream they want to cross over into. The sound is absolutely there, from those gleaming, airborne ... read more
CHVRCHES’ 2018 album “Love Is Dead” can be their most accessible and commercial to date, but still brings a powerful and lightly projected travel based on love deceptions and mental health.
The evolution of their sonority is constant and here it was not different. The best points are the amazing production - on point as always - and the splendid vocal delivery. As a CHVRCHES project the only point that really disappoints here is the lyrical content which is very basic and ... read more
This album is kinda ok i like it for the most part by the instrumental apartment dont hate the experymental synth but the lirycs in the hooks are kinda there not bad but i didnt stick with it a lot after all is great but could be better sure, they can make it more catchy beacuse going throught i lost a little of interest by the end
1 | Graffiti 3:38 | 87 |
2 | Get Out 3:51 | 78 |
3 | Deliverance 4:12 | 79 |
4 | My Enemy 3:53 feat. Matt Berninger | 83 |
5 | Forever 3:44 | 84 |
6 | Never Say Die 4:23 | 77 |
7 | Miracle 3:08 | 72 |
8 | Graves 4:43 | 81 |
9 | Heaven/Hell 5:05 | 77 |
10 | God's Plan 3:31 | 71 |
11 | Really Gone 3:11 | 70 |
12 | ii 1:09 | 68 |
13 | Wonderland 4:35 | 75 |
#8 | / | Drowned in Sound |
#18 | / | ABC News |
#45 | / | PopMatters |
#78 | / | Fopp |
#87 | / | Under the Radar |
/ | Radio X |