Album Results
Paul McCartney
Liverpool Sound Collage
Genre:
ROCK/POP
Label:
MPL Communications Limited
Release date: 2000
Album Reviews
The hype mill, stoked in part by McCartney himself, promoted this CD as nothing less than a posthumous chapter in the Beatles' saga ("a new little piece of Beatles," in Paul's words). Nonsense, for this is really just the latest of McCartney's excursions into electronica, an interest of his that dates back to the Beatles' boundary-shredding experiments with musique concrète and the Moog synthesizer in the 1960s. It is a series of five electronic collages, with occasional eruptions of a new tune called "Free Now" (actually a catchy repetitive riff, no more or less), sounds of the auto tunnel under the Mersey, pieces of strange off-the-cuff interviews conducted by Paul on the Liverpool streets (he asks, disingenuously, "What do you think of the Beatles?"), snippets of a chorale from his Liverpool Oratorio -- and yes, some Beatle talk from the 1965 sessions for "Think for Yourself." All of the tracks are given separately distributed credits to McCartney, the Beatles, the group Super Furry Animals, and Youth -- his collaborator in previous electronica projects -- but in fact, the whole hour-long CD is of a single piece. The most effective segment is the one credited solely to Youth (bearing the unwieldy title "Real Gone Dub Made in Manifest in the Vortex of the Eternal Now"), where the pitchless electronic sounds are at their wildest and the disembodied Beatles voices and ghostly choruses are hauntingly adrift in a high-tech netherworld. As a listening experience, it is at least as casually absorbing as McCartney's two Fireman albums -- and it grows on you, provided that you drop any expectations of this being a long-lost Beatles album. ~ Richard Ginell, All Music Guide
Track Listing
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The Holy Pictures David Holmes |
| Four years in the making, since venturing into the rugged rock-jazz-blues arena with The Free Association; to prepare his fourth proper album David Holmes has put aside Hollywood commitments that began as the soundtrack composer for Steven Sorderbergh movies and has nearly become Holmes main activity as forthcoming soundtracks for the Bobby Sands biopic "Hunger" and "Five Minutes of Heaven" undeniably prove. "The holy pictures" is named after the pub his father was a regular of and conceived as a tribute to the city of Belfast and its people. On it our favourite North Irish DJ gives another lecture on eclecticism and takes a 180 degree turn towards the trendy road where shoegazing and krautrock meet. Next to his cinematic instrumentals, the main surprise here is Holmes singing for the first time, in a not too different manner to Jesus & Mary Chain's Jim Reid. Best example is the first single "I heard wonders", helped by Martin Rev, one half of 70s icons Suicide. Other highlights include the closing track "The Ballad Of Jack and Sarah" dedicated to his parents. Altogether, is a beautiful and rewarding record; his most personal to date. | |
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