My Amazon Reviews: Bryan Ferry “Avonmore”

Avonmore Evermore
3 Out Of 5 Stars

There is still, always, that voice. The seductive, world weary croon that masters sublime mood and the occasional glimmer of funk-pop. The atmosphere of the best of Roxy Music and the various high points of his solo career, which has been maddeningly inconsistent. But at his best ("Avalon" will always be on my desert island list), Ferry has a grace few can equal. As he nears the age of 70, "Avonmore" strives to find those heights. Given his age, that old world weary man just slips into it like a glove.

Calling the CD "Avonmore" is hardly and accident. In much the same way that "Olympia" took a sample from "Avalon" to compose "Olympia's" "You Can Dance," the tempos and atmosphere are meant to evoke memories of that classic Roxy. However, the sound of "Avonmore" harkens more to "Boys and Girls" and "Bete Noire" than anything Roxy has recorded. Musically, I'd say he makes the mark about 50% of the time here. "Loop Di Li," "One Night Stand" and the title track are vintage Ferry, engaging pop with funky undertones, while "Lost" is the enigmatic Ferry (and also the shortest song here) and features Mark Knopfler on guitar. The cast also includes Flea, Nile Rodgers and Johnny Marr, even though you'd never know it because the sonics of "Avonmore" are just that consistent, even if the songs seem mostly to be retreads.

It's that consistency that lays a trap for the disc's final two songs. He covers Stephen Sondheim's "Send In The Clowns" and then Robert Palmer's "Johnny and Mary." Like his albums of classic cover songs during the Roxy era and his dreadful "Dylanesque," Ferry transforms these into his own. But covering Sondheim is a daunting task for just about everyone, and Ferry misses the target. It's just not a song to be Ferr-iszed. "Johnny and Mary" fares a little better by slowing Palmer's electronic groove down to a misty piano and bubbly synth. It makes the characters something of a middle aged couple who really do "need the world to tell him he ain't lonely." It's an odd way to end an album that, two songs before, had Ferry's position as an elder statesman of ennui secured. Adding these two songs at the end feels almost like an afterthought, like he just wanted to prove that he could take any song in the world and it would just drop into place. It doesn't work, and that is part of the reason I only rated "Avonmore" as an average, three star album.

     

My Amazon Reviews: The Ocean Blue "Ultramarine"

Waves Crashing
4 Out Of 5 Stars

After hiding out for nearly a decade, The Ocean Blue make a confident comeback on "Ultramarine." As impressionistic and dreamy as ever, they make the kind of lush new wave pop that carries its weight on memorable melodies. Given that the band debuted their first album just months after the members graduated high school, it says a lot that the only real change in the band's sound is that lead singer David Schelzel's voice has matured and deepened a little, and he's a much stronger singer than the teenager who first trotted out songs like "Ballerina Out Of Control" way back in the 80's. Heck, he even sounds a little like Paul Simon on "New York 6AM."

Don't expect that to mean "Ultramarine" will have a cover of "Bridge Over Troubled Water." There are still more references to The Smiths and Echo and The Bunnymen (or at their most artsy, Cocteau Twins). Schelzel favors jangle guitars wafting over airy synthesizers while casting about his poetic lyrics. It's just that he's become better at them. "Ultramarine" is actually a better album than "See" and maybe even on a par with "Cerulean." The band seems to know, and revel in the past as they sing "drifting, fall again, but it's different this time" at the beginning of "Latin Blues." Or when they play a little with more sounds of the moment on "A Rose is a Rose."

Given that The Ocean Blue never received much commercial success outside a fanatical cult (only the debut made the Billboard album charts at a measly #155), "Ultramarine" will likely have limited appeal outside that group of devotees. However, this Hershey Pennsylvania combo have proven that you can take your obscurity and make something positive out of it. For a fan like me (only the CD "See" has ever escaped my CD collection), it's heartening to hear what still sounds like a band in their prime, with further glories possibly to arrive.

     

My Amazon Reviews: Keane "Strangeland"

Can you hear the call? 
4 Out Of 5 Stars

I'm a sucker for Keane's brand of British Pop; anthemic songs with high soaring melodies and emotional impact. The kind of music Coldplay knocks off in their sleep and Snow Patrol can mount on a good album. "Strangeland" is a return to form in that regard. The synth-pop of "Perfect Symmetry" and the experiments of "Night Train" are gone, replaced with a back to basics approach to composer Tim Rice Oxley's emotional approach and the soaring vocals of Tim Chaplin. There's a lot of calls to the 'wide eyed dreamers' (in "Sovereign Light Café") or 'we're gonna rise again' on the ecstatic first single, "Silenced By The Night."

Pianos plink in the background and there's pipes and flutes, like you can just tell Keane was aiming for the big emotional statement. While this was done perfectly on the album "Under The Iron Sea," on "Strangeland," the band has matured into craftsmen. The lyrics are unforced, but also lack depth. A lesser band would have a calamity in this situation, but Keane have become sharp enough to overcome the occasional triteness by having enough of a sense of space and nuance (both "Neon River" and the excellant "Sea Fog," the discs elegiac closer). There;s also an earnestness to Chaplin's singing that assists in outshining the odd weaknesses.

"Strangeland" is not Keane's finest hour, but it is a return to what makes the unique in their world of pop. "Sometimes our fingers graze the sky" he cheers on "Day Will Come." With sweet and oft-catchy songs that recall Coldplay and U2, Keane are happy with grasping for the stars, and "Strangeland" will satisfy fans of "Under The Iron Sea" or "Hopes and Dreams."