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Track Listings
| 1. Turning The Mind |
| 2. I Dream Of Crystal |
| 3. Let Go Of The Fear |
| 4. Valium In The Sunshine |
| 5. Papercuts |
| 6. Love Will Come |
| 7. Everything Is Shattering |
| 8. Nothing |
| 9. The Note (These Voices) |
| 10. Chemeleon |
| 11. Die Happy, Die Smiling |
| 12. Without You |
Product Description
Review
It is an oft-observed phenomena that people on drugs tend not to be half as interesting as they believe themselves to be. Thus it was quite the relief when James Chapman – aka Northampton-based electro-gazer Maps – recently confessed that he’d been off his gourd for most of the time he was recording and promoting debut album We Can Create.
It wasn’t a dull record – indeed, in the spiralling dream-pop of You Don’t Know Her Name it boasted one of 2007’s most purely exhilarating musical rushes – but Chapman’s reedy monotone and ditchwater lyrics were by far and away the least appealing part. Two years on and he’s been quite free in talking up successor Turning the Mind as a better, more personal album; one that ups the lyrical game as it charts his journey from narcotic confusion to lovely, lovely sobriety.
It is, unfortunately, a similarly well-observed phenomena is that the only thing more tedious than people on drugs is people who used to be on drugs talking about how they’re not on drugs anymore. While kicking the narcotics may not be actively to blame for the failings of Chapman’s second album, the fact is that the meatier subject matter hasn’t helped him as a performer, and has indeed diminished the sense of ebullient lift his best songs require.
Presumably the numbness of his delivery on single I Dream of Crystal is meant to simulate his emotional state during the height of his abuse, but really, a spot of actual emotion on lines like “and I will screw it up, I’m used to that” could have done the song wonders. Portentously declaimed spoken-word statements like “release is a cocaine fury” (on Let Go of the Fear) are not really the answer, either.
It’s a shame, because he’s still bashing out some fearsome pop songs – witness the liquid analogue cascade of Everything is Shattering and the glossily strutting lattices of Die Happy, Die Smiling. The problem is that he’s still yet to convince that he should be the one to sing them. --Andrzej Lukowski
Find more music at the BBC This link will take you off Amazon in a new window
Product Description
CD
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
By Pete__S
Format:Audio CD
This is one album I will listen to again and again. Unlike most reviews here, I prefer this album on the whole to We Can Create.
Well worth the money, I dream of crystal is a fantastic tune. One of my all time favorites.
Maybe the first album attracted to many musical snobs, hence the reviews of this one. I think I have heard more tracks from this album on TV and films than i did the first one.
James C has done a great job on this and I cannot wait for the next one, Due this year according to twitter. Just hope he tours more this time.
Well worth the money, I dream of crystal is a fantastic tune. One of my all time favorites.
Maybe the first album attracted to many musical snobs, hence the reviews of this one. I think I have heard more tracks from this album on TV and films than i did the first one.
James C has done a great job on this and I cannot wait for the next one, Due this year according to twitter. Just hope he tours more this time.
5 of 7 people found the following review helpful
By Dr. Robert A. Josey
VINE™ VOICE
Format:Audio CD|Amazon Verified Purchase
It says above - a quote from James C - that this album is about 'the mind', and the effect that stimuli, mainly chemical, have on it. In this case - much for the worse.
'We Can Create' - the previous album - contains many beautiful hymns to 'chemical enhancement' - 'Liquid Sugar' for one. 'Turning The Mind' is the dark side, the come-down side, the 'darkest night of the soul', caught in a 'life(death)style' which is killing you.
Reading between the lines (sic) I think much of this album is somehow autobiographical. And I don't think the lyrics are unimaginative. I think they capture very clearly in their simplicity a terrible psychological state. Of emptiness, of self-loathing, of trying to find peace and direction and movement onwards/upwards. Desperately sad really.
'Turning The Mind' seems to be a term for 'going insane'. And there is that sense of ennui, of disassociation, of losing it, in all of the songs. It's a darker trip than previously, that's for sure.
The music therefore - to use clinical language - becomes an effective tool in outlining these themes/psychological descriptions... 'Everything Is Shattering' is like one of the best New Order songs you've never heard - 'born for nothing, to abyss/and nothing worth this wasted wish'.
Maybe I have got it all wrong, and have misunderstood the concepts? - but it's easy to see that this isn't just your typical 'shoegazing' set. I admire James Chapman for his great talent, his way of creating something intensely beautiful and immediate. But I think this is an album that isn't going to 'hit' you straight away.
I've been listening to it all day now and I can only say that there is much to value and love here. It is certainly deeply, heartbreakingly sad, shot through with a palpable sense of loss and regret; it is genuinely disturbing in places; and bloody powerful. Laughter in hell.
'We Can Create' - the previous album - contains many beautiful hymns to 'chemical enhancement' - 'Liquid Sugar' for one. 'Turning The Mind' is the dark side, the come-down side, the 'darkest night of the soul', caught in a 'life(death)style' which is killing you.
