Product Description

The title is a joking reference to the messianic anticipation that built up in the years between the Manchester, England rock band's 1989 debut--which Britain's New Musical Express magazine ranked as the greatest album of the '80s--and this 1995 follow-up. It's also a description of the Stone Roses' sound, a sort of second coming of '60s and '70s blues-rock, re-born with a funk beat. Back in '89 it sounded like a revolution, and it was: crossing Led Zeppelin and Bob Dylan with club music, it helped set the template for all British alternative rock to follow, from Blur to the revamped U2. Lenny Kravitz is among the Americans who owes a debt.
SECOND COMING consolidates that sound with a see-sawing mix of hard-rock driving songs--with chunky electric guitar riffs and big beats--and acoustic anthems that immediately sound like they've been on the radio for a dozen years or more. The latter group includes "Ten Storey Love Song", a devotional ballad with a Dylan-esque melody, and "Your Star Will Shine", a psychedelic folk ditty that would have fit on an early Bee Gees album. "Good Times" is one of the big-beat numbers, and although it starts out sounding like a very blue Eric Burdon,it builds into a classic shouted-out blues-rock chorus, thekind on which FM radio thrived in the 1970s. "Tears" follows a Zeppelin-esque arc from acoustic to electric folk. Which, no doubt, is the exact route a lot of hard-rock devotees think any second coming should follow.

Track Listing

1. Breaking Into Heaven
2. Driving South
3. Ten Storey Love Song
4. Daybreak
5. Your Star Will Shine
6. Straight To The Man
7. Begging You
8. Tightrope
9. Good Times
10. Tears
11. How Do You Sleep
12. Love Spreads
13. Foz

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1259 in Music
• Released on: 1999-03-20
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 73 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Their debut made them the new Beatles and Stones rolled into one, and Second Coming was five years in the making. Accordingly, the anticipation was immense, and when the product seemed on first listen to be a very long, very protracted Led Zeppelin guitar solo--courtesy of the excessively well-practised John Squire--The Stone Roses convincingly punctured their own myth. Nevertheless, some of Second Coming is quite good: "Breaking Into Heaven" is appealingly pompous, showing that the Roses at least had a handle on the nature of their own import, and better still, had the ability to pull it off. "Love Spreads" and "Ten Storey Love Song" are imbued with the arrogance--and thankfully the tunes--of old. And the rest? Well, if you've ever heard John Squire's next band, The Seahorses, you'll know what to expect. Seldom has the guitar solo been so accomplished, or so dull. --Louis Pattison

Customer Reviews

Good album, poor Roses album
There are a handful of very good songs - Love Spreads, Breaking into Heaven, Daybreak, Driving South and Ten Storey Long. The rest veers from the pleasant but ultimately disposable to cringe inducingly bad, mostly for the descent into rock cliche that is embarrassing for a group of lads inspired by the punk era and its' values. I guess by the start of the nineties they had lost the hunger, I think we knew that the summer of 1989 were the glory days and when the moment has gone, that's it. They burned brightly but all too briefly.

Great songs , but the album layout is a pain
I think the band wanted to force people to listen to the record end to end.... The 'trick' of making the songs start 3 mins into random music spoils this album. If they wanted you to listen why include so much random noise.

It fails on the basics. If you want to listen to made of stone, it's track 8 on there first album. Simple. One great song after another...

If you want to listen to 10 Story Love Song --- god knows where it is on this CD. Amazing songs on this record. But actually being able to find them would have been a good idea.

10 Story Love song tho is head & shoulder above any other indy ballad , as other posters say Razorlight, strokes etc are just a joke next to the Stone roses. Really It's in a different League.

Simply the best 'rock' album you will hear
The Stone Roses, like the beatles had four geniuses playing in the band, genuine bona-fida geniuses. Their first album was amazing, this one is even better. Back in the 90's before the Strokes ruined guitar music, the Stone Roses took their time to craft a masterpiece, possibly flawed in places but probably the better for it.

I have never heard a record with such intricate instrumentation, broad themes and musical excellence. Needless to say if you like guitar based rock in any form, you should own and adore this record. Anyone who says this sounds like Led Zeppelin is an idiot. Similarly anyone who critices Ian Brown's voice doesn't understand the band. He's not trying to be the star here, the band were the stars, each of them.

The album has everything from the stomping Breakin in to Heaven, Loves Spreads & Daybreak to the heartbreaking Ten Storey.., Your Star will Shine, Tightrope. All written and exectuted with such equisite detail you can find something new in each listen even 100's of listens on.

John Squire was going through a messy break up when this record was written and it shows in the lyrics and mood. This is darker than their previous euphoric sound. The debut was the sound of the sun shining, this was the sound of a deeper interesting autumn setting in.

A word of warning to the 'kids'. You can't hear this album once or twice to understand the Stone Roses appeal. This is not Razorlight or the Strokes or Klaxons, this is a far more mature and enduring peice of music and once you have it under your skin, you will realise it is worth 10 of the last Cds you bought by recent bands.

RIP the Stone Roses, Britains best ever four peice. It's the saddest thing that they didn't continue, nobody really knows why. They were the real deal and I pity anyone who doesn't 'get' this album