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The Week That Was clatters forth with all the excitement of Kate Bush's Sat in Your Lap, and follows up with lashings of Peter Gabriel 3-era synthesizers and marimbas and Adrian Belew-style rock guitar. Sadly, although Brewis sings, ''The detail is the difference'', the lyrical content doesn't quite measure up. In other words, your appetite for this will largely depend upon how nostalgic you feel about the synthesizer and drum-machine-led experimentation of that era. Certainly at times the arrangements seem overly frigid and melodramatic, like a synth-duo with their trousers pulled up too tight, and for all the intricacy and invention of the music, the vocals are bit of a let-down, although at times curiously reminiscent of Eno.
Peter Gabriel provides the most obvious touchstone for Brewis here. Like Gabriel (at least with Genesis) the pieces here are as much obsessively polished fragments as fully-rounded songs, while at times (as on Yesterday's Paper) literary pretensions mangle the melody without much poetic reward. Too brief and too prosaic, the overall story itself remains as opaque as it is intriguing, and there’s probably more fun to be had in spotting the musical references, although the Games Without Frontiers reference is surely preferable to the crashing Phil Collins tribute that opens the last track.
Despite such shortcomings, the album is never boring, and certainly poses the question as to how much deeper Brewis might have dug if he spent more than a week in perfect isolation. --Tim Nelson
Find more music at the BBC This link will take you off Amazon in a new window
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With thoughtful lyrics delivered in a gently but proudly regional Sunderland accent, there's a bewilderingly broad range of influences audible here, but it all comes together with a homogeneity and identity that feels singular and distinct. The drums and percussion are a very strong element, with some great percussive moments throughout the album, including the strong rhythmic intros to the opening tracks, and the clever stereo hi-hats of 'The Airport Line'. There's also a distinctly 80s vibe, but we're talking more XTC and Phillip Glass than Wham or Duran Duran! Labelled at the art/rock end of indie, I love that this music is just defiantly beyond easy categorisation.
There are some musical ingredients that run throughout most of the music here: heavy emphasis of the downbeats (the music isn't exactly funky), and something slightly angular and muscular in the melodies and riffs, but not to the complete exclusion of a more plaintive feeling. These elements combine effectively in 'Come Home', which is both self-consciously musically clever, and engagingly and wistfully personal. Interesting music, tightly played, well produced, and with real identity. If only the media gave this kind of thing more exposure. But dig the lyrics of 'Scratch The Surface' (another number endowed with excellent percussion, and a strong album closer): "We don't want what's on offer, we really shouldn't bother, so give to me some purpose, you've only scratched the surface"!
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