From: Al Crawford <awrc@dcs.ed.ac.uk>
Subject: Review: Ian McNabb - Truth And Beauty
Reply-To: Al Crawford <awrc@dcs.ed.ac.uk>
Organization: The University Of Edinburgh - Department Of Computer Science
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1993 13:12:33 GMT
Followup-To: rec.music.misc


Ian McNabb		Truth And Beauty	This Way Up 514 378 2 [UK]

	Total Running Time: 60 min 36 sec

	1.	(I Go) My Own Way		05:09
	2.	These Are The Days		04:29
	3.	Great Dreams Of Heaven		05:07
	4.	Truth And Beauty		06:50
	5.	I'm Game			04:32
	6.	If Love Was Like Guitars	05:06
	7.	Story Of My Life		03:17
	8.	That's Why I Believe		05:26
	9.	Trip With Me			03:48
	10.	Make Love To You		04:39
	11.	Presence Of The One		11:58

_Truth And Beauty_ is Ian McNabb's debut solo album. McNabb is probably
best known as the driving force behind the now defunct group The Icicle
Works and not unsurprisingly the flavour of this album does echo that of
the group's last album _Permanent Damage_.

However, while _Permanent Damage_ was far from being the highpoint of The
Icicle Work's output, _Truth And Beauty_ is a *very* impressive solo debut
and had this album been released on schedule last September it would have
been a serious contender for my favourite album of last year. As with the
last album, the primary influences here are the Byrds and the Beatles, but
where _Permanent Damage_ tended to be uninspired, samey and by turns angry
and melancholic, _Truth And Beauty_ is far stronger, with good distinctive
and above all *happy* songs that must be amongst the best McNabb has ever
written.

The album kicks off with "(I Go) My Own Way", which demonstrates that Ian
hasn't been living under a rock for the past two years, and fuses vaguely
psychedelic guitar pop with a laid-back dance groove. Not very original, I
admit, and the whole Stone Roses/Happy Mondays/Manchester thing died some
time ago, but it's still carried off beautifully. True, the lyrics are of
the cliched "Hey, I'm a rebel" variety and feature too many "Yeah"s but
this is more than offset by the quality guitar work and smooth vocal
harmonies. A good start.

"These Are The Days" is melodic guitar pop, with uplifting feel-good
lyrics. This is true of the whole album in fact - it's very much an "up"
album, and if you buy it expecting gloom and angst you're likely to be
disappointed. Apparently this track is soon to be used in a series of
television advertisements for a UK building society.

Next up is "Great Dreams Of Heaven", which was first released as a single
back in 1991. I was glad to see that the version here is the original
single version rather than the weaker acoustic version that appeared on the
"If Love Was Like Guitars" CD single. Apart from being quite horribly
catchy the lyrics are fascinating, an excellent example of McNabb's
love/hate relationship with religion. One of the highpoints of an album
that doesn't really have any lowpoints.

The undoubted peak of the album has to be the title track. In almost seven
minutes the track moves from quiet contemplation with McNabb in full "I
wanna be a Beatle" mode to energetic guitar pop and back again. It's truly
stunning and would make a great single if there was any way of cutting it
down to single length without losing something. Unfortunately there isn't,
this song grabs your attention from start to finish and skipping any of it
would be a crime. A beautiful song.

After the grandeur and introspection of "Truth And Beauty", "I'm Game" is a
refreshing change and manages to outdo even "Great Dreams Of Heaven" in the
so-catchy-it's-annoying stakes. I'd be interested to see him do this live
though - with up to 3 layers of vocals (all sung by McNabb) at any one
time, all singing different words, I'm sure he'd run out of mouths fairly
quickly. Just to add to the taste, mix in what strikes me as a very slight
Postcard influence (a brief, rather spikier guitar section plus vocals that
at one point remind me of Edwyn Collins) and the occasional (synthetic)
brass. Wonderful.

