Dust Bin The Lover Speaks
posted by on April 11 at 10:00 AM
I don’t think a day went by during my sophmore year of highschool (1987) that me and my friend, another big drama-queen, didn’t obsess over the self-titled album by The Lover Speaks.
This desperately romantic new wave gem was the brainchild of David Freeman, a casual songwriter and erotic poet of the time. He and his friend Joe Hughes made a demo and sent it to Eurythmics frontman, Dave Stewart. He was sufficiently bowled over by it, played it for his band mate Annie Lenox, and eventually sent a copy to his friend, Chrissy Hind of The Pretenders. She in turn passed it on to the ‘80’s super-producer Jimmy Iovine, who was able to get the band signed to A&M.
The list of players on the album is fantastic. June Miles-Kingston, Nils Lofgren and Dave Stewart are the big names. But alas no amount of stars could pull the album from the obscurity it was doomed for.
Maybe it was the over-the-top romantic lyrics, like these from the song Never To Forget You
A sneaky glance across the room(A blatant reminder)
A picture fixed above the bed,
Means “You belong here”;
Bundles of love-notes…so protected:
Pages of dangerous words
Listing everything…
In seriously purple prose, but heaven knows….
Or it could have been David Freeman’s soaring romantic voice pitched with June Miles-Kingston’s background vocals (she also did the background vocals on Fun Boy Three’s Our Lips Are Sealed). I dunno. But whatever the reason the album tanked.
Even opening for the Eurythmics on their world tour couldn’t help sales. The project had a cult following, though, and recorded a second album with Iovine, Stewart and Daniel Lanois sharing production. But with the first album’s sales so low, it was never to be released.
With that, the band faded into obscurity, until Annie Lennox revived interest in the group with her hit cover of the song No More “I Love You’s”.
The album however was never re-released, and has gone out of print, with copies of the cd trading for roughly $120 and old copies of the LP going for just under $100 online.
That said, if you really want to fall into a romantic swoon over the next week of spring, visit my blog where you can find song samples from my original vinyl copy.
These include the ultimate break-up song, the original version of No More “I Love You’s”.
Grab a tissue and enjoy.
I have this on vinyl from back in the day. I used to give people mix-tapes where "No More 'I Love Yous'" would follow "Kangaroo" by This Mortal Coil (or something similar.)
I used to make lots of mixtapes; the content of which tended to define the relationships that I had with people. Any break-up would involve a couple of "please reconsider" tapes and a "I'm moving on tape." (Nothing better than to finally seal the vault on a relationship with a tape that starts with "Don't Wanna Know If You're Lonely" by Husker Du.)
I didn't think much of it...until one of my ex's turned the tables on me...and her tape to me was filled with "Nobody's Diary" by Yaz, "When Love Breaks Down" by Prefab Sprout...
And the first song she put on her mixtape to me? That's right--The Lover Speaks-"No More 'I Love Yous'." I'd taped some of it for her over the time we'd dated--but in order to make me a mixtape, she had to track down her own copy of the vinyl just to make certain that I knew, through melancholy 80's wave/pop, exactly what we were both supposed to be feeling...
I remain impressed to this day and the memory is more than a little bittersweet.
pg
PS--Good to know that my vinyl is worth something more than just those bittersweet memories... Maybe I should call her and let her know.
Got this on cassette when it first came out, with the single (NMILY) on 12". Tracked down the CD a few years later.
The sleeve notes credit several females my question is this: Can you confirm that the female vocals on "No More I LOve You's" are by June Miles-Kingston?
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