Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Fab album - buy it, 12 April 2009
I love this CD, especially the very witty 'Wicked Way' and the final track 'After it's Over', with keyboards by Jamie Cullum. Ben has a beautiful tonality to his voice, it's rich and memorable, as befits his lineage. I would recommend this to anyone who likes their music smooth and listenable. It hasn't been off my CD player since I got it and I like it just as much as his previous album, 'Another Run Around the Sun'. Ben is an intelligent songwriter and I hope more people discover his talent.
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8 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Nice sounding album with a silly title, 29 Sep 2008
The danger of producing an album with a title like this album's is that it won't live up to it. The title, I guess, is a bit of a joke and isn't meant to mean much. But if you're expecting something new and unique, don't. This `concept' of Kung Folk sounds an awful lot like regular pop music to me.
But, as pop music goes, it's not bad.
Songs like `Wrong' and `She's Gone' have a laid back groove, pleasant harmonies and nice, though not particularly memorable, melodies. Ben's voice (his best asset) is smooth, and he has a nice way of phrasing things. Most of the songs on the album are like this.
The exceptions are `Dangerous Girl', for a start, on which Ben seems to be singing through a vocoder. This is more of an `effect' song, that descends into some rather inane talking at the end. Never a good idea. `Wilderness' is another slightly different track, and the only song not written by Ben or co-written with his buddy David Saw. `Wilderness' goes a bit overboard with the drum machine and gets repetitive and annoying enough to need skipping past.
Probably the best song is `Wicked Way', though I'm sure some will think it's a bit sleazy. It's a frank and unromantic seduction song that's pretty funny.
The album ends with the soft piano-driven `After It's Over', which is nice enough. By this time, you will have noticed that though the album is undeniably pleasant to listen to (`Wilderness' excepted), it doesn't really go anywhere, doesn't have any standout songs, and certainly doesn't live up to that title. Worse though, is that it isn't, I reckon, as good as either of Ben's previous albums. This is part one of the legend... let's hope part two is better.
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~ Ben Taylor
~ Ben Taylor Band
~ James Taylor
~ Melody Gardot
~ Yusuf / Cat Stevens
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