Rating: 5/5
Review:
An excellent album from one of Britain's best
This is an excellent album. It's among Thea Gilmore's best work, which is really saying something. After John Wesley Harding, which I didn't really see the point of to be honest, and the very good "collaboration" with Sandy Denny, Gilmore has returned to writing songs which are purely her own and which feature her trademark lovely tunes, terrific musical structures and thoughtful, intelligent lyrics. Her voice has always been simply fabulous and has lost none of it's quality, and she has a growing maturity in putting a song across.
There is a fine variety here with, for example, the rocking single Love Came Looking For Me, the atmospheric title track (which is a real stunner), the magnificent, declamatory Let It be Known, the lovely This Road - a song to her children - and the old, spiky Thea is still there in the edgy Spit And Shine. There isn't a duff song here, although some are stronger than others, of course. The arrangements are fuller than they often have been, but beautifully handled so that you get no feeling of corporate gloss over the songs, and the band are as good as ever.
Thea Gilmore is one of Britain's very best, in my view. She writes really good music and terrific lyrics and is a top-class singer and performer. I thought Murphy's Heart was a near-masterpiece. This isn't (yet) quite in that league for me, but it's very, very good. She says that she's "still trying to change the world, one minor chord at a time," and for me she's managing it. As Keats might have said, I have been half in love with easful Thea, and Regardless has only strengthened my love of her music and my deep admiration for her. I hope this fine album does something to gain her the wider recognition she richly deserves. Very warmly recommended.
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