Songwriter [CD]

From the opening signature strum of The Valley Of My Heart it's easy to feel that you're on familiar ground if you've followed Andy White's career, but as this album unfolds it becomes clear that this time around there's some other things in the mix which make for an interesting listen. The most striking of these is the addition of Allison Russell on vocals. Her voice really meshes well with Andy's and the tracks where she is involved are essentially duets. It brings to mind the way Kathryn Williams and Neill MacColl's voices perfectly compliment each other on their Two album.

The other striking aspect is the band Andy has assembled which add a fantastic richness and lushness without drowning out Andy's own distinctive sound. John Raham's rhythms are loose (in a good way) and have a great groove and Paul Rigby's swooping guitars and pedal steel combined with Radoslav Lorkovic's hammond organ washes and piano lines add a wonderful rich texture to the whole album. The mix throughout is just right, the faster songs have a fantastic loose stomp to them and the slower songs have a wonderful swirling, shimmering atmosphere. This band must be the best that Andy has assembled for any album and part of the appeal is it feels like a group effort rather than AW + backing musicians.

Stand out tracks for me are:

The Valley Of My Heart: which has a fantastic Joshua Tree era U2 swooping feel to the rhythm and guitar work. The anthemic way it builds towards the end is fabulous, with the band really letting rip.

If You Want It: a beautiful duet with Allison Russell which has a wonderfully lazy groove and strong lyrics that tumble along beautifully in true AW fashion.

Turn Up The Temperature On The Machine Of Love: not entirely sure I'm sold on the lyrics on this one, but it has a great enthusiastic stomp to it and Paul Rigby's guitar work is fantastic.

When You Gonna Come: a fast rockabilly romp with great duet vocals from Allison Russell.

First And Recovery: another duet with Andy and Allison's voices interchanging beautifully. And the mournful accordion set against and almost howling organ and tinkling piano in the background is stunning.

Why Don't You Stay: the standout track of the album for me. It has an ethereal floating ambience as the strumming guitars and hammond organ swirl all around in a way reminiscent of some of the songs on Andy's 1990 album Himself. Great harmonies from AR and beautiful lyrics about the dislocation of moving to another country, indeed the other side of the world.

Kathleen: an up tempo American-Irish jig which deals with finding out the grass isn't always greener.

So why not 5 stars? Well I feel there's a few weak tracks on the album which let things down and overall Andy's lyric writing is patchy. The good songs rank up there with his best work, the ones that don't work so well are mostly let down by sloppy lyric writing which stumbles into cosy cliche a little too often (which is ironic given the title of the album). The worst offenders are When I Come Back (twee and glib) and Start All Over Again (warm milk, sleepy head ... erm). Oh and rhyming Santa Monica with harmonica just deserves a slap! But even the weaker tracks lyrically are still interesting enough sonically to keep your fingers off the skip track button.

If you're new to Andy White's music this is a fair starting place, but there are better albums (Himself, Out There, Speechless). If you're already a fan, go get this you won't be disappointed. Whilst there's a few weak tracks, the good tracks are right up there with his best material and overall the whole album has a very coherent feel. I think it's fair to say that all the best songs here involve Allison Russell, so I hope they team up again. Perhaps a full duet album next time out?