Courtney Love: from a promise to a lost chord

Under a heavy legal cloud - bust for breaking-and-entering, drugs possession, rehabs and suite by her mother-in-law to take Frances Cobain away from her - will the release of Courtney Love’s debut album help or, alike in Ben-Lo saga, get the main participant drowned in the celeb-overkill? Is ‘American Sweetheart’ going to establish C. Love a Rock Queen or…

It is hard to see how our perception can be changed about this 39-year-old woman who has spent too many hours wasting on film sets to the detriment of her musicality which, in turn, has always been doubted. The general belief is that the Hole’s album ‘Live Through This’ had been written by her late husband Kurt Cobain and, disrespectfully and opportunistically, released only weeks after the man shot himself.

Then, there had been her constant Hole co-writer Eric Erlandson and later Billy Corgan. What real songwriting power woman possess we therefore have no idea but this is an album that addresses her male counterparts, as one generic ‘he’. The one she sings of on ‘Mono’, Love claimed to be a “Fred [Durst] murder fantasy.” Or, as she later hinted, about Eminem. Or even Jack White. In the end, the real “he” behind the song is irrelevant; it’s every He.

Courtney Love once promised that her debut solo album, ‘America’s Sweetheart’, would have “one song about a fictional boy who saves fictional Rock’n’Roll in a fictional town.” Change that to “girl” and the premise remains the same. Love’s ironically titled album is as much about herself as about the state of rock, audaciously taking on the entire male rock pantheon and offering Love - as in herself - as its saviour.

Love drives this point home throughout the rest of this fast-moving album, citing past and present punk and rock heroes: Black Flag’s ‘Rise Above’ and the Damned’s ‘Smash It Up’ in ‘Mono’; the Velvet Underground’s ‘All Tomorrow’s Parties’ in ‘Sunset Strip’; Prince’s ‘Erotic City’, The Ramones’ ‘Pinhead’ and the Clash’s ‘London Calling’ in ‘But Julian, I’m a Little Older Than You’ [whose title refers to Strokes frontman Casablancas]; and the self-explanatory and intentionally misspelled ‘The Zeplin Song’ - “Why does the song remain the same?” she quite reasonably inquires).

The list goes on, and Love never fails to note her place in all of this. For all self-promotion and promises, she then brags that when all is said and done, she’s still going to be the best you’ll ever have. Love’s at her best when she links her bravado to raging riffs, as in ‘Hello’. You almost believe she’ll deliver the goods when she sings, “You’re going to hear the lost chord tonight.” That chord’s a myth, of course, and thus the boast is wasted.

‘Sunset Strip’ is about one kind of addiction, the bottom-heavy, bluesy ‘All the Drugs’ takes the dependency theme further, as if the layered guitars’ texture imparts meaning to the damage and delight implied by “all the drugs in the world”. Forever a lyricist as sharp as a butcher’s cleaver, it is disappointing that among her collaborators - Wayne Kramer (MC5 legend), Kim Deal (Breeders, reformed Pixies) - are Linda Perry (C/Aguilera, Pink) and Bernie Taupin (Elton John’s co-writer).

It all adds to this mixture alternating between sounding like a ‘kinderwhore’ and Stevie Nicks; and yet, Love’s the most impressive in selling herself: a destroyer and creator in equal parts, who voices topics Americans dare not say. ‘America’s Sweetheart’ may not save Rock’n’Roll but her career. We hope, for her sake. But, she’s got a serious competition in The Distillers’ Brody Dalle, her heiress-apparent.