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Robert Plant & Alison
Krauss - Raising Sand
Sometimes it's best
when an album comes along completely unannounced
and blows you away. Robert Plant and Alison
Krauss together? The most exciting and unexpected
collaboration since Mark Lanegan and Isobel
Campbell, the Led Zeppelin legend and the
bluegrass superstar may not seem like an
obvious mixture, but like Ballad Of The
Broken Seas, Raising Sand is awesome. Of
course, with the two people involved, you
would expect it to be great, because even
though Plant's glory days were in the 70s
with Led Zep, his solo career has been mightily
impressive, particularly recently. Dreamland
and Mighty ReArranger were both great bluesy,
rootsy albums and it isn't much of a leap
from them to Raising Sand. Krauss has been
a star in the US since she was a teenager,
and her performances on the O Brother Where
Art Thou soundtrack brought her to an international
audience. This album will certainly help
broaden her appeal, and stems from an appearance
she and Plant made together at a Leadbelly
tribute concert (well, how else would a
Brummie rocker and a Nashville fiddler hook
up?), creating magic that inspired them
to try and make a record. O Brother soundtrack
producer T Bone Burnett is at the helm and
has crafted a very fine album from their
respective talents, with Plant delivered
a very understated performance, presumably
saving the more bombastic vocals for that
upcoming Zep gig, while Krauss harmonises
beautifully with him and singing as sweetly
as you would expect from her when she takes
the lead. One of the highlights is Gone
Gone Gone (Done Moved On), which showcases
not only their excellent voices mingling
perfectly, but also the tight and very percussive
backing they get from the assembled collection
of studio musicians. Burnett has described
Raising Sand as taking all three of them
out of their comfort zones, but it is not
so much a case of that as just three incredibly
talented people coming together and making
an album that uses each of their talents
in a way that you might not have expected
to hear. Even on tracks like Fortune Teller,
Plant is very restrained and while he and
Krauss are from very different backgrounds,
they aren't quite the odd couple that Lanegan
and Campbell or Hazlewood and Sinatra were.
Raising Sand is an album of very subtle
and sophisticated charms and is amongst
the best work that either of these two artists
has done before, which for both of them
is saying a lot. Perhaps not the album to
listen to on the way to the O2 Arena for
that big show, but an understated masterpiece
nonetheless.
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Groove Armada - Greatest Hits
Didn't Groove Armada release a 'best of' album just three years ago? Yes they certainly did, so what makes it worthwhile doing another one now, with just one album having been released in-between (this year, in fact)? Well, it's difficult to say really. They are kind of celebrating their tenth anniversary this year and are releasing a rarities collection next month, so... we're still a bit confused about the purpose of this. Sure, Song 4 Mutya was a hit earlier in the year, but sticking that and a couple of other singles from last album Soundboy Rock on and ditching from of the other Best Of tracks to make room doesn't really justify a re-release does it? Maybe there will be people out there who want a fully up-to-date compliation, but does that mean they'll do another one after their next album? Where will it all end? Anyway, you know what you're getting with a Groove Armada greatest hits album, you're getting lots of advert jingles basically, from the Marks and Spencer food porn soundtrack At The River to the almost actual porn car advert of I See You Baby (presented in the Fat Boy Slim remix variety of course) along with other very familiar tracks like My Friend and If Everybody Looked The Same, plus a few songs that you probably didn't know where by Groove Armada and some you've never heard of and will probably never listen to again. They aren't bad at what they do, and some of their albums have been very good, but the problem with this collection is that too many of the songs are just too ubiquitous for their own good, and that weakens the compilation because they dominate it so much. The point of an album like this is to get casual fans to buy it and then go and buy the rest, but how many will buy it for the bottom shaking song and then bother to go get Soundboy Rock or Lovebox? Probably not many...
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Peter Cincotti - East Of Angel Town
'As featured on Parkinson' it says on the very front cover of Peter Cincotti's new album and that alone with drive many self-respecting music fans running from it in terror, with Parky coming to represent all that is false and commercial about jazz music in recent years. And there is no doubt that this New Yorker won't be everyone's cup of tea, and East Of Angel Town is a very slick record that aches for mainstream pop success. When we reviewed single Goodbye Philadelphia, we mentioned a resemblance in sound to Elton John, and Cincotti certainly owes a lot to the former Mr Dwight, and not just because that song could have come from any of Elton's recent albums, but because his whole way of phrasing and piano-playing seems to come from him. He might have started his career releasing albums of jazz standards, but East Of Angel Town's jazzy touches are just that, touches, rather than anything substantial. He is more like Jamie Cullum playing Matchbox Twenty songs, with his brash New York side occasionally bringing hints of Billy Joel. But while there are all these influences swirling around, this album is his first of entirely original material, and the lyrics from John Bettis are suitably bland and generic to go along with the music, with a team of producers combining to give everything a fancy glow and add flavours of rock and funk to Cincotti's piano-playing. Having worked with Michael Buble and Josh Groban, David Foster is certainly perfect for this kind of album and tracks like Make It Out Alive are fun and well put-together, even if they are all a little bit too forgettable. East Of Angel Town is the very definition of slick and radio-friendly, so it's no surprise that Cincotti is already being lauded by the likes of Parky, but that extra spark is lacking that could have made this more interesting than it is.
