Bricks Are Heavy

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Bricks Are Heavy is the third studio album by American rock band L7, released on April 14, 1992, by Slash Records. The album peaked at number 160 on the US Billboard 200<ref name=billboard200/> and number one on the Heatseekers Albums chart.<ref name=heatseekers/> As of June 2000, Bricks Are Heavy has sold 327,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen Soundscan.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Production

Produced by the band and Butch Vig, musically the album is heavier and dirtier than the band's previous recordings and described as "catchy tunes and mean vocals on top of ugly guitars and a quick-but-thick bottom of cast-iron grunge" by Entertainment WeeklyTemplate:'s Gina Arnold.<ref name="Arnold"/>

Critical reception

In a contemporary review for Playboy, Robert Christgau regarded Bricks Are Heavy as an "object lesson in how to advance your music by meeting the marketplace halfway", although he believed it would not sell as much as it deserved. He said Vig helped L7 produce grunge-metal featuring "intense admixtures of ditty and power chord" that "never quite gathers Nirvana's momentum, but it's just as catchy and a touch nastier."<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> NME critic Angela Lewis called Bricks Are Heavy a "polished, virile white heat rock" record that "verifies their hard rock credentials completely" and demonstrates that L7 ought not to be pigeonholed as a grunge act in the vein of "Hole–Babes–Jane".<ref name="Lewis"/> Kerrang!Template:'s Steffan Chirazi was most impressed by the album's "relentlessness" in "driving the frustrations of everyday life home",<ref name="Chirazi"/> and Gina Arnold said in Entertainment Weekly that L7 distinguish themselves from the musically similar Nirvana through the "clarity" of their lyrics. "Although the band's positive-plus stances on liberal issues may not instantly endear it to fuzzy-minded teen America," Arnold wrote, "L7 does manage to be simultaneously fun and furious, an intensely appealing combination."<ref name="Arnold"/>

Los Angeles Times writer Jonathan Gold, while finding Bricks Are Heavy "a very good, sometimes brilliant hard-rock album", expressed reservations about Vig's polished production, saying that although it suited "a pop band at heart" like Nirvana, "L7 is a rock band, less like the Byrds than like the MC5, less about pop craft than about sheer aggression."<ref name="Gold"/> Arion Berger of Rolling Stone felt that the production's "neatly modulated dynamics" rendered the album "merely raucous where it might have been apocalyptic."<ref name="Berger"/> In the Chicago Tribune, Greg Kot opined that there were not many good songs such as "Slide" and "the performances—while certainly ferocious—aren't sufficiently varied enough to make up the difference."<ref name="Kot"/>

NME listed Bricks Are Heavy as the 39th best album of 1992.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> It placed at number 32 in The Village VoiceTemplate:'s Pazz & Jop critics' poll,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> with the poll's creator Robert Christgau ranking the album fourth on his ballot.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

Legacy

Reviewing Bricks Are Heavy for AllMusic, Eduardo Rivadavia said that Vig helped L7 "obtain a tight, compact sound" and sharpen their songwriting on what would be their "crowning achievement" and "an impossible act to follow".<ref name="Rivadavia"/>

Bricks Are Heavy is now regarded as one of grunge music's best albums. TrebleTemplate:'s Brian Roesler credited L7 with helping to define "the very best of early grunge" through the album's fusion of pop and metal musical elements.<ref name="TrebleList16"/>

In 2015, Spin placed Bricks Are Heavy at number 249 on its list of the "300 Best Albums of the Past 30 Years".<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Accolades

Critical rankings for Bricks Are Heavy

Publication	Country	Type	List	Year	Rank	Template:Abbr
Treble	United States	All-time	The 30 Best Grunge Albums	2016	15	citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>
Rolling Stone			50 Greatest Grunge Albums	2019		<ref name="RSList19">Template:Cite magazine</ref>
Far Out	United Kingdom		The 10 best grunge albums of all time	2021	4	citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>
Loudwire	United States		The 30 Best Grunge Albums of All Time	2023	16	citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Personnel

Credits adapted from liner notes.

L7

• Donita Sparks – guitar, lead vocals (tracks 1, 2, 3, 4, 8 and 10)
• Suzi Gardner – guitar, lead vocals (tracks 6, 9 and 11)
• Jennifer Finch – bass, lead vocals (tracks 5 and 7)
• Demetra Plakas – drums, backing vocals (track 3)

Additional musician

• Paul Ryan – bongos

Production

• Butch Vig – production, engineering, mixing
• Howie Weinberg – mastering
• Steve Marker – engineering
• Mr. Colson – engineering
• Elizabeth Hale – art direction
• Jeff Price – art direction
• Randall Martin – artwork
• Vicki Berndt – photography
• Arlan E. Helm – photography
• Damion Romero – photography

Charts

Album

Template:Album chart

Chart (1992)	Peak position
UK Albums (OCC)<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	24
US Billboard 200<ref name=billboard200>Template:Cite magazine</ref>	160
US Heatseekers Albums (Billboard)<ref name=heatseekers>Template:Cite magazine</ref>	1

Singles

Year	Title	Peak Chart positions
		Template:Small Mod	Template:Small <ref name="aust">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }} "Everglade": Template:Cite Ryan</ref>	Template:Small <ref name="ukchart">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>
1992	"Pretend We're Dead"	8	50	21
	"Everglade"	—	85	27
	"Monster"	—	—	33
"—" denotes singles that were released but did not chart.

External links

• Template:Discogs master