384) Ivy - Apartment Life

Can you please review Ivy Apartment Life? No problem, thanks for the request. Mr Knowledgeable wants to ask one question is Ivy a band or a female solo artist?

Quick type on phone, a band, of course,  I thought so….

Brief history, Ivy were a three piece band featuring two multi-instrumentalists Andy Chase and Adam Schlesinger and singer Dominique Durand (Chase and Durand are now married) and between 1994 and 2012 released six albums.  Sadly, Schlesinger died of Covid in 2020, and Chase and Durand have reunited and with demos featuring Schlesinger released the bands seventh album in 2025, nice tribute.

Apartment Life was their second album released in 1997; I was twenty-six going through a divorce so that’s clearly why it passed me by (always good to get the excuses in).

A quick read and I see Lloyd Cole, a man who deserves so much more than he has been given, helped produce the record and James Iha of Smashing Pumpkins was involved in the track Back In Our Town so that’s where I start where his guitar and vocals blend in perfectly, it has an airy laid back vibe.

Four singles were released from the record opening track The Best Thing being one of them which starts pleasantly with Durand light vocal leading us in before the band explode into the chorus and Durand hits the chorus hard as well, from there the song gallops along and I am afraid it’s one of those choruses that stays in your head, excellent start and the guitar solo reminds me of Johnny Marr in The Smiths.

I’ve Got A Feeling reminds me of Saint Etienne (Never Do That Again could be off any of their albums), it’s lush and well-structured and This Is the Day the band add horns and at the two minute mark the guitars and horns hit just right, seemingly used in the film Something About Mary I am surprised it wasn’t a hit.

The final song released as a single is You Don’t Know Anything which opens with much heavier guitars a Wah Wah effect which reappears throughout, four excellent singles.

I Get the Message is insanely catchy and the trumpet on Baker is beautiful and Get Out of the City and These Are the Things About You are good pop.

In fact, apart from Ba Ba Ba, which never engaged with me, every track on this record has something.

The final track is called Quick, Painless and Easy well these forty-three minutes pass quicky are certainly not painless and they make it seem so easy.

8/10

GIVE IT A STREAM: This Is The Day