Kevin Ayers
(Gigantic)
Syd Barrett shot through with Scott Walker; that’s the impression I’ll provide those unacquainted with Ayers. Whether acting as the beautiful man-child with the baritone voice (to say nothing of his needling guitar work) in the first version of Soft Machine or as art-rock’s truculent papa, Ayers was mercury itself. You could feel the temperature of his music — an un-chilly tone surprising in avant-pop, tropical even — rising throughout his intricate signatures, cheerily surrealist lyrics and smoothly rumbling voice. Take your pick, Whatevershebringswesing, Confessions of Dr. Dream: deliriously humid and odd, all. He’s rock’s Werner Herzog.
So it’s no surprise that past collaborators (Phil Manzanera, Hugh Hopper) and followers (Ladybug Transistor Neutral Milk Hotel) join in for Ayers’ newly flowering madness. Rather than carry with the same, there’s more emotion and grace to the dream realities of Unfairground than anticipated. Backed by sympathetic strings and old Soft-y Robert Wyatt, “Cold Shoulder” is anything but, with Ayers creep-walking through time’s tides bravely. The yawning pedal steel guitars and mariachi brass of “Friends and Strangers” and “Only Heaven Knows” offer differing rainbow shadings to the Ayers’ shadowy noir croon.
It’s almost unfair how bold and brilliant this record is and how long he’s left us hanging.
Standout tracks: “Brainstorm,” “Cold Shoulder” A.D. AMOROSI
