Love (Bonus Tracks)

iTunes Review

Love's 1966 eponymous debut may pale in creative comparison to their 1967 cult classic, the highly influential Forever Changes, but this one rocks much harder than what many critics and musicians hail as the band's magnum opus. With Love, the Los Angeles outfit staked out a darker piece of Sunset Strip's exploding psychedelic rock scene. The sinister stomp of "My Little Red Book" (originally penned by Burt Bacharach and Hal David) unleashed the band — as well as their complex and enigmatic frontman Arthur Lee — on an unsuspecting world of teenagers who may have been expecting something akin to the pacific folk rock of Love's contemporaries, The Byrds. Though there are subtle hints of Byrdsy influence on songs like the semi-sloppy garage rock of "Can't Explain" with its tambourine jingle and 12-string jangle, Lee preferred to sing about the fear of death and soured relationships rather than quote Pete Seger's interpretation of the third chapter from Ecclesiastes. Love also put a proto punk spin on their version of "Hey Joe," and the moody intricacies of "Signed D.C." along with the psychedelic song craft of "Mushroom Clouds" hinted at what Lee and Love were later capable of on Forever Changes.