Album Reviews.

Here are some of the most recent reviews I have done:

LAMBCHOP – DAMAGED

Some records leap forth from the speakers and smack you right in the face. Others sneak up on you slowly, like when you fall asleep on the couch and your girlfriend covers you with a blanket while you doze. ‘Damaged’ falls into the latter category, and once you are wrapped up inside the folds of these gorgeous songs, you may not want to re-emerge. This is a late-at-night album, a soundtrack for drawn curtains and lit lamps, or homebound drives along country back-roads. Pace-wise, it rarely rises above somnolent, but it still makes you feel as if your feet are being lapped by warm Mediterranean water. Whether singer Kurt Wagner addresses faltering relationships (“And I promise I won’t live without you”) or American politics (“I have always thought that handguns are made for shooting people”), he does so with invention and wit rarely seen around these parts. The standout track is ‘I Would Have Waited Here All Day’. Originally written for Candi Staton, Kurt reinvents himself as a woman counting off the moments for her significant other to come home. It’s a tearjerker in the best sense. The ten songs here are concerned with how being human can be both joyful and sucky, but ultimately the message is one of hope, or perhaps redemption. ‘Damaged’ may be the product of great hurt, but it is soothing in the way that only a well-worn comfort blanket can be. Let it sneak up on you.

DUKE SPECIAL – SONGS FROM THE DEEP FOREST

Question: What do you get if you cross Aimee Mann, Ben Folds and Nick Cave, with Randy Newman, Ed Harcourt and Tom Waits? Answer: An AU reviewer trying desperately to describe what this album sounds like. And failing, for if Duke Special’s first “proper” record proves anything, it is that record labels are still willing to take a punt on interesting, strange and plain different music. Sure, keen-eared listeners will be able to detect echoes of the work of each of the aforementioned artists, but the simple fact of the matter is that Duke Special hails from a world all of his own. And he didn’t make it by cribbing from his vinyl collection; he made it by a winning combination of talent, hard graft and writing cracker tunes. And hot patootie, here be monster tunes. There’s ‘Everybody Wants A Little Something’, a jaunty little number with a chorus more addictive than Tetris. Or ‘Brixton Leaves’, a dark, Parisian-flavoured track that could be featured in a West End musical. Or how about the single ‘Last Night I Nearly Died’, a song so elaborately orchestral that it makes one think of ELO, even though Duke Special claims to have never heard ELO. And it’s not just about bombast, either: there is nobody else around right now writing songs like ‘This Could Be My Last Day’, which is so elegant and poised that it changes both the colour and the temperature of the air around your fingertips. This is not empty writer hyperbole; it’s fact. Here’s another question: should you buy this record? Answer: definitely. It probably won’t change your life, but it will make your year.

SEAN LENNON – FRIENDLY FIRE

You can feel the burden of the past weighing down upon this record. Comparisons with The Beatles, or at least one of them, are inevitable, and it’s difficult not to notice the echoes of John Lennon’s voice floating throughout these songs. Hearing his ghost materialise and disappear within the room is disquieting to say the least, but it is not as if Sean isn’t aware of his heritage. At one point he knowingly sings “I’m a believer”. But if Sean has inherited anything, it’s the ability to write skewed but melodic pop songs. ‘Dead Meat’ opens with a spectral piano reminiscent of Muse by way of The Onedin Line soundtrack, and ‘Parachute’ is decorated with merry-go-round whimsy. ‘On Again, Off Again’, meanwhile, is in the same vein as the prettier low-key songs on ‘The White Album’. The emphasis on orchestral psychedelia and major-to-minor chord changes mark this out as the album that Elliott Smith never made, and that’s high praise indeed. A very fine surprise

THE FRAMES – THE COST

Reviewing the latest Frames album is a scary prospect. The band inspire such unbridled devotion in their fanbase that it is worrying to think of the backlash should some lazy, lying journalist utter anything approaching a discouraging word. There is also the small fact that the band are yet to release a duff record, which, after five full-length studio albums, is a pretty impressive run by anybody’s standards. The Frames are just as stylistically contradictory as Radiohead, so it’s tricky to predict which direction they will take next. Whereas ‘For The Birds’, arguably their most popular work to date, was an intimate and stripped-down affair, its successor, ‘Burn The Maps’, was a chaotic and noisy dark night of the soul. Aptly, the band nearly burnt out whilst making it. To ‘The Cost’ then, and a few songs in this reviewer is still wondering what to make of it, not to mention thinking more and more about the impending deadline for the dreaded review. Sure enough, opener ‘Song For Someone’ is delicious, and ‘Falling Slowly’ ranks up there as another very fine Glen Hansard composition. Elsewhere, the songs are difficult to grab hold of, and when one tries they fall apart, like damp confetti. After living with ‘The Cost’ for a few days, the tracks that before seemed so subtle take on a new, stirring form, and the album as a whole develops an intriguing fluidity reminiscent of Will Oldham, whom The Frames have long claimed as a touchstone. This emphasis on space and warmth culminates with ‘Bad Bone’, a sensual track that just begs you to hit the repeat button on your iPod while you drift from room to room, buoyed along by the intricate melody that washes in and out of the headphones. Whereas other albums depend on noise to make an impact, ‘The Cost’ has a quiet, dignified presence. When it stops playing, the house seems strangely empty.

MOBY – GO – THE VERY BEST OF

Moby may be a slightly odd, chrome domed vegetarian with some questionable political beliefs, but it is doubtful that thousands of pretty young ravers are thinking about that whilst shaking their rudeboxes to his hit records. This expert in tofu cutlets also knows a thing or two about manning a drum machine and a sampler. Years on, ‘Go’ still sounds fantastically thrilling, and the beats ‘n’ blues grooves of ‘Honey’ and ‘Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad?’ aren’t too shabby either. But here’s the thing: Moby effectively has a Best Of in the form of his breakthrough record ‘Play’, thus rendering this record completely unnecessary. There is a distinct whiff of contract fulfilling about the whole affair (it’s not as if Moby needs the money), along with a wimpish lack of bravery to the pick-and-mix song selection: ‘God Moving Over The Face Of The Water’, the shimmering theme to the movie Heat, is conspicuously absent. Worse, a couple of the fifteen tracks are real stinkers: the HI-NRG waffle of ‘Move’ is as dated as an episode of My Family, and ‘New York, New York’ is a leaden dance number replete with Debbie Harry’s sea lion honk that would be more at home on a Bonkers compilation – and it’s the new single! This kind of dross is better off in the bargain bin, or just the bin. It doesn’t do Moby any favours, and it won’t do you any either. Best buy ‘Play’ instead.