Thursday, March 14, 2013

CD - Ben Howard: Every Kingdom


He’s been releasing material and building a loyal following on the live music circuit for a good five years now, but the Howard-heavy 2013 Brit Awards has sent the Devonshire singer/songwriter’s 2011 album, Every Kingdom, back up the charts.

The folk infused, whispery, Only Love and the, ever so slightly, heavier, Keep Your Head Up, have been mainstays on popular music radio stations for several months now, sitting comfortably with fans of the softly, softly, plucky, sensitively unplugged side of the indie scene.

That said, Howard’s arrangements are more pacey than his acoustic pin-up counterparts, making this record less likely to lull you into a semi-suicidal comatose state than, say, Ed Sheeran or Brits ‘Critic’s Choice’ winner, Tom Odell.

He’s also much more beautiful than them, cripplingly so, which matters if you’re going to sit through a two hour live show of his, which I imagine are quite simple, static affairs.

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