In his previous Birmingham band incarnation as Rachels Basement (whose excellent Quit Your Low Down Ways is included here as a bonus track), Rachel found himself courted by any number of labels looking to get themselves their own Ocean Colour Scene. After all, the bands were regular gigging acquaintances and Rachel’s warble didn’t sound a million miles from that of his mate Simon Fowler. However, labels being what they are, dithering took hold and when OCS began to show signs of loosing a little lustre, interest cooled. Rachel retrenched, disbanded and reconstructed himself as a singer-songwriter plying the acoustic circuit. A further clutch of demos and a series of London dates earned him sufficient good notices to prompt this own label solo album debut, stripping the sound back to the simple voice and guitar format.
The strangled treble of Meet Me At The Bridge and Need To Be Somebody ensure the Fowler comparisons won’t die away yet awhile, but Letter To A Soldier, the yearningly wonderful Ragged Smile and The Sound of the Silence now give access to such influences as Loudon Wainwright, Dylan, early Donovan, McGuinn, and maybe even Ralph McTell, though perky domestic love song Saturday Morning Sunday Night suggest he may also possess a Harry Nilson album. Like all folkies, he’s not averse to incorporating a few unacknowledged borrowings into the work, the Desiderata lines of Child of the Universe or ‘keep on moving, keep a searching’ phrases of Hawaiian lilting Mamma Cha Cha (a wink to ex-Specials guitarist Roddy Radiation apparently) for example. But at least he nicks them to good effect. Aided and abetted by Goldfrapp drummer Rowan Oliver and Damned pianist Joe Atkinson, musically he exhibits a decent diversity within the limits of the instrumentation, dropping in Ska ripples, African flavours and on Free My Mind, psychedelia chops, and his gentle melodies are often truly beguiling. Thematically, fame, failure, rejection and ambition provide the building blocks of songs that flag up a never surrender self-belief though it has to be said that in the cold light of the lyric sheet lines like ‘need to go somewhere soft where you can bathe the goose’ are quite frankly barking.
MIKE
DAVIES
NET RHYTHMS
