Reviews by simonh

I was under the mistaken impression that The Charlatans were just another Manchester band hastily thrown together during the Madchester supernova of the early ’90s.

How wrong could I be?

Firstly, they formed in the West Midlands before later becoming associated with the Madchester scene. Secondly, they’d been around since the ’80s.

OK, some of the tracks here still have that Madchester sound, but by this point they were clearly broader than that. These are properly constructed songs, with plenty of layers and some excellent musicianship, all held together by that great Hammond organ bubbling away underneath.

Rich and heavy in places, melodic in others, this is a fine album.

The vocal reminded me a little of Marc Bolan in places, but that’s about as far as the comparison goes.

Everything here feels incredibly basic — the songwriting, the arrangements, even the performances. Most of the tracks seem to follow the same sparse formula, and after a while it starts to feel less like a finished album and more like someone sitting down with a guitar and making it up as they go along.

There’s a certain charm to that kind of simplicity, but for me it wore thin very quickly.

I couldn’t wait for it to end.
1½

More like palatable telephone hold music than something I’d want to actively listen to.

I happily played it through twice while I was working and hardly noticed it was there. Totally inoffensive. Barely registers.

I've heard of them.
I recognised a track.
Everything else was a reasonable listen.
Perfectly adequate.

One of the granddaddies of what the press would soon insist on calling Britpop (although I have no idea why).

And it was a pretty strong firstborn.

Art house bollocks sung by a Bryan Ferry wannabe.
1½

Nice drum and guitar sound, and James Hetfield is a good frontman. The songs are strong too, although, like most thrash albums, it does get a bit samey in places.

I mean, it’s an OK album.

But it’s not the bleedin’ Messiah.

Some good ideas and promising starts, repeatedly spoiled by unnecessary noise and tracks being dragged out far too long.

For Germans, I’d expect more discipline.

Justin Hawkins giveth and Justin Hawkins taketh away.

This is an album full of great songs and good musicianship which, in all likelihood, would have gone largely unnoticed without Hawkins’ unusual, almost comic falsetto. And yet it was that same falsetto that made people assume The Darkness were a bit of a piss-take and *Permission to Land* wasn’t meant to be taken seriously.

But at the end of the day, this IS an album full of great songs.

Same recipe for every track, but it’s a darn good recipe. A little more spice and seasoning may have made it a five.

I like the stories.

But then he decides to set them to music.

I know he can sing more conventionally - I’ve heard 'Lay Lady Lay' — so the nasal, half-cheered delivery here is clearly a choice. I just don’t particularly like the choice.

And by the sixth album I’ve had on this list, I’d have thought he might have learned to play the harmonica. 'Queen Jane Approximately' is borderline assault on the eardrums. It must be deliberate.

'Like a Rolling Stone' is a strange one. Where did that Hammond organ come from? It sounds like it should be being played by a naked Terry Jones.

I just have to concede that, as a songwriter, Bob Dylan is class. But as a performer, I find him relentlessly one-dimensional.

I’ve always avoided The Grateful Dead, so I wasn’t expecting to like this. What I WAS expecting was a lot of hippy caterwauling, poorly recorded and drowned in off-stage noise.

What I actually got was crisp production, tuneful jamming, some great guitar work and surprisingly little background noise.

A revelation.

OK, so that was the first record.

The second started off a bit bluesy. Then came an Elvis impersonator. Then it carried on in much the same vein. And then we got ten minutes of feedback.

A letdown.

So, in summary, I’d happily listen to the first record again while using the second as a beermat.

Quit while you’re ahead.

Record 1: 5
Record 2: 1

Gabriel says: “Look what I can do.”

This is a real pick and mix of songs.

It starts with Moribund the Burgermeister, a song that could have come straight off The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway. But after that, any similarity to Genesis is largely put to bed. Every track seems determined to do something different, and there’s little stylistic consistency across the album.

The only thing that lets it down for me is some of the production. There’s a lot of very obvious stereo panning, with sounds jumping between the left and right channels. It’s particularly irritating on Humdrum, and even on Solsbury Hill the movement between the speakers starts to grate.

It kinda spoils what is otherwise a really good album.

It’s interesting to think this came out in 1984, when I was 20, at university, going to clubs, working as a university radio DJ and reading the music papers — and yet I’d never heard of them then or now.

Which does make you wonder why some mediocre bands become enormous while others barely see the light of day beyond a local cult following.

The album itself is perfectly respectable. The vocal has a definite Peter Gabriel feel to it, and quite a few of the tracks do too, but then everybody is inspired by somebody. It’s well produced, has a strong sound, and clearly somebody somewhere thought they were worth investing in.

Altogether, not bad at all.
3½

Certainly not what I'd call ambient — at least not in the way Eno seems to have defined the genre. No, this is actually listenable.

More than that, it's excellent. And yes, while I might have it on in the background, this is foot-tapping, hypnotic, immersive chill-out electronica. Almost dance music, but post-dance music. Yes this is what I want to listen to on the way home.

This album felt like different things at different times.

On the bog, with a good pair of cans in the dead of night, it was gorgeous. On the car stereo it became a bit of a tinny, drawn-out drag. Played in the kitchen during a meal, it was distracting. Quietly in the background around the house, though, it was strangely soothing.

In parts it’s exquisite dining. In others, soup kitchen.

I doff my cap to the electric piano, organ and all the other relatively modern touches — there are moments here that sound extraordinary — but I just can’t listen to the whole thing in one sitting.

Ooh look, someone’s been having woodwind lessons.

It’s OK as a one-off (particularly in 'Virginia Plain') but putting your Grade 1 squeaky clarinet, sax and/or oboe parts in practically every track is taking your ego too far and spoils what could be quite a good album.

I don’t know who the mad reed player was, but it had Eno written all over it. Glad he fucked off.
(Ed: It wasn’t Eno after all. But I'm still glad he fucked off.)

2½

I like dance music. I like electronic music. I like club music. So I like what The Chemical Brothers do.

But by the 50th repetition of the same bar, even I start to get a little tired of it.

Unless I’m in a club and have had a lot of beer.

Like most Mercury Music Prize nominees, I’d never heard of the band or the album, but this was surprisingly enjoyable.

I like a bit of weirdness, and at least the lyrics were audible. I gave it three listens and by the third the androgynous, theatrical falsetto was starting to grate a little.

Overall, a decent enough album, if not one I’m likely to add to a playlist.

And, like most Mercury Music Prize nominees, I’ve never heard of them since.

“This is a booty call. My boot up your arsehole.”

Fair enough.

The best thing about this album is the absolute meltdown it's going to provoke among the American 'list police'. I can hear them already. "Goddammit! More British crap nobody's ever heard of!"

But of all the early '80s synth-pop albums, this is one of the most interesting, with its unpredictable arrangements, shifting rhythms and, above all, Billy Mackenzie's manic vocals.

It starts off a little disjointed but gets better and better as it goes along, peaking with the magnificent *Club Country* and the sublime *Party Fears Two*.

Realistically, this is a three — maybe a four at a push. But just to rub it in, I'm giving it a five.