Word Gets Around

If you listen to this first, you'll expect them to always be highly-energetic and insightful rock. But they change, Kelly Jones maturing and writing more about immediate personal experiences (such as the last, very sad tracks of "You Gotta Go There To Come Back", full of regrets). Here, he's writing from a younger perspective, but in tracks like "Billy Daveys Daughter", you can see the sheer poetic and empathic talent of the man.

If you *DO* come to this album from the later ones, stick with it: it will grow on you. If you go forward, don't expect them to write the same material; they don't. That's why the Stereophonics are one of the greatest bands of our time. Take them for what they are: very, very good.

Just Enough Education... did what so many British bands have been tempted to do: to deliberately 'Americanize' their style to tap into the lucrative market across the lake. So it was successful for Bowie - what then? Name-checking San Francisco and being the latest to ponder Kennedy's assassination does not good music make, as the 'Phonics have found to their dismay. Word Gets Around's success bred on regional nostalgia for their small town Welsh home, with profound yet hardly world-changing local incidents the themes. One can't help but feel the grief of Billy Davey as 'Phonics lead singer Kelly Jones chronicles his daughter's tragic death (in 'Billy Daveys Daughter'): it is hardly on the same worldwide level as Kennedy's death, and so much the better. Similarly, standout track Local Boy In The Photograph relates the second-hand memories of a boy's suicide on the railroad with the utmost poignancy: 'He'll always be 23/Yet the train runs on and on/Past the place they found his clothing'.

Death is a main theme - it surfaces again in 'Same Size Feet' and 'Looks Like Chaplin' - but the pumping rock pace never permits morbidity. Instead, nostalgic yearning and perhaps a lament for the disappearing small town life - a decidedly unusual premise for a rock band - are the implied main concerns. 'Last of the Big Time Drinkers' ('I don't need to eat or sleep a wink at the weekend/just rot my guts and I can't wait for my next drink') is deeply ironic and satirical in its approach, yet is emblematic of further remorse for the increasing imposition of modernity, as pondered in a bewildered fashion in the slow tempo 'Traffic'. 'We all face the same way/Still it takes all day...Is anyone going anywhere?/Everybody's gotta be somewhere.' And just to confirm it all, the album is dedicated 'to the people of Cwmaman: "keep the village alive".

Musically, The Stereophonics are nothing new, as gritty rock songs with reference points such as the Rolling Stones, Jam, Nirvana and early Who have been tried with varying degrees of success by countless bands. However, it is not just the unusual song writing themes that set them apart. Irresistible hooks are rampant with dynamism unmatched, but it is the gravel-in-the-throat vocals of Kelly Jones that make their compositions so arresting. With a delivery matched in modern times only by Anthony Keidis (of Red Hot Chili Peppers' fame), Jones' grate (think Rod Stewart with brawn and vigour) quite simply makes many of the tracks his own - 'More Life In A Tramps Vest' and 'Check My Eyelids For Holes' are fine examples.

This album is here not through accident or personal favouritism (although you can undoubtedly see my fondness for this record). Its legend has grown - and will continue to grow - as it gains more exposure. Word Gets Around comes highly recommended.