Search - Human League :: Travelogue

Post-punk synth classic

aliled | Shawnee, Kansas United States | 01/29/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"For all the press that synth pop got in the early 80s, not a lot of it has held up particularly well, except at the more experimental end of what could still sort of be called pop. Suicide's first album still sounds fab, Cabaret Voltaire's early Rough Trade material makes increasingly wonderful aesthetic sense, but it's the Human League who finally seem to be undergoing a long overdue critical reevaluation. This began with the release of a CD of "pre-Human League" recordings made largely under the name "The Future". It continues with the reissue and remastering of the first three Human League albums."Travelogue" is the band's true masterpiece. Much more cohesive than its predecessor "Reproduction", it maintains a unique experimental edge that's largely (though not entirely) lost on their next album, "Dare" - but it's loaded with songs that are full of great ideas, catchy tunes and stark beauty. It's hard to resist "The Black Hit Of Space" - wherein a song so bland becomes a black hole, sucking up everything in its orbit and climbing so high in the charts that it reaches negative numbers - in this day and age. They turn a commercial jingle for gin into a lovely tune, cover Iggy, Mick Ronson and Gary Glitter, and convincingly too.What's new about this remaster? Well, it sounds great - better than the original vinyl and miles beyond the earlier CD issue. Other than that, it looks the same from the outside, but inside the booklet are expanded lyrics and credits. That's the good stuff... Oh well. It's nearly the length of two LPs (there are 7 bonus tracks) and worth every penny anyway.For the record, "Reproduction" and "Dare" are similarly remastered and worth it too. Each has 8 bonus tracks."

As long as Philip Oakey is here, it's still the Human League

HumanDon119 | USA | 02/19/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I wasn't sure what to expect since I knew that the band at this time was not a pop dancing band, and was a more pre-Tarantino kind of style, but I felt reassured when I heard Being Boiled. When I got the album, I was more satisfied than I expected! It was still a rock kind of music you could dance to, but a little more darker with the lyrics and synthesizers; they are still the same Human League I know, just a different style of them, but still deep down, still the Human League they turned out to be. Some of the most favored songs on Travelogue is "Life Kills", "Rock n' Roll/Nightclubbing", and "Gordon's Gin." Whether or not this album was remastered, I would still have loved it! But the great thing is this album is remastered with six extra tracks! Overall, it was a great CD!!!"