Reviews

Artist:Rob Clarke
Album: Blues Beats and Brel
Label: Self Released
Tracks: 11
Website: https://www.robclarkemusic.com/

It was a pleasure finally to meet Rob Clarke at the recent Love Folk Festival in Southport. He sent me two singles from his new album "Blues Beats and Brel" in the middle of last year for consideration for airplay and I played both. The album title references Belgian master of the 'chanson' Jacques Brel, recording artist and actor whose last recorded work was released in 1977. Like many from that purple patch of songwriting, Brel's panache and presence lives on.

But in paying tribute to one of the songwriting greats of the past, Liverpool born and based Rob Clarke is also carving something of a niche of his own. In his solo work he travelled to Warner Bros Nashville studio to work with legendary American producer Elliot Mazer, whose skills have seen him has work with Neil Young, Bob Dylan, Linda Ronstadt and their ilk. Rob also runs two bands: there's Rob Clarke with The Brown Bears, a country rock outfit, and Rob Clarke and the Wooltones, a four piece '60s-retro Liverpool-based rock band.

For this new album "Blues Beats and Brel", released on 12th January, Rob has taken a stripped back, light touch, live approach. With producer Fran Ashton adding 'a bit of piano' and Jo Powell on accordion, the imagery of this album is of a basement blues scene, of which I think Brel would probably approve. So to the songs:

The first two songs on the album are the aforementioned singles, and the thing that strikes you when listening to the opening song "She's a Mean" is that Rob has one of those rounded voices, which hovers comfortably around the middle frequencies, and engages you from the start. Fran Ashton adds 'a bit of piano' as the song chugs effortlessly along.

"Tik Tok" has a real Townes Van Zandt feel to it, with Jo Powell's accordion accompaniment adding a Gallic mood. "Cheapskate" is performance poetry backed by a blues rock beat, with electric jazz guitar and piano frills complemented some vivid and relatable imagery.

"I've left you a sandwich there and some soup" greets you at the introduction to "Fridge", and Rob lets loose his blues harmonica skills. When I saw the title, and then heard the opening rhyming between 'sandwich' and 'fridge', I did wonder where this song was going to end up, but actually it's ended up as one of my favourites on the album.

Upright bass, beats and organ introduce "Crusherun", a second piece of performance poetry that leads rather abruptly into "What a Commotion", another harmonica and guitar song, this time with a 'Liverpool sound' structure, and sentiments that certainly resonate: "Everybody's saying something but nobody's doing nothing / If you want to give me something then it's good for me".

More bal-musette accordion sandwiches underpin "You Don't Talk", another favourite of mine from the album, with lead guitar that has the feel of a theme to a '60s detective series. The mood changes with another blues rock piece of performance poetry, "My Kind of" (as it turns out, 'model'), which at just over a minute long, considers the time pressures of modern life. "On My Way" opens with some guitar tuning, then slips into a lazy blues beat with harmonica frills, and again shows the quality of Rob Clarke's singing voice. It doesn't necessarily follow that someone with a good speaking voice also has a good singing voice (or vice-versa), but in this case, with or without effects, Rob engages with both.

I've selected "My Old Banjo" as the next of these songs to play on a future edition of my Compendium radio show. For such a stripped back album, "Blues Beats and Brel" provides a varied array of sounds to accompany a very fine voice indeed. The album closes with "Even The Good", another 'Liverpool sound' song, with Beatles-esque chord structure, and one of the few occasions where he adds backing vocals, creates a singalong chorus and a gentle ending to an album with real edge.

Rob Clarke's warm, engaging style of delivery and excellent vocal quality carry this minimalist album from start to finish, and I'm looking forward to seeing him play live in the not too distant future.

John Reed

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