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I Could Live in Hope is the debut studio album by American indie rock band Low. It was released on December 2, 1994, on Vernon Yard Recordings.

I Could Live in Hope
Studio album by Low
Released	December 2, 1994 (1994-12-02)
Recorded	Autumn 1994
Studio	Noise New Jersey, Hope Township, New Jersey[1]
Genre	Slowcore dream pop
Length	57:05
Label	Vernon Yard
Producer	Mark Kramer
Low chronology
I Could Live in Hope (1994) Long Division (1995)

Background and composition

A reaction to the abrasiveness of alternative rock in the early 1990s, when grunge had reigning popularity, Low "eschewed conventional songwriting in favour of mood and movement."[2][3] Influenced by Brian Eno and Joy Division, the band, working with long-time producer and New York underground mainstay Mark Kramer, favored slow-paced compositions, a minimum of instrumentation and an economy of language.[4][3][5][6]

Reception

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[4]
Chicago Tribune	[7]
NME	7/10[8]
Q	[9]

I Could Live in Hope received generally positive reviews from contemporary music critics. Writing for the Chicago Tribune, Greg Kot felt that "its heavy-lidded drama creeps by in all-enveloping slow motion" and called it "the best record made for those dreary, nothing's-going-on-and-I-want-to-crawl-into-a-hole afternoons since Galaxie 500's debut."[7]

Legacy

Featuring an "unprecedent pace in the then-flowering underground,"[3] I Could Live in Hope helped to birth the genre known as slowcore, which encompassed acts from Bedhead to Codeine throughout the 1990s.[5]

Pitchfork placed I Could Live in Hope at number 49 on its 1999 list of the best albums of the 1990s.[10] The same year, critic Ned Raggett ranked it at number 37 on his list of "The Top 136 or So Albums of the Nineties" for Freaky Trigger.[11] In 2004, the album was included in Les Inrockuptibles' "50 Years of Rock'n'Roll" list.[12] In 2018, Pitchfork placed it at number 22 on its list of the 30 best dream pop albums.[13]

Track listing

Personnel

Credits adapted from the liner notes of I Could Live in Hope.[14]

Low

• Alan Sparhawk – guitar, vocals
• Mimi Parker – percussion, vocals
• John Nichols – bass

Additional personnel

• Mark Kramer – production
• Steve Watson – assistant production
• Low – artwork
• Gerree Small – inner sleeve photography

References

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