Brian Eno is MORE DARK THAN SHARK

INTERVIEWS, REVIEWS & RELATED ARTICLES

Rip It Up OCTOBER 1993 - by John Taite

JAMES: LAID

James have been around for nearly ten years. They had a huge hit with Sit Down, they embossed a line of condoms with the title of their other hit How Was It For You, and still the band begs the question "James who?".

I'm happy to say that all of the Simple Minds comparisons they picked up with Seven (their last album) have vanished. This time round James have stepped out of the stadium and back into your local. And in doing so they've recovered the craftsmanship in their songs. The guitars of Saul Davis and Larry Gott have been given a serious boost of, well, feeling. There's more acoustic wonderment within the album and songs like Five-O and Liar are steeped in a typically American (strange seeing as they're English) lonely road to nowhere, type guitar sorrow (touring with Neil Young does that to you, I suppose).

Laid is a slower, more deliberate and, urgh I hate to say it but, mature album. It's the perfect vehicle for the vocals of Tim Booth, which sounds so much more convincing and intimate. The man could melt polar caps with numbers like Lullaby. And all credit to Brian Eno's production. It's the complete opposite to his work on U2's Zooropa - the grandiose toss has been extracted. In fact disheartened U2 fans should probably give this a listen.

As I'm sure the promotional posters would love to boast, you should go and get Laid.