Artist: Kravitz, Lenny
Label: Virgin Records
Released: 2008
Hard to believe, but Lenny Kravitz has been on the wider music scene for a full nineteen years now. An undeniably enviable stretch that has taken the New York-born musician through practically every phase of musical development, from likeable but expendable rocker, through the peak of his rock career with the double-platinum Are You Gonna Go My Way, to the final metamorphosis into one of the leading sex symbols of the modern pop rock scene. Lenny has seen and felt pretty much everything there is to see. Now he’s back, this time armed with a thrilling set of fourteen tracks that will put a smile back on the faces of fans of heavier guitar sounds for the first time in ages.
It Is Time For A Love Revolution is a real revelation, at least compared with the proverbial predictability of Kravitz’s recent work. After the constant re-orientation toward the MTV-style pop-ish posturing we’ve been getting from Lenny for the past few years, you’d gotten thoroughly out of the habit of expecting a sharper guitar response from the man. Oh well, blindly following the paths that the scene so willfully points out by mutely flipping its trendy switches takes its toll, and now that the number of potential consumers of harder rhythms is soaring, Kravitz is once again presenting himself as a tireless rock & roll stallion who has no qualms about wantonly plundering your soul. Which, in the end, is easy to forgive, mostly thanks to this more-than-excellent album, which doesn’t skimp one bit on belting out the essential rock ingredients. There’s truly an abundance of them here, way too many for the meager average grasp of rock culture of the legions of female fans who, I have no doubt, packed in behind Bežigrad years ago, dutifully waiting for some genuine rock satisfaction.
Heads up, here’s one more little detail that might interest you! The album is entirely Lenny Kravitz’s own work, which means that besides the songwriting, arranging, mixing and all the other indispensable parts of the recording process, the man is also responsible for the right sound of every instrument involved in the project. Multi-instrumentalism, topped off with a deliciously dirty production, takes Lenny back to his roots with It Is Time For A Love Revolution, or rather, shows the listener his true face again. There’s no energy-saving going on here. Love Revolution tips its hand right from the start, flirting with the hard rock/funk rhetoric of the seventies, which with few exceptions remains the backbone of the album. Bring In On, Back In Vietnam and a kind of tribute to the Rolling Stones in the form of Dancin’ Til Dawn keep dictating a sharp tempo, which finally gives us a bit of a breather with the likeable ballads I’ll Be Waiting and the untamed blues of A Long And Sad Goodbye (which, by the way, strongly recalls Lenny’s previous triumph Believe), both of which reveal the guitarist’s sentimental side through generous vocals. Kravitz keeps cranking the intensity up from there, getting cheekier and at times even unpredictable. With a package of punchy tracks with more or less misleading titles, Love Love Love and above all Will You Marry Me, we get lashed again by the edge of some high-spirited funk rhythm, which, truth be told, would serve its purpose even better with a more robustly colored voice, something Kravitz sadly doesn’t have. Still, there’s plenty of reasons to be happy here. The brilliant This Moment Is All There Is and the coda I Want To Go Home take care of that too, rounding off this sensational piece of work with a good dose of quirky symbolism.
Lineup
Lenny Kravitz: all instruments
Production
Lenny Kravitz
Track list
1.Love Revolution
2.Bring It On
3.Good Morning
4.Love Love Love
5.If You Want It
6.I’ll Be Waiting
7.Will You Marry Me
8.I Love The Rain
9.A Long And Sad Goodbye
10.Dancin’ Til Dawn
11.This Moment Is All There Is
12.A New Door
13.Back In Vietnam
14.I Want To Go Home
Album length: 62.09
