The Verve
Urban Hymns

THE REVIEW

Urban Hymns came out at the end of September 1997 and is the third and final album by The Verve, with which they reached the peak of success and paradoxically also their extinction as a group.

In my opinion, this CD is truly beautiful and varied because it manages to move from psychedelic tracks like "Neon Wilderness" and "Catching The Butterfly" to genuine Brit Pop anthems like "Lucky Man" (which shows a significant influence from Oasis) and the masterpiece "Bitter Sweet Symphony". The album begins with this song that allowed Ashcroft and company to remain forever in the history of their genre and to leap immediately to the top of all the world charts. After this great piece comes the sweet and romantic ballad "Sonnet", another fantastic and especially relaxing song. Track number 3 is "The Rolling People", a rocking tune that highlights the band's skill in playing. After an energetic track like number 3, it's time for a very melancholy one titled "The Drugs Don't Work" which talks about The Verve's drug problems.

With track 5, the psychedelic part of the CD opens thanks to the beautiful "Catching The Butterfly" which makes us all ask the question: "Did The Verve really quit drugs?!" to know the answer, just listen to the next piece, which is "Neon Wilderness", a track with a very Floydian initial atmosphere, and you'll understand. After these two tracks, the psychedelia ends, and it returns to Brit pop with the beautiful "Space And Time" and "Weeping Willow", which nonetheless serve as an opening to the beautiful and exciting "Lucky Man" track, which best expresses the band's musical essence, although as mentioned earlier, it feels a bit of Oasis influence, but that's how things were going in England at that time. The album continues with the excellent ballad with great lyrics "One Day" and "This Time", perhaps the least valuable piece of the album, and ends with the sadness of "Velvet Morning" and with the audacity worthy of a great Brit pop group and the desire to break everything with "Come On".

In essence, we can say that this album is very valid, certainly one of the best in the genre, and its main feature is that it easily spans between Brit pop and psychedelia. In short, an album that never bores you and certainly a worthy end to a band that had to stop giving us pearls of great music due to various problems, including drugs, too much pressure, and internal quarrels.