Reviews roundup -The Dark Light vs. Scott Matthews vs. Artur Menezes vs. Benjamin Lazar Davis vs. Peggy James

Reviews roundup -The Dark Light vs. Scott Matthews vs. Artur Menezes vs. Benjamin Lazar Davis vs. Peggy James

 

THE DARK LIGHT
Keep Off The Grass
Unknown Pleasures

Really! You had to mention Brexit in your press release. FFS. You’re a retro rock band regurgitating the sounds of the last fifties years through your own prism. Get a grip.

It’s a shame they pissed me because they’re alright. For sure, I’ve heard it all before. And it’s not just old fellas like me who’ve heard it before. The generation below me who bought into Oasis and all the soundalike bands who followed them will have heard it before. Although The Dark Light are more in the Northern Uproar division (ask yer Dad).

But they’ve got some good songs and riffs which if heard at a festival would get your mullet shaking. It’s the slower songs that are most redolent of the aforementioned Oasis (try ‘It’s Alright’ and play spot the difference). So it’s when they shake their maracas that my ears prick up with the opening ‘She Likes It’, the best of the bunch. There’s certainly some promise here but they need to find out who they are first.

 

SCOTT MATTHEWS
The Great Untold
Shedio

Scott Matthews is one of those performers whose name seems to appear in the inkies and the glossys to almost universal praise. Which means I have never had any urge to seek his music out as that usually guarantees a pleasure free zone. But this one popped through the letterbox so let’s see what you’ve got.

And the answer is seventies styled singer songwriter confessionals that sometimes teeter on the edge of collapse, so frail are they. Which may or may not be a good thing depending on what mood you’re in. But Mr Matthews caught me on a bad day so I was rather taken with his minimalist, acoustic ruminations. It’s his sixth album and I’m told that this is more redolent of his early work as recent releases have been more band oriented. In which case I reckon I got lucky.

Not everything works as there are a few tracks that just seem to involve press play and record whatever happens. You know the sort of thing. Jeff Buckley on Mogadon. But when an actual song gets involved as happens on album highlight ‘Cinnamon’ it all makes an awful lot of sense. It’s definitely going to get a thumbs aloft sign from the serious journalists out there and amongst those who wear their hearts on their sleeve. I can’t quite go two thumbs but it certainly escaped an angry middle digit. I might even go and find some more.

 

ARTUR MENEZES
Keep Pushing
independent

To Los Angeles and the Brazilian born blues man Artur Menezes. Or rather the much lauded blues man Artur Menezes to give him his full name. And rightly so, based on this.

It’s actually quite old fashioned for a young ‘un, what with the seventies styled Malaco horns that pop up hither and thither. But it’s his fluid guitar lines and excellent vocals that really grab the imagination. He’s got one of those voices that sound as though they’re about to fall apart as he reaches for the final note only to be saved by the ghost of Bobby ‘Blue’ Bland.

He writes all his own songs as well, which is bordering on being a show off. And they’re good ones. He can riff with the best of them as ‘Keep Pushing’ ably demonstrates. There’s a 12 bar feel to that before the modern blues rock of ‘Come With Me’ arrives. It’s one of those albums that it’s almost impossible to pick favourites from as each time I play it I seem to end up scribbling down three different songs from the time before.

Unusually for me, though, it’s the slow blues of ‘Any Day, Any Time’ that seems to be a constant. I mean I’m a rocker so for that to grab me means it has real power. Blues fans really need to have this in their lives as it’s going to be up there at the end of the year in many a best of list.

 

 

BENJAMIN LAZAR DAVIS
Nothing Matters
11A Records

Turns out that Benjamin Lazar Davis has made a minor name for himself with a co-writing credit on Joan As Police Woman’s latest album, and involvement with Okkeril River (nope, me neither).

And in the modern world that translates as solo deal. The main point of interest is that the grown up Benjamin Lazar Davis went back to his mammys hoose and recorded it in his childhood bedroom. And it sounds exactly like what you would expect from a grown man who went back to his childhood bedroom to make an album.

Fey. Now I’m not saying that everything has to reek of sweaty bawbags. After all I’m reliably involved that we now live in a gender fluid world where Precambrian throwbacks like me are slowly disappearing in the final rays of a dying sun. But this is just all too nursery school for me. However, there are probably a fair number of people out there who will happily listen to the likes of ‘A Love Song In Seven Ways’ and ‘Brass Tracks’ while attending an Incan tapestry demonstration at their local vegan cafe before replicating it on a Chad Valley piano.

 

PEGGY JAMES
Nothing In Between
Happy Growl Records

Album number four from Milwaukee singer/songwriter Peggy James. And it’s an, um, I’m not sure kind of thing.

See, musically, some of it sounds really good in a late sixties, keyboard driven folk rock kind of way. But the songs just seem to be missing a killer hook. The organ part on ‘We Had To Meet’ is a perfect example. I could listen to it all day. But the song around it doesn’t work. And that’s a problem. Fortunately (for me) there are a good few country songs here that lift the mood considerably. They also suit the voice of Ms James a lot better as well. Because when the twang arrives it really works. ‘In One Ear (& Out The Other)’ being a prime example and the album highlight.

Lyrically you’re getting what you would expect. A lot of emotions, broken hearts and the death of love. There were just too many tunes where I found myself looking out the window. Which is a real shame because there are some strong arrangements and excellent musicianship on offer here. I understand why artists feel the need to express themselves in a diverse fashion but maybe next time a country rock album? It would make me a happy man.

 

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St Columba’s Hospice Tribute Fund for Linda Hamilton
http://linda.hamilton.muchloved.com/
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