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English Ghosts (AND CD42) £8 Superior songwriting can be heard throughout NIGEL STONIER's English Ghosts. Stonier knows how to write catchy hooks, witiness his contributions to recent Fairport Convention and Lindisfarne albums. He's hauled some of the Woodworm crew with him to studio bases in Cheshire and Devon and turned in a blinder. Nigel has also produced the wonderful Thea Gilmore albums and is a member of her very fine band. *** REVIEWS *** Top Magazine, July 2000 If the name Nigel Stonier doesn't provoke instant recognition, then a cursory rifle through your Fairport, Lindisfarne or Chris While albums - to name but three - may well shed some light. Stonier is a songwriter/producer/multi- instrumentalist whose words, music and all round abilities have enhanced the work of all the above. Always in demand for his various collaborative skills, he has, up to now, found relatively little time for solo activities (just one release, 1995's Golden Coins For The Holy Kid) but the new CD sees him assembling a classic squad of English folk-rockers for support - in fact English Ghosts is positively haunted by random spectres from the Tull and Fairport camps. When you spend a lot of time in various musical setting as the 'right hand man', and then suddenly step into the centre it can be a little weird says Stonier so I thought the least I could do was make sure I got the right guys in - and I know them all well enough that, if things weren't working out they'd definitely tell me! Paul Burgess - who aside from Tull duties also thumped the skins for acts such as Joan Armatrading and the Icicle Works - links up with Maartin Allcock to form the rhythm section for the entire album, and Chris Leslie - with whom Stonier co-wrote most of Fairport's latest album - crops up playing violin on two tracks. To cap it all, the album was produced at Martin Barre's Press House studios in Devon by Mark Tucker, sound advisor to more acoustic and contemporary rock acts than he probably cares to remember. However - names chames eh? An all star cast doesn't a great album make, not - let's be frank - if the songs suck! In this instance, it was well worth all of them trapsing down the M5 because Nigel Stonier has come up with a pearl of an album. To me, the songs are everything - well, if not everything, 90 per cent of the deal. They're the major currency we have - the things that last, longer than bands, musicians or albums. And, perhaps as you'd expect from someone whose production track record includes work with acts from Paul Young to Christine Collister, Thea Gilmore to Kathryn Tickell, English Ghosts works on a big, wide musical canvas. The title track - already described by the editor of one national roots mag as an English pastoral gothic classic rings with strident electric guitars and an anthemic chorus, and, elsewhere, highlights abound: from the full-on rocking verbal venom of Here Comes The Sky to the baroque ache of Don't Leave Too Soon (also recorded recently by Fairport); from the chiming Byrdsy guitars of Passenger to the chilling acoustic ambience of More In The Shadows. Right across the collection Stonier delivers insiduously clever melodies and stunning lyrics, and early reaction to the album suggest that, once in your house, English Ghosts will stay with you for a long, long time. ********************************* Folk Roots mag NIGEL STONIER English Ghosts Nigel Stonier’s been earning himself quite a reputation in the past year. He’s done great work helping Fairport and Lindisfarne make their best albums in many a moon, production work for rising star Thea Gilmore, and there’s a new disc with Rod Clements in the pipeline. You could easily think he had enough to keep him occupied. Well aybe...truth is he’s rather decent operating under his own name. This album's thoroughly excellent, a cracking job of Beatles-like twangy pop, singer writer ballads with cute hooks and folksy strum.A tight band of old chums Maart Allcock, Paul Burgess and Mark Tucker cut the mustard in high fashion, stonier fronting up with a whole library of lyrical trickery. Decent lyrics are a dying art, he once told me. Not here: each track is a complete novel that Stonier spins in his sinewy vocal, nothing flash, nothing startling, just plain suitable. The imagery on the title track and Suppose You Threw A Love Affair And No One Came is so full that you have to listen quite a few times before you even begin to appreciate the detail. To balance it he can write fluff like the candy floss of Passenger or the ease on Only A Woman meaning here’s a store house for any band needing decent material. Simon Jones back to band list Price: £8 # 181(CD42) |
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A New Day Records 75 Wren Way Farnborough Hants GU14 8TA |