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Amazon.co.uk Review
One of the year’s most eagerly awaited albums, Kings and Queens is as convincing as a follow-up gets these days, as Jamie Treays and his musical collaborator Ben ‘Bones’ Coupland expand on 2007’s acclaimed Panic Prevention without any obvious concessions. Playing virtually every instrument, the pair may not sound quite like a band, but they sure sound human. The opening "368" defies easy categorisation, perhaps capturing some of the feel of MIA’s Clash-sampling "Paper Planes" while "Hocus Pocus", effectively the title track, is as unfocussed and entertaining as a messy evening out. The Clash are an influence throughout but it’s the underrated Combat Rock era, where their influences stretched beyond America to encompass the world, that leaves a mark. Kings and Queens is very much a London record for all that, but these days the whole world makes up the capital, and plenty of local types turn up here. "Sticks’n’Stones" even rhymes ‘shooting gallery’ with ‘Jeremy’, in possibly the most middle-class drug reference ever made, while "Emily’s Heart" is as weary and lovely as the Lemonheads’ classic "My Drug Buddy". The cutely titled "Chaka Demus" is witty and cheerful (‘there’s an Englishman in every coward’, declares Treays), the warped folk of "Spider’s Web" steamrollers the concept of musical authenticity, while "Castro Dies", with distinctly grimy keyboard stabs lifting the chorus, resists cliche. Stranger still "Earth Wind and Fire" welds an urban dance beat to a country-rock stadium chorus, with unexpected success. Tellingly though the simple, affecting "Jilly Armeen" that closes the album, with whistling and fingerpicking, is an instant fan favourite. As pop savvy as Lily Allen and as diverting as Mike Skinner at his sharpest, Kings and Queens is as prime as any British pop in 2009. --Steve Jelbert
Review
In 2007, Jamie Treays, then a scrappy 21-year-old from south London, released Panic Prevention, a debut that showed a young man in possession of a rare, cocksure talent; a devilish storyteller who might conquer the world, armed with little more than an acoustic guitar and a glottal stop.
Despite impressive reviews and a Mercury nomination, however, the album failed to inspire a wider audience. Treay's problem, perhaps, was that he was paddling in the same estuarine shallows as Mike Skinner and Just Jack — semi-spoken, semi-rapped, skiffley wide boy accounts of modern urban life, full of nights out, loves lost and lessons learned. The pity of it was that neither artist came close to matching his prowess; indeed there are few narrative songwriters working today who can rival Treay — a fact that his second offering only serves to underline.
Kings and Queens is unarguably a more polished performance, the songs grander and glossier than his debut, but happily Treays has lost none of his rambunctious charm; he brings a wit and a wisdom, not to mention an appetite for the faintly grisly, to these tales. At times, he's still the excitable young hoodlum we met on Panic Prevention — in the perky, puppy-dog punk of singles Chaka Demus and Sticks 'n' Stones, for instance. The hooks are irrepressible, bounding in all joyful and unruly on 368 and Earth, Wind and Fire as well as the brawling hip hop of The Man's Machine.
His songs have always displayed a passion for London, for all the rattle and the rabble of the city, but while on Panic Prevention the tales could occasionally stray into the loutish, here on Kings and Queens his writing and his delivery have gained a little composure, as if he's no longer always in the thick of it, but on occasion an inquisitive onlooker. It is perhaps this stance that has allowed a new and intriguing delicacy to creep into his work.
The album's highlight, Emily's Heart, is perhaps the most fragile of his compositions to date, an impeccably-plotted murder ballad, the story of a love besmirched that is, characteristically, deliciously macabre. It is, one hopes, a hint of Treay's work to come — more refined, perhaps, but just as ghoulish and infectious. --Laura Barton
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Viva Jamie !!,
By
This review is from: Kings & Queens (Audio CD)
Now here's a very talented young man to be sure.Jamie T. (nee Treays) second album 'Kings and Queens' is, from top to tail, an entertaining and highly original body of work. The 11 songs in this new collection build on the strong foundations laid down in his 2007 debut 'Panic Prevention'. There is considerably greater maturity in both writing and production but his raw energy and wit are undiminished. Sure there's a pinch of this and peck of that in evidence but Mr T wears his influences and musical loves lightly. '368' is a powerful opening track. Dark, disconcerting and electrifying. 'Sticks 'n' Stones' is alone worth the price of the album. A raucous, driving, pogo-inducing blast of a performance. Full of hoots and whoops and blistering conviction. An absolute joy in every way !! His collaboration with Mr Coupland has resulted in music of truly exhilarating complexity and imagination. The calamitous chorus and vigorous vocal delivery of 'The Man's Machine' is a rousing and affecting anthem. 'Emily's Heart' is a stripped down, powerful ballad with a timelessly convincing quality conveying brutally sculpted emotion. The finger-picking hokey charm of 'Spider's Web' is funny and smart. This lad delivers more words per square inch than The Oxford English Dictionary and Roget's Thesaurus combined. 'Earth, Wind & Fire' is a surreal highlight. Disjointed, unpredictable but strangely, wonderfully coherent. Closing track 'Jilly Armeen' is a crazy little masterpiece. Eccentrically English yet delightfully unconventional. A riveting and mind-bending achievement. Essential.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
As good, if not better,
By
This review is from: Kings & Queens (Audio CD)
Bought this on the day of release after thoroughly enjoying his debut album Panic Prevention. This album is as good if not better than his debut. The upbeat melodies and genius lyrics work perfectly well to create an album that in my opinion gets you in a good mood and is happy, but underneath the upbeat are the lyrics which need to be heard for Jamie T to be appreciated. Its not without a couple of surprising songs either, which seem to come out of nowhere, which makes them even more so pleasant. Since buying I have hardly stopped listening to it, just so I can hear the lyrics again and properly.I highly recommend this album if you enjoyed his first, or just fancy listening to something happy and meaningful.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Love it!,
By Book Wormess (England) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Kings & Queens (Audio CD)
I bought this after listening to Jamie T do his thing in the live lounge. To be honest I was only interested in Chaka Demus and wasn't really expecting much from the rest of the album. How wrong I was. This whole album is fantastic, I am so pleased I went for the whole album and not a single download. Kings & Queens has earned it's royal place as one of my favorite albums bought this year.
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