Album Review: Lionheart - 'Love Don't Live Here'

If you’re sick of all that generic, 'soft' hardcore the kids are listening to these days, we passionately prompt you to check out Lionheart. After all, there’s no hardcore without the hard element, and these guys bring it down heavy. Be it their fast-charged tempo or their uncaringly snappy lyricism, new album ‘Love Don’t Live Here’ sounds like Turnstile reproduced with Raised Fist. And it’s awesome.

The overriding vibe is one of ‘1-2-screw-you’, a description that generally does match up with what a good album sounds like. ‘Keep Talkin’ sneers over dirty, ominously low guitar tones and ‘Bury Me’ carries a profane-centred middle finger. The latter is, at times, unpleasantly macho, reflected in the slight vulgarity of ‘Dead Wrong’. If you don’t mind, you’ll probably enjoy this album a lot more than you expected.

Musically, the LP is mostly straightforward, but breaks in the guitars highlight a willingness to experiment, as do the vocals on ‘Lock Jaw’ performing a dalliance into melodic hard rock. However, the most exciting aspect of this release in that department is its potent hip-hop influence. It’s not just overused lines such as ‘like damn’ embedding that impression into the listener's mind (as on its title track) but instead completely blatant references, including a nod to The Notorious B.I.G. when ‘Rewind’ begins with ‘it was all a dream’.

The B.I.G. mentality that reigns in hip hop – that of showing the people who doubted you can, so to speak, ‘make it’ – is reflected on ‘New Enemies’ down to its lyricism, and even the album’s title references R & B. If you’re not a fan of the genre, you won’t notice it, but if you are, try not to miss it.

Apart from a couple of annoying fadeouts, ‘Love Don’t Live Here’ is hard not to engage with. It delightfully embarks on its own journey, taking cues from other genres but not becoming part of the herd. It’s solid core, but not core-ny. If you hated that pun, at least take its message: Lionheart have dished out a strong offering.

1.Pain

2.Keep Talkin’

3.Witness

4.Bury Me

5.Love Don’t Live Here

6.Rewind

7.Still

8.New Enemies

9.Lock Jaw

10.Dead Wrong

11.Going Back To The Bay