I HEART HISTORY TOO AL (I Heart History - Al Start)

Member Name: Richada

Product:	I Heart History - Al Start
Date:	09/03/09 (161 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Music. Lyrics. History. Stories.

Disadvantages: For me, none.

NEVER say NEVER!

Like love, I guess, music is a funny old thing and, in my case at least, has proven, without the right inspiration, an impossible subject to write about. On how many occasions, I wonder, have I written that 'Richada does not DO music reviews'?.........

Well, bear with me, because here comes my very first, so thanks Al, you have removed my writers block on this particular subject......

......and in some style!

RICHADA AND MUSIC

I like music, I always have, however, unlike my wife, or my mother indeed, I could never actually claim to be passionate about it. In truth I could manage to live a life without music - much of which I merely regard as noise pollution anyway. However I know what I like and, in spite of the last sentence, have a surprisingly broad musical taste.

People, often in conversation, seem to want to put me on the spot by asking my favourite "type" of music, or even my favourite artist - both questions I find impossibly difficult to answer.

At this very moment for instance I am listening to - and enjoying immensely Gloria Estefan but with music, as with love, so much depends on mood and circumstances.

Push me a little harder and maybe I would confess to a liking for solo female singers; Madonna's earlier music, Celine Dion (sorry - but yes!), however, three artists unfailingly hit the spot for me, Randy Crawford, K D Lang and, now, Al Start.

Al who?

OK, until reading this (unless that is you read it elsewhere!) you might have never heard of her. I wish that I could actually play you here the music that you are about to read about - the best I can do is to point you towards www.alstart.co.uk at this point. The album described below will actually play to you in abbreviated track form as you read this.

AN EVENING AT THE MUSEUM

An extraordinary chain of events lead to my wife and I "discovering" this local artist. Tuesday is late night opening at Brighton Museum, we went that particular Tuesday evening to see an exhibition entitled "Little Black Dress", irrelevant as that fact may seem, bear with me, there is, I assure you a very close connection between the superb museum and the album; I Heart History.

Entering the main gallery downstairs we were a little surprised, having visited the museum many times in the past, to hear live music being sung by a young lady with a guitar - her female accomplice twiddling knobs on some impressive looking sound equipment. Not recognising the face or voice, we were however mesmerised by both music and voice. We were invited by the accomplice to stay on for the gig there at 7.00pm (closing time). On our way in, we had in fact walked past a sandwich board outside the museum entrance advertising the free concert.

I rarely "get" music on first hearing, especially if, as in Al Start's case, the lyrics are relatively complex, however something just clicked in this case - even listening to the rehearsal it was obvious to me that the lady had talent, plenty of it!

The hour long gig, which we enjoyed in the company of a 90% female audience, included all but two of the tracks on the album, I Heart History, which we purchased on our way out of the museum.

Al proved to be a delightfully easy going, even amusing, host throughout the performance, more importantly for us though was the fact that we heard first hand, from her own mouth, explanations of the story behind each track.

In order to find inspiration, and to write the lyrics, for this album, Al took a six month internship at Brighton Museum, working alongside the curators and professional historians in order to craft a beautiful and historically authentic series of lyrics. Whilst at it, she also put together an exhibition in the museum - entitled "On The Pull", it charts the more romantic side of this great city of ours.

Being a Brightonion by birth, I found the whole concept captivating - especially as several of the stories are legendary in this city.

However, please do not let the local connotations put you off - wherever you are located geographically, for me the local connection proved merely to be the icing on the cake. Indeed, my Polish wife found it fascinating too, the stories were new to her - but the lyrics stand alone anyway.

This review is however about the CD, I Heart History - NOT about our night, and her stunningly good gig, at Brighton Museum!

AT LAST - Richada WRITES ABOUT THE ALBUM!

I wonder how many of us rush home with a new album in our sweaty little palms and cannot wait to pop in the magic disc, paying little or no attention to the packaging from which it has just been removed?

In our case this was not an issue - we purchased our copy of I Heart History whilst the artist was still in the building......

......I have never had the nerve to ask someone to sign a CD before....never been in a position to come to think of it - but here, in Brighton Museum we did just that!

Not in a traditional jewel case, the album is presented in a cardboard folder, which opens out into a book, a very informative one at that. It tells the story of Al's research and how through the archives she wrote lyrics which bring the individual and non-connected stories to life.

Not only explaining the stories, but beautifully illustrated and containing the full lyrics for each song, the album case is a work of art and worth having in its' own right. That ours bears Al's signature and a dedication makes it all the more precious.

HOW ABOUT THE MUSIC?

