Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
In the modern world it could be said that we have no mystique left, that we are all guilty in some way or another of sharing too much about ourselves in the digital spectrum, that people now not only see us naked physically but also uncovered in our thoughts also; the inhibitions banished to the social network winds and no longer we stand as anything but skin, bone and dissected illusion.
Perhaps in some ways we should look to a simpler time, a period when everything didn’t have to be shared, some feelings left locked away so that there was something of a surprise to be had when finally we meet that person to whom being naked in front of does not mean being unclothed and feeling cold and observed in all our crowning glory like a specimen of meat on a cool shelf in a supermarket but instead is the delight in the eyes as our deepest desires gets played out; not everything in the past was a bad thing and we recognise that when we see that Everything’s Gone Vintage.
Returning to the world of enlightening tales and fixtures of music that deal with the classic feel of Rock and Blues, the sidestep of comical observation and the grounding of a heritage that was anything but vintage, more of a glorious institution, The Outsiders UK have fondly offered a look into the world in which was perhaps safer, more innocent and slightly more beige that could be imagined, a world in which the sanctity if the lyric was in its wry humour but also in its powerful beat.
In tracks such as Millstones and Wheels of Steel, the fabulous Mersey Girls, Hurricane Sister, Confidence Tricksters and Death Rides A Pale Horse, The Outsiders UK have produced an album of searing quality, of an abundant sense of cool but one tinged with regret that we have allowed ourselves to become so streetwise and yet cannot tell friend from foe; the sense of the technological knowhow wrapped up in the arms of a person wielding a large knife in which the back is a great target.
Everything’s Gone Vintage, a place to which fashion sometimes dictates but in which the mind should be applauded.
The Outsider’s UK’s Everything’s Gone Vintage is released on 17th February.
Ian D. Hall