"If Love Was Like Guitars" is the current single and...yep, it's another
hugely catchy song. While it does have a dance beat, it's more relaxed and
less obviously influenced by the Manchester thing than "(I Go) My Own Way"
was. It relies heavily on McNabb's strong, clear vocals with the verses
consisting for the most part of little more than McNabb's vocals (layered
symbiotic harmonies again) over the beat. Throw in the guitars (you can't
have a song called "If Love Was Like Guitars" without guitars in it!) in
the chorus and the bridge, add some more synthetic brass, cute (if a little
twee) lyrics along the lines of "If love was like guitars we'd all be
stars" and you can't really go wrong. Great pop.

Up until this point, most of the "guitar pop" songs have also mixed in
other elements such as keyboards and synth brass, but "Story Of My Life" is
much purer guitar pop. Lively and melodic, with a more obvious Byrds
influence and suitably smooth, slightly spaced out sounding vocals. This
would have been a standout track on pretty much any Icicle Works album but
pales slightly after the glory of the previous six tracks. Still very good
though.

"That's Why I Believe" is another old track, and was originally a bonus
track on the "Great Dreams Of Heaven" CD single. It's more typical of the
standard voice/guitar/bass/drums fare that appeared on the last Icicle
Works album. Relaxed and sleepy, it relies more on lyrics and Ian's
excellent voice than on a strong melody.

"Trip With Me" is another catchy one. Reasonable, if rather obvious, lyrics
and once again hopelessly positive and cheerful. "Make Love To You" is, by
contrast, the only track here that misses the mark for me. It's another
pure guitar pop piece, slowly and with that Byrds influence in full view
again. Like "Story Of My Life", it's a good track that would have stood out
on any of the Icicle Works album but one that suffers by comparison with
the highs of this album.

Finally, there's "Presence Of The One", all twelve minutes of it. The
formula is simple - starting with a very simple, slow keyboard melody and
McNabb's intimate vocals the sound slowly builds, adding in a new element
every minute or so then stripping them out again one by one until
eventually we're left with Ian's voice whispering over a quiet acoustic
guitar and the longest fadeout I've ever heard (it drops below easily
audible over a minute before the track finishes and then just keeps getting
quieter and quieter). Although the song is slow and the lyrics
philosophical, it's still an unremittingly hopeful, positive song.

My only real problem with the album as a whole is the production. The album
was self-produced by McNabb and recorded in a tiny studio (so small they
couldn't get a drum kit in and all the drums on this album are done by a
drum machine) and while the production is acceptable and many of the tracks
quite atmospheric, I can't help but feel that a little extra polish on the
production side would have helped some of the tracks. The production
doesn't spoil the enjoyment at all, but it does make you wonder what some
of these songs would have sounded like with a more "rounded" sound.

Now to the difficult bit - summarising. Well, the summary itself isn't
difficult - this is a great album. As for who it might appeal to - well,
one of the music mags I've seen suggested that R.E.M. fans would find it
worth a listen, but I'm not too familiar with R.E.M. so I won't make any
judgements on that. Icicle Works fans should, of course, buy this without
hesitation, it's the best thing McNabb has done yet. As for anyone else, if
you like melodic, happy guitar pop that's sometimes cheerful and bouncy,
sometimes more contemplative, you probably won't go wrong with this.
McNabb's vocals might take some getting used to though - he's got a strong,
clear and tuneful voice but does tend to come across a little too
melodramatically at times.

Onto the rating - damn, this is a tricky one. I normally listen to an album
between half a dozen and a dozen times before writing a review and giving
it a rating. This time I've listened to it perhaps two or three times as
often, simply because my initial impulse was to give this a rating of +4
and I wanted to be sure the album really warranted it. My gut reaction is
still to give it this rating as _Truth And Beauty_ is an album that's
destined to become a minor classic, but I wouldn't want to make people rush
out to buy the album on my recommendation then be disappointment because my
enthusiasm got the better of me, so I'll let my natural caution get the
better of me and just give this album...

Erland Rating: +3 (a very high +3 though :-))

-- 
			Al Crawford - awrc@dcs.ed.ac.uk
	  Department Of Computer Science, The University of Edinburgh
   Rm 1410, JCMB, Kings Buildings, Mayfield Rd, EDINBURGH, EH9 3JZ, Scotland
	     Tel: +44 (0) 31 650 5165  Fax: +44 (0) 31 667 7209
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