Slowdive – The National Stadium – Live Review

 Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com 

Slowdive – Everything is Alive – Album Review

 Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com 

Mary Lattimore – Silver Ladders – Album Review

 Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com 

Neil Halstead - Sleeping On Roads

By 2002 Neil Halstead had become progressively mellower post-Slowdive and Mojave 3.  His debut solo album saw him go full Nick Drake, all whispery vocals and rolling folk signatures.  Opener Seasons takes a simple two chord motif through the song, and its wistful melody and guitar playing create a highly effective atmosphere.  It's the standout on the album.   After this we get the low key folk of Two Stones In My Pocket, followed by Driving With Bert.  The combination of brass and guitar picking on the latter gives it a timeless feel.

Hi-Lo and In Between and final track High Hopes have a simple warmth to them that evokes very early Dylan, while Martha's Mantra nods to coffeehouse folk like Simon and Garfunkel.  One of the more uptempo tracks is See You On Rooftops, which arrives in time to prevent this album from falling into something of a hazy stupor.  A combination of soaring keyboards and fuzzy electric join the acoustic reverie, filling out the sound nicely.

Certainly a pleasant, comforting listen for those who like folky guitars.

Slowdive – Slowdive – Album Review

Review for www.nomoreworkhorse,com

https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2017/05/02/slowdive-slowdive-album-review/

Album Review: Slowdive - Pygmalion

Erstwhile shoegazers Slowdive released their 3rd album in 1995.  This was a huge departure.  They'd clearly heard Talk Talk's masterpieces, Spirit of Eden and Laughing Stock.  Opener Rutti is definitely inspired by the aforementioned albums.  Ten minutes of ponderous build up and Neil Halstead's curiously plucked guitars comes off as mysterious and unyielding, yet gorgeously ambient, and must have been jarring for fans of their previous work.  The likes of Crazy For You and Trellisaze are more like mood-setting metronomic grooves than actual songs, yet they work quite well in the context of the album.

Bewitched folk is also well-represented here.  Miranda and J's Heaven, featuring Rachel Goswell on wordless vocals would have been an influence on torch singers like Beth Gibbons.  The brief interludes Cello and the folky Visions of La maintain the late night mood, before the loping, pretty drift of Blue Skied an' Clear, which is one of the few tracks here that could be classed as conventional.  The album finishes with the elegiac string piece All Of Us.

Slowdive produced an album that, while clearly in debt to late period Talk Talk, is able to stand on its own as a fine, late night ambient work.