This version of Nobody's Daughter has become one of my favourite albums. I actually rate it as highly as Hole's three studio albums.
Courtney Love - Nobody's Daughter (Bootleg Version)
Tracklisting:
1. Pacific Coast Highway
2. For Once In Your Life
3. Letter To God
4. Stand Up Motherfucker
5. Loser Dust
6. Dirty Girls
7. Never Go Hungry Again
8. Nobody's Daughter
9. Happy Ending Story
10. Car Crash
11. Sunset Marquis (Piano Version)
[My updated version also adds 'Samantha', 'Dirty Girls (Candy Version)' and 'Sunset Marquis (Band Version)']
Best Tracks:
Pacific Coast Highway
Letter To God
Happy Ending Story
For Once In Your Life
Courtney Love releases music with frustrating infrequency. When America's Sweetheart was finally released in 2004, it had been a long wait. Not only was it her first album since Hole's Celebrity Skin in 1998, she'd also been teasing us with hints and the occasional performances of new songs since around 2001. The follow up, which became Nobody's Daughter, was no different. Well. It was different. The teasers were more frequent and more intriguing. The wait was excruciating.
So, the story goes that, after the disaster of America's Sweetheart and Courtney's so-called "Letterman Years" of 2004-2005, our hero is finally court-ordered to three months in rehab. Her friend, Linda Perry, shows up, gives her a guitar and tells her to make good use of her time in rehab. And, she does.
The first glimpse we got of the album was a 2006 UK TV documentary called The Return Of Courtney Love. It's actually a great documentary. I still like to watch it from time to time. However, it got me really excited for the album. Recording with Linda Perry (and with Billy Corgan helping out), it was then titled, How Dirty Girls Get Clean. The songs they played in the documentary sounded great. 'Pacific Coast Highway', 'Sunset Marquis' and 'Letter To God' all stood out - I desperately wanted to hear this album. These snippets showed great potential.
Eventually, Courtney herself started leaking songs. 'Dirty Girls' was put up on her MySpace, 'Car Crash' played when you visited her website. Then, 'Letter To God' leaked. And, my God! I fucking loved 'Letter To God', as did my fellow Courtney-loving comrades - it became a favourite to sing along to drunk. It was put on very high rotation. It was the perfect song for Courtney at that point in her career - it would have been the perfect single for Courtney's comeback, even though Linda Perry wrote it. Had she played her cards right, it probably would have been a (moderate) hit.
Sometime in late 2009 (if memory serves), this version of the album, now called Nobody's Daughter, leaked. Having my appetite whet by The Return Of Courtney Love, I eagerly downloaded it.
First was 'Pacific Coast Highway'. This is what I'd been longing for. There'd been a teaser in The Return Of Courtney Love, and the recorded version was even better than I'd hoped. Despite some very ominous imagery, Courtney insists this song isn't about her late husband. Whether it is or not is irrelevant. It's the best song she'd written in years, easily on par with her best song-writing moments from Hole's career. This was the Courtney Love I'd longed to hear. And, that I'd longed for the rest of the world to hear. Mature, yet still ragged. She'd grown up, but she hadn't lost her spark. She could could finally prove to the nay-sayers that she was, indeed, a force to be reckoned with. It was simply magical. As time has gone on, I'm not ashamed to say, I think it's possibly the best song she's written since 'Doll Parts'.
While clearly not the finished version, I was still struck by the album. It was exactly the album I'd wanted her to make, since 'Hold On To Me' from America's Sweetheart had shown her softer, (for lack of a better term) singer-songwriter side. These songs showed that she didn't have to be screaming her head off to make a powerful statement. It was both raw and vulnerable. The tenderness of 'For Once in Your Life', the heartbreak of 'Happy Ending Story', the sorrow of 'Car Crash' and 'Nobody's Daughter' (which is completely different song to the 'Nobody's Daughter' that came out on Nobody's Daughter), the defiance of 'Never Go Hungry' and 'How Dirty Girls Get Clean' - this was the side of Courtney Love that I longed for the world to see. Many of us knew it was there. It felt like, with this album, she was ready to show the world she was more than another celebrity-gone-bad headline.
It's rough. It's raw. It's passionate. It perfectly depicts a woman coming to grips with her past, while trying to put her life back together. I desperately hoped it would be the album that Courtney back her credibility. On a large scale.
