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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
City, clubland, theatre, dockland, 20 Oct 2005
Amazon reviewers are a self-selective sample, aren't they? Chances are we're only here to tell you that this is the 'best album of all time'. I won't go that far, but I will suggest that Heaven 17's 'Penthouse and Pavement' is one of the most important albums of the 80's. Why? First off, it did 'classy' infinitely better than London's queeny Soho New Romantics ever did 'classy'. As a concept album, 'P&P' tells a great story about Thatcherite-era consumerism while affirming an deep-rooted confidence that Sheffield was always going to sound cooler than London. It's also packed - like every other Marsh/Ware product - with great production tics that transcended the obvious. The unsung hero of the piece is guitarist/bassist John Wilson whose gorgeous playing shapes tracks like Play To Win. To a die-hard synth freak, Wilson opened my mind to the beauty of the guitar rather than fearing it as an instrument of Satan. A year later I was listening to Chic and thanking H17. As a teenage Human League fan I was overawed how smart, grown-up and ahead of its time up 'P&P' sounded. Almost a quarter of a century later, this middle-aged father still reckons he was right first time around.
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Goodbye to the pavement, hello to my soul, 3 Nov 2004
By A Customer
Possibly one of the first concept album of the 80's and filling in some of the themes previously touched on the Human League's 'Travelogue'. There are two strains of thought that course throughout 'Penthouse and Pavement'. 'Groove Thang', 'Geisha Boys and Temple Girls', 'Lets All Make A Bomb', 'Height of The Fighting' and 'We're Going To Live for a very Long Time' hold a mirror up to the world at large and report back on the distortions locked in their subjects; US Politics and their effect on the world, Religious implications and their impact on relationships, The possibility of nuclear war (a subject that mattered greatly in '81), war (in general) and religious extremes. '(We don't need this) Groove Thang' sets the tone for the rest of the album; a serious 4/4 workout full of chants and a slinky bass line similar to what Frankie would do three years later on 'Two Tribes' and so good, it was banned by the BBC. 'Penthouse and Pavement', 'Soul Warfare', 'Song with No Name' and 'Play to Win' look inwardly at 80s Britain; principally the rise of the yuppie - their focus on money, their empty relationships with money, cocaine, the beginning of privatisation and Thatcherism (most critics lazily assumed that Heaven 17 were celebrating the lifestyle little realising that Gregory, Marsh and Ware were all Socialists). Sounds drab eh? Not a bit of it - this is music for the mind, heart, soul and the feet. This album is fuelled by early analogue electronics that most modern bands would kill for, looping over this - some of the most killer bass lines; generating precision but fluid rhythms you can't help but move to. There is now an import version of the album available which features one of their greatest 12"s; 'I'm your Money', which explores similar themes to the album and sounds like Detroit techno at least seven years before it existed. Celebrate and vaporize.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The packaging screams product , the music proves otherwise., 4 May 2009
If any album ,superficially at least , seemed to embrace the precepts of Thatcherism and monetarism it's Penthouse and Pavement by Heaven 17.The cover shows the band embracing corporate culture with ultra sharp pin stripe suits and all the (then) accoutrements of high flying executives. Right down to it's B.E.F.( "British Electric Foundation") logo this album seems to be screaming product rather than endeavouring for any artistic credibility.
That is until you hear the music .Martyn Ware had stated that pop music was something to be enjoyed ,that it couldn't change the world It is, he said," A confection". Yet the songs on Penthouse and Pavement were hardly lightweight wispy throwaway ditties. Recorded "dry"( a technical term for an absence of reverb ) the songs, specifically those on the old vinyl side one-dubbed the "Funky" side- absolutely wallop out of the speakers. There is genuine sonic clout on Penthouse and Pavement and it still sounds great today.
This clout, this aggression came not just from the bands chosen themes. Martyn Ware and Ian Craig Marsh ,especially Ware, were still seething at being kicked out of The Human League and this fuelled a creative binge which meant the second ,more electronic side, of the album was recorded in just one week. All this , and of course some terrific songs mean that Penthouse and Pavement is one of the great pop albums from the early eighties.
Despite the cover -a part of their distinctly anti-rock stance and a send up of artists as multinational assets- the band were not above social polemic and anti-establishment subversion. Single "(We Don't Need This) Fascist Groove Thang" ,written between President Reagan's election and inauguration, was a protest at the shift to the right wing .The album though is aspirational though what it actually aspires to has been misconstrued. Songs like the brilliant "Play To Win" are about breaking free from home , from the norm and heading out into the world and not about striving for success and monetary gain.
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