#410: The Divine Comedy - A Short Album About Love (1997)

Zack: First off, great band name. Second off, I really enjoyed this EP (you can’t force me to call it an album). Divine Comedy have this really lush sounds to them, like a big band started making 90s pop music. Wikipedia informs me that this is called orchestral pop, which I think is an apt name. The EP, as the name suggests, centers around the concept of love. It discusses it in sloppy, often hysterically awkward terms. This includes the incredible, “If you were a horse, I’d clean the crap out of your stables and never once complain / If you were a horse, I could ride you through the fields at dawn through the day until the day was gone.” I actually found this element to be somewhat charming. Think about all of the different quotes you’ve heard in movies and books and TV shows trying to explain love. Some are shitty, some are poignant, but none ever really capture it. Love is such an abstraction that we don’t really have a great way to explain in linguistically outside of cliches. This EP sort of accidentally captures that. It spends 32 minutes trying to explain being in love, which is an endeavor not unlike The Big Bang Theory trying to explain string theory. But the effort is sincere, if occasionally cringe-inducing. Along with the majestic music, this made for a fun way to spend half an hour.

Favorite Tracks: In Pursuit of Happiness; If…; I’m All You Need

Emily: I was also a big fan of this not-quite-EP, not-quite album. I'm all in on musical compositions clocking in at just over thirty minutes. They get their point and sound across clearly and efficiently, and hopefully with no filler. A Short Album About Love was just as it says in the title - short (and filler-free) and lovely. The sound is orchestral and grand, and you get the sense that in whatever venues The Divine Comedy plays in they can't quite replicate it without the stage cracking under the weight of all of musicians and instruments necessary. Or it's all on a computer, but I have no idea. The instruments are a romantic ideal, and this album is certainly romantic. It could be the soundtrack to a quirkier, indie-film Love Actually (minus all the Christmas music). It may not accurately capture what's it's like to fall in love, but that's a near-impossible achievement. But capturing the romance and grandeur of love? A Short Album About Love embodies that beautifully.

Favorite Tracks: In Pursuit of Happiness; If I Were You; Everybody Knows (Except You)