Wild Wood Deluxe - Paul Weller

I've liked Paul Weller for some time, having mainly admired from afar; just listening to and appreciating his music when friends played it. Having recently seen him in concert, I decided to just equip myself with his entire back catalogue. A friend of mine who is a long time fan recommended Wild Wood to me as Weller's best album, more so than Stanley Road, which I shall also review shortly, and which he feels is overrated. Both are really great albums but I have to agree that this is Weller's finest release. There were no tracks I had trouble getting into, and there were none I wanted to skip over. The instrumentals are lively and delivered with ...  Read the complete review

Being an avid fan of The Jam then naturally drifting into the cool romantic sounds of The Style Council, I was always apprehensive about Paul Weller out on his own. In my own mind, I had trouble dismissing the image of too short drain pipes and stripey shirts that once clothed the young and immaturely skinny Weller jumping uncontrollably to ’A Town Called Malice.’ Forever prepared to shake off anything other than ’Shout To The Top’ from his Style Council days, I really took the opportunity to readily cast aside the idea of listening to a more recent solo project such as ‘Wild Wood.’ Born and bred a Surrey man from the dull and uninteresting town of Woking ...  Read the complete review

A warm, raw, uplifting but endlessly self sestioning record, Weller's second solo album was inspired by R&B, British mod psychedelia and the folk music of Tim Hardin and Nick Drake as Britains formerly Most Vehement Man faced up to an uncertain future. Polydor had dropped him at the end of the '80s, his '91 comeback had only been a modest success, and he was already 35 by the time of Wild Wood's release. Following The Jam's newspapery bluster and The Style Council's slick magazine self consciousness, this is the sound of an artist finding a more emotional voice, unburdened by the responsibility of ever again saying something 'important' ...  Read the complete review

Many feel this is paul Weller's best album,although there are some songs on the album that can quite rightly be said to be some of his greatest.There are some songs that don't really deserve to be on the album. The title track,a very nice acoustic track,that reminds me of a Small Faces song,is widely thought of as Weller's best. And then there is sunflower with it's repeating riff's is quite infectious.The other song that stands out is Hung up,which i feel is without doubt his greatest song. The rest of the album is not bad but it's not great,although peoples opinions of this album are different. This could have been Paul Wellers ...  Read the complete review