Fletcher
Album: Upon Ayr
Label: Dramatico
Tracks: 10
Website: http://www.fletcheruponayr.com

Fletcher's debut solo album, is one of those releases that was recorded, almost guerrilla style in studios around the world using begged, borrowed and at times, stolen time in studios around the world and then pretty much mastered in the same way.

Fletcher himself is no stranger to the recording process having played and recorded in bands, including that of fellow Aussie, Sarah Blasko, who returns the favour by providing backing vocals to "Upon Ayr" an album, which by its nature is predominantly instrumented by Fletcher.

It's an album where you can feel folk sensibilities are involved in the way the songs are put together, but are stylised very much more in a singer-songwriter style with a far more contemporary feel. Likewise the words and phrases are very much those of today, though the themes, love, loss and travel are as old as the hills.

Fletcher writes descriptive songs, songs that it's easy to see yourself and others in because they're quite vivid, for me there is a price and that price, for me, is that occasionally you don't always get the emotional intensity that the narrative deserves and I'm not convinced it's a price worth paying.

That said, I do feel "Upon Ayr" is an album that's worth exploring. I do feel that loss of emotional integrity is partly down to the way the album was recorded, you can't always recapture the mood of a partially recorded piece over extended recording sessions that are driven by necessity and opportunity, rather than exclusively focused on creativity.

Neil King