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Freemasons
- Umixed
Having
released Shakedown earlier this
year, featuring two mixed CDs
of their own singles and remixes
of hits by other artists, Freemasons
are now bringing out Unmixed,
a more conventional album of
just their stuff as individual
tracks. It comes at a good time
too, as they finally broke into
the top ten this month with
their cover of Alanis Morisette's
Uninvited, featuring Bailey
Tzuke's lovely vocals, getting
to #8. It is quite strange that
it was that track that has been
their biggest hit so far, because
as the origins might suggest,
it's hardly their most commercial-sounding,
but is a damn fine tune and
works well as the opening track
here, before the sunnier side
of Freemasons comes flooding
out through Rain Down Love and
another new song If. Listening
to tracks like those and Nothing
But A Heartache make you wonder
why Freemasons haven't had quite
the success of the likes of
Groove Armada, with that track
(a cover of The Flirtations'
Northern Soul classic) in particular
sounding like it could have
dominated the airwaves if the
sun had ever come out this summer.
Late October may seem like a
strange time to release Unmixed,
but hey, the sun's out at the
moment... The two tracks in
the middle of the album both
feature Amanda Wilson on vocals
and are the ones that first
broke Freemasons in 2005 and
2006, with the lush Love On
My Mind and the funky Watchin'
both great dance tunes with
powerful performances by Wilson,
just one of several impressive
vocalists who make guest appearances.
But even when things are kept
instrumental on Desperados,
Freemasons are still great fun
and always interesting. They
even show their generous side
by bundling in a bonus section
for DJs and producers featuring
beats, effects and a capella
mixes of a few tracks to encourage
some homemade remixes. Freemasons
might not yet have been catapulted
to the big time, but Unmixed
shows that they certainly belong
there.
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Gillan - The Singles Box-Set
Having helped Deep Purple become one of the most famous rock bands in the entire world, done an album with Black Sabbath and performed the title role in Jesus Christ Superstar, Ian Gillan is hardly short of fame or acclaim, but since getting back with his old band in 1992, his recordings in between were rather forgotten. However, this year has seen the excellent albums by his Gillan band reissued and that concludes now with this box-set featuring CD replicas of the original vinyl singles they released in between 1979 and 1982. The Ian Gillan Band had been more into jazz fusion than bluesy rock, but starting with Vengence, he got back to his roots with Gillan and all of the tracks here are great, including the b-sides, with an eight-minute run-through of Smoke On The Water coming on the first disc. The vinyl replicas are great nostalgia for fans who were there at the time and just great for those of us a little younger than that, and it's fun enough looking at them before you get to listen, not least the rather naughty and unpatriotic Sleeping On The Job cover. By 1982's Long Gone, the Gillan sound had gone a bit 80s (that track pretty much sounds like Jump by Van Halen) and you can see how they ended up splitting, but there's some great tunes here. Of course, the problem with any singles box-set is that it's not easy to actually listen to them as you end up with 11 discs with just two tracks on each of them, but it's the kind of thing that fans will lap up for the nostalgia value alone, not least with the bonus DVD featuring rarely-seen promo videos for some of the singles, and some of them are classic, particularly for the cover of Stevie Wonder's Living For The City.
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The
Flies - All Too Human
We
got sent an unmixed copy
of The Flies' debut album
so long ago that we can't
even remember where we
put it, but now it's finally
being released as All
Too Human. Sean Cook,
formerly of Spiritualized
and Lupine Howl, is the
man behind The Flies,
along with The Insects
(producers Bob Locke and
Tim Norfolk) who have
worked with the likes
of Massive Attack and
Goldfrapp, and these talents
are wrapped up in a new
kind of comedown music.
If David Lynch made a
film set in the 50s, All
Too Human would be the
soundtrack to it, with
Cook et al taking familiar
tunes like (Remember)
Walking In The Sand and
giving them rather sinister
twists and ghostly ethereal
production. Tracks like
Bitter Moon and High show
Cook's knack of writing
great tunes that borrow
from the likes of The
Doors, Roy Orbison and
Massive Attack all at
the same time. The only
downside to All Too Human
is that it is all a little
bit samey, and some of
the more downbeat tracks,
like Chills, are almost
nonexistent because they
are so low-key, and that
can at times make the
album feel like it is
dragging a little. One
thing you can certainly
say for The Flies is that
they don't sound like
anyone else out there
and when the formula works,
it works really well,
while Cook's slightly
stoned-sounding croon
is certainly an important
part of that. My Pleasure
is one of the highlights,
exploding (quietly) into
life at times with lush
production and overall,
All Too Human is a dark,
brooding and classy collection
that deserves to be heard.
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Kevin Michael - Kevin Michael
Kevin Michael has got an awesome afro. He's also got a very nice soulful falsetto voice that he uses to full effect on his self-titled debut album, but of course, having big hair and a sweet voice doesn't make up for a collection of bland R'n'B, and sadly, that's what Michael has churned out here. Anyone who heard his first single We All Want The Same Thing last month will know what to expect, and he delivers more of the same throughout, but the problem is that without the intervention of people like Lupe Fiasco and Wyclef Jean, Michael's voice actually starts to work against him, and it doesn't help with tracks like Vicki Secrets sound like they last for about half an hour when they're really little more than three minutes' long. It says a lot when the syrupy ballad like Ain't Got You (a little bit like Nothing Compares 2 U or If I Ain't Got You by Alicia Keys but with less heart than either) is what breaks the tedium. You'd expect a track called Stone Cold Killa to be a bit more fun, but Michael just seems to lack the variety in his vocals to really go for the uptempo tunes, and that leaves his debut album floundering somewhere in between fun and boring. With his voice, he could still prove us wrong and go on to be something special, but he is best enjoyed in small doses.
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