THE PUBLISHERS i.e. Lone Coyote Records HAVE THIS TO SAY:

"On the theme of love/romance/heartbreak/betrayal, this is a concept album with a sting in the tale! The songs are all based on true stories. From the tragic tale of the Chocolate Cream Poisoner to gender-bending Colonels, drowned mermaids and lovers' lane ghosts; this is narrative songwriting at it's finest."........

......and in my opinion indeed it is.

As a musician however Al proves herself to be far from a one trick pony. So often it works better when lyrics and music are written by individuals specialising in each field, Ms Start is more than proficient in both, this album has no weak tracks.

THE VOICE

Well after all it was the young lady's voice that first got us hooked.

Madonna? No.

Celine Dion? Certainly NOT!

Randy Crawford? Not really......

......K D Lang? Well now we are getting closer, and in more ways than one.

Al has a warm, feminine voice, slightly at odds (I hope she will not mind me saying this) with her dress and appearance.

For me, the listener, most important is that I can hear clearly every word of the excellent lyrics and it is here that Al scores so very highly in my estimations. I rather think that this is the main benefit of the singer / songwriter being one of the same person - you have no sense anywhere throughout the album of the music in any way trying to compete with, or out-do, the lyrics. Song and tune fit perfectly, time after time.

THE STYLE

Here my descriptive powers are becoming stretched to the limit. Al's style, the style of the music, is very difficult to categorise, pop folk, easy listening - not that easy, the lyrics are too challenging and interesting for that.

Whilst nine of the ten tracks have a similar acoustic style to them, with Al's own, pure voice and guitar prominent, there is one "surprise" track - "More Of A Man". I really was not very keen on this one the first time that I heard it, partly because it is such a departure from the rest, but also because the male voice on it is very strange. However, read the lyrics - the story behind it - and you will discover that it is indeed a strange story. Al has been very experimental and clever as it turns out, and has electronically 'altered' her own voice to that of a male.

The story is that of one Colonel Victor Barker, who checked into Brighton's Grand Hotel in 1923, moving in his lover, Elfrida, soon afterwards. He was an eminently respectable gentleman, a decorated war hero, he and his fiancée married at St Peter's Church, they were the centre of local high society. The Barker's hit the headlines a few years later, having moved from Brighton, when Colonel Barker was revealed as Valerie Barker, how she carried off this subterfuge, by all accounts keeping even her "wife" in the dark, is a remaining mystery!

Through the many oral history reviews that Al read during her research, she came up with several Second World War related stories and themes. Probably my favourite track is "Civillian's Lament". In a sense it covers the period during which my own family originally settled in Brighton. The theme of it is constantly changing realities, leading people to live life very much in the fast lane, drinking, dancing and making merry - never knowing which day may be their last.

Until reading Al's explanation, I actually had no idea that Brighton had taken as many as 271 direct hits from Luftwaffe bombs during the war......the War Ministry had located my Great Uncle Bill and his engineering works here because it was regarded as a "safe" place for production!

My wife's favourite track is Lover's Lane, a beautiful but tragic love song actually set in a park very close to where we live - the murdered wife being buried in Lover's Walk, a twitten almost adjacent to our current doctor's surgery!

THE CLEVER BIT

If you are a complete stranger to the City of Brighton and Hove this music remains outstanding. It is quite simply very good quality music - indeed the City itself is not specifically mentioned - the streets and place names could be completely fictitious and the whole thing would still work brilliantly.

THE LAST TRACK - APPROPRIATELY ENTITLED "BIG WORDS"

Could this be Richada's theme tune?

"Give me a yarn and I'll spin it
Give me an inch and I'll take a mile..........

.........Wake up and smell the coffee
They'll never get one over on me
Cos I like it
It's just like I thought it would be
They use BIG WORDS (I'm learning BIG WORDS) GREAT BIG WORDS!

In case you were wondering, Al's talking about museums here, contrasting "museum talk" - the formality and technicality of it - with ordinary every day language as spoken by the many voices that she listened to on those many aural history tapes. Again it is a great concept skilfully adapted into music.

Hopefully I have not used too many BIG WORDS in the course of this review and I also hope that I have managed to convey just what a consummate and talented musician Al Start is.

I Heart History was published on 14th February 2008 on the Lone Coyote Records label and is her latest - and best - album. We have since added two earlier albums to our collection, both are good, particularly the previous album: "GO", but I Heart History is outstanding, our £12.00 museum purchase was money seldom better spent.

Please note that this is not a CD that in all probability you are going to find in your local HMV, or come to that on Amazon either. If you like the sound of it, go to www.alstart.co.uk where you can listen to sample tracks - and for £13 (including postage) purchase your own copy of this outstanding album.

© Richada March 2009

Summary: A great album by a hugely under-rated talent.