Amazon.co.uk Review
Perhaps the most talented "son act" in pop music, Jeff Buckley combined the often harrowing eclecticism of estranged papa
Tim Buckley with the rock acrobatics of
Robert Plant. This posthumously released collection of four-track demos and sessions helmed by Tom Verlaine indicates that Buckley's astonishing full-length debut,
Grace, was no fluke. The young singer-songwriter puts his falsetto to good use on an extraordinary collection of original material, from the soulful "Everybody Wants You" to the psychedelic "Murder Suicide Meteor Slave". And while his bluesy take on Porter Wagoner's "Satisfied Mind" may not be as revelatory as his earlier version of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah", this album offers ample proof that Buckley was among his generation's most gifted voices. --
Bill Forman
CD Description
We'll never know for sure what artistic heights Jeff Buckley might have gone on to reach, since he was taken from us soobscenely early, with only time enough to complete one album and begin work on a second. With the help of SKETCHES, though, we can make some educated guesses. This double-disc, lovingly assembled by Buckley's friends, colleagues and family, gathers together both his studio efforts and home 4-track demos for the album he was trying to complete up until his tragic drowning.
The studio sessions, produced by Tom Verlaine, find Buckley downplaying his phenomenal vocal abilities somewhat, in favour of focusing on the songs, from the Zeppelinisms of "The Sky Is A Landfill" to the undoubtedly Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan-influenced "New Year's Prayer" and the beautiful, ethereal "You & I". The home demos show Buckley's more experimental, playful side, an aspect of his music presumably encouraged by his pals/heroes The Grifters, whose lo-fimasterpieces inspired Buckley to work in the same studio inMemphis. The closing "Satisfied Mind", from an earlier liveradio broadcast, is a touching elegy to an artistic flame that was extinguished far too soon.