Liam Blake - You and Other Stories Album Review

Just from one cursory glance at the album cover of You and Other Stories, you would be forgiven for thinking that this is an album which dangles dangerously close to being a collection of over used clichés and well-trodden sentiments; you know, standard singer-songwriter fare. You have the painfully trendy 'hero' on the cover, with his designer stubble and a moody expression pointed to the floor. This moody character is also holding an acoustic guitar, so you know where this is going.

And honestly, the albums opening track For Your Sake does little to dispel these notions of cliché. The song is a finger-picked, self-pity yawn-fest. The vocals are mixed too high, so you have to really crank the volume to get even a hint of the intricate (and credit where it's due: impressive) guitar line. The album is punctuated by these soul-searching folk numbers, with Sinners and Saints, the albums final song treading the same ground as track one, and Show Me the Way to the Sun adding a hideous, twee sort of tone to proceedings.

However, between these moments of dishwater grey blandness, there is some incredibly high quality song-writing on offer here. Tell Me Beth, Do You Recall, though still very much locked into the minor key formula has an almost Beatles-esque rock vibe and a brilliant, luscious guitar solo. The songs Simon and Heart and Soul are fantastic, full band pop songs, which give Blake the space to stretch out and experiment with arrangements to great effect. The albums middle song Rush also sounds a bit like that Lime in the Coconut song from the soundtrack to Reservoir Dogs. Without these songs, this album would be 100% without merit and fade completely into the murky waters of teary eyed singer songwriters. God forbid.

You and Other Stories then, is very much an album of two faces. There is the standard 'soulful' singer-songwriter dull-athon tracks, but then there are also moments of truly great, though not particularly new or ground breaking song writing. There's nothing offensive here, it is just another album by another singer song-writer.

Ben Walton