However. This is Courtney Love we're talking about. Obviously, it wasn't meant to be.
Sometime, while all of this was happening, Courtney announced that she was getting Hole back together. Except that she wasn't getting Hole back together. No Eric, no Patty, no Melissa. Essentially, no Hole. She was playing with her new band and calling it Hole.
Not long after, after a four year wait, the release of Nobody's Daughter was announced.
After so much potential from the leaked demos from the album, I was worried. Once it had it been announced that she'd completely re-recorded the album with Michael Beinhorn (who'd produced Celebrity Skin), my heart sank. I worried that she'd strip the songs of their vulnerability and try (too hard) for a hit record.
Turns out, I wasn't entirely wrong.
With all that out of the way, let's officially start the blog on the official version of Nobody's Daughter.
Hole - Nobody's Daughter
I'm playing the vinyl version because it sounds way better. The CD version sounds far too compressed. There's a very noticeable difference. The CD mix is a mess in comparison.
Versions:
CD
LP
Tracklisting:
1. Nobody's Daughter
2. Skinny Little Bitch
3. Honey
4. Pacific Coast Highway
5. Samantha
6. Someone Else's Bed
7. For Once In Your Life
8. Letter To God
9. Loser Dust
10. How Dirty Girls Get Clean
11. Never Go Hungry
Best Tracks:
Pacific Coast Highway
Never Go Hungry
Samantha
This was never meant to be a Hole record. And the 'Hole' moniker never fit it. The songs are very much Courtney Love solo. Which is - absolutely - not bad thing. I blame Billy Corgan for it. He's been playing in a band called The Smashing Pumpkins that isn't really The Smashing Pumpkins for some years now.
Nobody's Daughter feels like a missed opportunity. Michael Beinhorn's production is a mess. These are, for the most part, pretty mellow songs. On the Linda Perry version, they were presented beautifully - raw, vulnerable and surprisingly tender for a Courtney Love record. Which is what the songs were begging for. The released Nobody's Daughter strips all that away. Everything is way over-produced. And, this new band plays the songs as if they're big, flashy rock songs. Which, they're not. The acoustic guitars - one of the high points on the Linda Perry version - sound atrocious, mixed too violently and drowning the record.
'For Once In Your Life' might the best example of this. One of the highlights from the Linda Perry version, the Nobody's Daughter version is a mess. Despite there being potentially gorgeous strings buried in the mix, it's drowning in those 300 layers of acoustic guitars. Listen for yourself:
(Original)
(Album Version)
Interestingly, 'Letter To God' and 'Never Go Hungry' are the Linda Perry produced versions on the released album. 'Never Go Hungry' is unaltered, while 'Letter To God' has had the piano mixed out. It just doesn't have the same impact without it. 'Pacific Coast Highway' sounds like a Celebrity Skin reject here, but doesn't suffer quite as much, despite a new outro which, quite frankly, drives me nuts. 'Loser Dust' doesn't suffer much, either. However, that it was included on Nobody's Daughter while the beautiful 'Sunset Marquis' and 'Happy Ending Story' were not, is yet another frustration I have with the album.
The news is not all bad, however. The new versions of 'How Dirty Girls Get Clean' and 'Samantha' work very well. They're the only songs from the original batch that work as rock songs. The new 'Nobody's Daughter' and 'Someone Else's Bed' are also very good. I was never fond of 'Honey', until I saw her play it live last year. It was really nice live. Actually, all the songs I saw her play from Nobody's Daughter were particularly good live. Which reinforces my view on this album. The songs are there. They're good fucking songs. The production just does them no justice (much like America's Sweetheart). However, the quality of the song writing is leagues ahead of America's Sweetheart. Maybe even Celebrity Skin.
All that said, the released version of Nobody's Daughter is a actually pretty decent record. I just wish she'd released two separate albums - the Linda Perry rehab album, then the Michael Beinhorn rock album. I do also wonder what I would have thought of the album had I not heard the original version first, and had I not already been familiar with most of the songs on it. But, the fact remains - tonight, I listened to the released version of Nobody's Daughter for the first time in a long time. Yet, I still play the Linda Perry version. A lot. That probably says more than this blog could.
