Dead or Alive - Fragile

Track List: Fragile

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Album Details: Fragile

Release Date:

09/19/2000

Label:

Avex Trax Japan

UPC:

4988064118236

User Reviews: Fragile

1. You've heard it all before, but better

   , June 29, 2002
   Reviewer: A (Dubious) National Secret - See all A (Dubious) National Secret's reviews

   Overall:
   Lyrics:
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   Oh, what one must do maintain a record deal when one exists on the outskirts of pop land. DOA only has a concrete deal for new material in Japan, on the label Avex Trax. Most of their fan base is there (apparently the rest is in Germany and parts of the US; it is good to know I am noticed). Sold-out concert dates for upward of $500k each upfront, millions of fans, ten million units sold in the last ten years - unfortunately it is all restricted to just one small nation.
   
   And this is much of the reason: According to the label, the fans want nothing but redos of DOA's old material. Getting Avex Trax to foot the bill for any entirely new songs has been like getting blood from a stone. Still, six new tracks and an actually welcome rehash appear on Fragile, the title a reference to leadman Pete Burns' former problem with psychotropic drugs (administered by a US doctor preceding a brief tour). They apparently left him near death from sleep depravation, and the effects took months to disappear.
   
   Background information aside, what of the songs within? Well, the remixes are apparently not so, rather the tracks were re-recorded from scratch, unlike the remixes on Nukleopatra. Unfortunately, little new is brought forth from these new renditions, the 1984-1990 originals being far preferable, except in the case of the Blue Christmas 2000 version. The original version was too torchy and grim, and this new incantation lifts the dark sheen a bit.
   
   The six new tracks are also a varied bunch. The weird and amusing Isn't It A Pity and the almost too uptempo I Promised Myself emerge as the best here. The remainder show somewhat low reserves in the Burns / Steve Coy coffer, sounding oddly familiar. Perhaps overwhelming the other four is the use of the older songs for the bulk of the album, but originality is waning drastically. If they are going to resurrect old stuff, perhaps they could look back to their really early days (1977-1982), before they had the deal with Epic / Sony that launched them into the mainstream world. I have all of the material from that period on vinyl, and some of it might be reusable.
   
   The bottom line: When at their best, Dead Or Alive can still deliver fun, quirky-good dance music. But they are not at their best here, not for nearly 50 dollars anyway (I paid $38 for mine from a specialty retailer). Sony is publishing a "Best Of" compilation this year, and there have been whispers that they might take DOA back, after dropping them back in 1991. A truly international stage might bring back the luster of this oddly alluring gem. ...

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Dead or Alive Biography

A British dance-pop group which found fame thanks to the antics of androgynous frontman Pete Burns, Dead or Alive formed in Liverpool in 1980. Burns first surfaced three years prior in the Mystery Girls, later heading the proto-Goth rockers Nightmare...Full Dead or Alive Biography

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