Sean Lennon
Friendly Fire
(Capitol)
Proving that real life, even among the New York It kids, can be more tragic and beautiful than anything Hollywood conjures up, Sean Lennon’s second CD Friendly Fire is a richly orchestrated autobiographical poem dedicated to his best friend Max Leroy, who died in a car crash. He and Leroy were involved in a love triangle with Lennon’s ex Bijou Philips, and most of the songs and the mini-films on the accompanying DVD wear the scars of a friendship never reconciled. Opening track “Dead Meat” mixes softly sung finger pointing with baroque strings and pretty piano, while the title track plays sweetly on the oxymoron by asking for forgiveness.
—Sue Carter Flinn
This article appears in Dec 6-12, 2007.