Category: Pop rock
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Lisa Stansfield: Deeper
We weren’t sure what this was going to be like, except that if the Press budget extends down the food chain to us, great things must be expected. Deservedly so. Banish thoughts of cheesy pop or pop diva-ish warbling: this is a great pop/RnB album and Stansfield gives a masterclass in how to produce music:…
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Vance Joy: Nation Of Two
Joy is a singer/songwriter, the basic format of his songs between him and acoustic guitar. He’s ok; to call him average is harsh — to write and play one decent song is too much for most of us — but he brings nothing new to the game. Noah And The Whale did something similar, and…
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Speak, Brother: Young and Brave
Just to get the negativity over first: Speak, Brother are aimed at the Mumfords market, without the world-class songs that made the latter famous. Despite the mockery that followed Mumfords for a while because of their omnipresence, they did write some very good songs. That they were nice guys and being good live also helped,…
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Nick JD Hodgson: Tell Your Friends
Hodgson was the Kaiser Chiefs’ drummer and main songwriter but don’t expect any laddish sing-alongs. While drunken students chanting: “Ruby, Ruby, Ruby” might help his pension pot, he’s better than that and has written tunes for the likes of Mark Ronson, Hurts and Shirley Bassey. He plays all the instruments on this album; he and…
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Pet Shop Boys: Please
We’ve had the later re-releases, now here are the remasters of the early albums, with Please being the debut. Two things leap out: first, it’s truly majestic pop; second, they’d have to release a lot of terrible albums (which they haven’t) to even partially squander the goodwill albums like this built up. No wonder people…
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Kim Wilde: Here Come The Aliens
Yeah, so you’re Kim Wilde, pop singer, best known for being poptastic and slightly cheesy, and though you’re gigging aplenty, your new collection of songs is so good you want to reach a wider audience. What you going to do? How about package the new collection as a 50s pulp fiction sci fi film and…
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Josh Taerk: Stages
Taerk (pronounced Turk) looks and sounds like a refugee from Top Of The Pops in the 80s, up there with people like Nik Kershaw and Howard Jones — singer/songwriters far better at writing tunes then looking hip. We’d not heard of him, but you can tell he’s one those “big in their own country” acts,…
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Andrew Lloyd Webber: Unmasked The Platinum Collection
Lloyd Webber is one of those composers you never think about; his music has become the background sound to modern culture in a way that few other performers manage. Don’t Cry For Me Argentina is a song that everyone can sing along to, from youngsters to pensioners. Listening to this four CD boxset, the overwhelming…
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The Wombats: Beautiful People Will Ruin Your Life
Another decent album from The Wombats, who survived being lumped in with the landfill indie mob and morphed into a decent pop band playing upbeat tunes. It’s more than a decade since the band’s Let’s Dance to Joy Division was a hit, and they’ve managed to keep going despite a lack of hits. We’d guess…
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Peyton: Sinners Got Soul Too
Chris Peyton operates in worlds with which we are not familiar, house music and talent shows, though he got his musical start in the church. Raised in the south of the US, he was brought up in a family of Pentecostal preachers and was working as the minister of music for his father’s church by…
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