Reading between the lines (sic) I think much of this album is somehow autobiographical. And I don't think the lyrics are unimaginative. I think they capture very clearly in their simplicity a terrible psychological state. Of emptiness, of self-loathing, of trying to find peace and direction and movement onwards/upwards. Desperately sad really.
'Turning The Mind' seems to be a term for 'going insane'. And there is that sense of ennui, of disassociation, of losing it, in all of the songs. It's a darker trip than previously, that's for sure.
The music therefore - to use clinical language - becomes an effective tool in outlining these themes/psychological descriptions... 'Everything Is Shattering' is like one of the best New Order songs you've never heard - 'born for nothing, to abyss/and nothing worth this wasted wish'.
Maybe I have got it all wrong, and have misunderstood the concepts? - but it's easy to see that this isn't just your typical 'shoegazing' set. I admire James Chapman for his great talent, his way of creating something intensely beautiful and immediate. But I think this is an album that isn't going to 'hit' you straight away.
I've been listening to it all day now and I can only say that there is much to value and love here. It is certainly deeply, heartbreakingly sad, shot through with a palpable sense of loss and regret; it is genuinely disturbing in places; and bloody powerful. Laughter in hell.
2 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
Mr Chapman makes some pretty noises on his new album
Turning The Mind. His musical cohorts have helped him
to realise and release the simple inner power of the
twelve fine tracks in this collection.
Dr Josey's splendid review has already highlighted its
elusive beauty. A fragile beauty born out of melancholy.
Even when the beats warm up, as in 'Let Go Of The Fear',
there is always a little energy held back.
This calculated sense of reserve imbues the project
with a shifting dream-like quality.
One suspects that Mr Chapman may well be familiar with
the narratives of Huxley, Micheaux and Leary. If not
then he is a kindred spirit beyond his knowing.
The 80's have also left their footprints in the
synth-saturated sound palette. It is a good synthesis.
Here and there I was reminded of that wonderful London
band Shriekback who flowered for a while in that decade.
'Valium In The Sunshine' and 'Papercuts' are powerful
evocations of that memory. Spare and atmospheric.
Dislocation. Disorientation. Dissociation.
Mr Chapman is, however, an experienced guide who
never quite lets go of our hand on this journey
through the darker spaces of his turbulent mind.
The maps are always written in a familiar language.
'Nothing' could almost be a pop song were it
not for the creepy whispered vocal performance.
(Actually, on reflection, it probably couldn't
but I love its bitter and twisted lyrics a lot !)
Final track 'Without You' delivers a stunningly
luminous and uplifting conclusion. A truly lovely song.
Don't put it on at a party but don't pass it by either.
Highly Recommended.
Turning The Mind. His musical cohorts have helped him
to realise and release the simple inner power of the
twelve fine tracks in this collection.
Dr Josey's splendid review has already highlighted its
elusive beauty. A fragile beauty born out of melancholy.
Even when the beats warm up, as in 'Let Go Of The Fear',
there is always a little energy held back.
This calculated sense of reserve imbues the project
with a shifting dream-like quality.
One suspects that Mr Chapman may well be familiar with
the narratives of Huxley, Micheaux and Leary. If not
then he is a kindred spirit beyond his knowing.
The 80's have also left their footprints in the
synth-saturated sound palette. It is a good synthesis.
Here and there I was reminded of that wonderful London
band Shriekback who flowered for a while in that decade.
'Valium In The Sunshine' and 'Papercuts' are powerful
evocations of that memory. Spare and atmospheric.
Dislocation. Disorientation. Dissociation.
Mr Chapman is, however, an experienced guide who
never quite lets go of our hand on this journey
through the darker spaces of his turbulent mind.
The maps are always written in a familiar language.
'Nothing' could almost be a pop song were it
not for the creepy whispered vocal performance.
(Actually, on reflection, it probably couldn't
but I love its bitter and twisted lyrics a lot !)
Final track 'Without You' delivers a stunningly
luminous and uplifting conclusion. A truly lovely song.
Don't put it on at a party but don't pass it by either.
Highly Recommended.
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4.2 out of 5 stars
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
2.0 out of 5 stars
he could create
With previous releases "start something" and the stunning "we can create" Maps realy did create something original and fresh. With vivid sound scapes and thoughtfull lyrics. Read more
Published on 30 Oct 2009 by C. P. Hayward
3.0 out of 5 stars
Valium in the sunshine and showers
Two years after releasing one of the finest debuts in history, James Chapman as Maps has followed We Can Create with a mixed bag. Read more
Published on 2 Oct 2009 by Mr. T. Ainslie
3.0 out of 5 stars
Unexceptional
James Chapman has always been a bit of an enigma. Essentially his music is really good as proven by his first two album but it has never been translated into the success that maybe... Read more
Published on 28 Sep 2009 by Toby Staunton
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