![]() So far over 1,000 people have contributed to the debate, and it’s getting testy. He’s tamed it slightly since this photo, but basically the hardliners are saying that though it’s been copied by mods the world over it’s not in any way a 60s mod haircut. Heliocentric might well be too musically smart for its own good, but it seems Weller has staved off that artistic decline, once again. Opinion is raging on the UK Mod Scene Facebook group as to what Paul Weller’s hair is all about. Most of those tracks find him in a guilty, reflective mood but elsewhere he's rocking and riled about the environment (the clumsy A Whale's Song), the powers that be (Back in the Fire) and his own everchanging booze-moods (the Bowie-ish There's No Drinking After You're Dead). ![]() That's apparent on Frightened, the equally fetching With Time and Temperance, Sweet Pea, My Sweet Pea, and Picking Up Sticks (complete with drum solo). ![]() Here that means a solid, often dense, and musicianly collection that in its acoustic-framed songs echoes Wildwood (from 93, still the best of his solo efforts), though just as often its delivery recalls Weller's days on the Council. Just like, say, Neil Young or Elvis Costello, Weller merits critical attention because he's still capable of adding - rather than detracting from - his musical legacy. They may not have quite set the world alight (though 1995's r'n'b-fired Stanley Road sold a million in the UK during the Oasis-led Britrock bull run) but, just as Heliocentric does, they've showed that Weller, aged 42, has staved off the sometimes inevitable artistic decline that comes with middle age. A decade later and we're up to this sixth solo album. But at the start of the 90s, Weller started working under his own name. After all, the English rock veteran has already had a musical career of two era-defining halves - as the angry young Mod of the Jam, then as the soulful haircut and voice of the Style Council. Herald rating: *** (Island) Review: Russell Baillie By rights, Paul Weller should have slipped into the where-are-they-now? category a while back.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |