I Am The Greatest

There's a wise old saying (actually it's the title of a Bruce Willis album but that doesn't have quite the same authoritative ring) that goes *What doesn't kill you, only makes you stronger*.

A House have been the recipients of the kind of underwhelming apathy that would lead most bands to go back to their day jobs and while away their evening swilling pints in The Norseman, mulling over what might have been. But they're still alive and spitting, and here then is the third album from a band who have found themselves paddle-less up more creeks than they'd care to count and have emerged from their sojourn in the wilderness battered but staunchly defiant and with a record more cohesive and infinitely more glorious than anyone could have hoped.

Long past his angry young man stage, Dave Couse has embraced the era of the paranoid, terrified, unsure, disgruntled, disillusioned slightly older man. This record is so full of blatant pain, anguish and fear that the listener feels uncomfortably voyeuristic at times (yes, yes, I know that technically speaking, a listener can't be voyeuristic. Don't write in). I Am The Greatest contains 16 songs of cynicism and desperate hope, from the almost venomous diatribe of 'I Don't Care' to the gorgeous child-like pleading of 'Take It Easy On Me'.

There are no - count 'em, none - weak tracks here, and while picking highlights is a fairly redundant exercise, A House will have quite a task in every again capturing the haunting quality of 'When I First Saw You', comprised of only sustained, ominous baroque chords crowned with gut-wrenching vocals. If you don't tremble when Dave sings the line *God, you're beautiful, you really are*, you're either comatose or possess the soul of a politician. My only quibble is that when I first heard this song, at an afternoon gig in Dublin's City Centre early this year, it was twice as long and consequently twice as precious.

Musically, this album isn't a million miles from its predecessors, but lyrically it's ten times more potent and self-assured. The likes of 'Live Life Death Die' and 'Creatures Of Craze' don't need standard lyrical formats - streams of juxtaposed words more than suffice, and the final title track is a knife-twisting attack that hits the music industry where it hurts, climaxing with an anguished 'I Am The Greatest' repeated over and over like some unrelenting battle cry.

'Cotton Pickers' and 'How Strong Is Love' are singalong jewels. 'Blind Faith' is savage and incisive, and there is more, much more, just waiting to be discovered, immediately loved and forever treasured by you.

This is life-affirming stuff, undoubtedly cynical and perhaps even bitter, but retaining some glimmer of hope and resolution in spite of all that. A House are the finest band Ireland has ever produced. One day a statue will be erected somewhere on O'Connell Street to be a testament to this fact.

Until then, make room in your record collection for 'I Am The Greatest', one of the most cherishable pieces of black vinyl you could ever hope to own.