Life in Exile After Abdication | ||||
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Studio album by | ||||
Released | 1989 | |||
Recorded | March 1988, June – October 1988 | |||
Studio | Noise New York, West 34th St, New York City; Mirror Image, Gainesville, Florida | |||
Genre | Alternative pop, rock, post-punk | |||
Length | 48:03 | |||
Label | 50 Skidillion Watts[1] | |||
Producer | Moe Tucker | |||
Moe Tucker chronology | ||||
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Review scores | |
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Source | Rating |
AllMusic | [2] |
Robert Christgau | B+[1] |
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music | [3] |
MusicHound Rock: The Essential Album Guide | [4] |
The Rolling Stone Album Guide | [5] |
Spin Alternative Record Guide | 8/10[6] |
Life in Exile after Abdication is the second album by Moe Tucker, released in 1989.[7][8]
Rather than performing all of the instruments herself, as on her debut album, Tucker is accompanied by Lou Reed, Jad Fair, Daniel Johnston, and all four members of Sonic Youth.[9]
Robert Christgau wrote that "'Work,' 'Spam Again,' and 'Hey Mersh!' are Amerindie knockouts, lived postpunk takes on the grind and release of lower-middle class adulthood, a subject rock and rollers usually leave to Nashville company men."[1] Trouser Press wrote that "Tucker’s loose and unpredictable Life in Exile offers a little of everything, all performed and recorded with ramshackle casualness."[9] The Chicago Reader called the album "a tour de force recording that wedded noisy indie guitar textures to songs of blue-collar rage, fueled by [Tucker's] years as a divorced mother of five trying to support her family on a Wal-Mart paycheck."[10] The Washington Post wrote that "anyone who ever loved Maureen Tucker—and that surely includes all true Velvet fans—will find Life in Exile, motley as it is, irresistible."[11] The Spin Alternative Record Guide deemed the album Tucker's "finest solo outing."[6] The New Yorker thought that the album "demonstrated an abiding love for Bo Diddley rock and girl-group pop, played as if by dinosaurs and sung as if by a choirgirl."[12]
Reed selected the album as one of his "picks of 1989".[13]
All tracks written by Moe Tucker except where noted.