Diamond Hoo Ha Man-Colour [7" VINYL] [Single, Limited Edition, Maxi]

I know this cd didn't chart as high as their others, but I actually think that it might be their best so far. I'm looking forward to their next album release in 2010 and I can certainly recommend that you buy this one.

'Diamond Hoo Ha', Supergrass' sixth studio album, hasn't exactly been an easy album for me to love. The first time I listened to it, I wasn't impressed with it at all and found it to be the least charming and least accessible piece of work in Supergrass' career. Now, while that may still be the case, I have now, over time, appreciated this album as a stand-alone effort rather than as a record to slot comfortably in Supergrass' overall portfolio. It quite honestly works best if you can forget that 'Diamond Hoo Ha' is by Gaz, Mick and Danny. On the first couple of listens, this hits you hard and comes across as a big, loud, brash rock album, full of heavy, edgy riffs and seems to feature much less of the quirky, melodic charm which usually characterises a Supergrass release than normal. The opening (and title) track, for example, has more in common with 'Seven Nation Army' by The White Stripes than with anything from their first five albums. However, time and repeated listens reveals the appeal of 'Diamond Hoo Ha' as well as much of its subtleties and beauty.

Although many of their recent releases have been fairly mellow affairs, it isn't unheard of for the Oxford quartet to make heavy albums - it just hasn't happened for a while, that's all. There are, naturally, glimpses of the Supergrass of old - 'Rebel In You' features an instrumental break which is vintage 'grass, 'Return Of Inspiration' would have fit right in on the eponymous third album and 'Whisky & Green Tea' could easily have been written during the same era of 'Lenny' and 'Mansize Rooster'. A couple of pieces of brilliance and the undoubted highlights of this album for me are the dark 'When I Needed You', which is both powerful and beautiful at the same time and the magnificent last track 'Butterfly' which has all the hallmarks of a Supergrass classic. These tracks are worth the price of the album alone, but there is enough of this album to please and surprise old and new fans alike. Just don't expect to love it straight away. It's a grower.

Now, had this been another band, this album would be easily a 5 star. It's just, all of Supergrass's albums deserve 5 stars!

I must say, at first I wasn't too excited about this one. I already had 4 of the songs (the best ones really) - Hoo ha, Rebel in you, Whiskey, and Bad Blood. And the others just didn't seem to come close. But after listening more, as with much other Supergrass stuff, they get better every listen (the opposite of most good stuff). I really don't know how they do it!

And each album (although with much variation) has a different sound and feel to the others. While 'I should Coco' is the crazy one, the Xray album is the darker one, and 'Road to Rouen' is the mellow one, this one is the glam-rocky one (not traditional glam-rock like Queen, but their own version of glam-rock).

Get this!