Artist.......: Cerys Matthews
Album........: Never Said Goodbye
Label........: Rough Trade
Genre........: Indie
Catnr........: n/a
source.......: CDDA
rip.date.....: Aug-14-2006
str.date.....: Aug-21-2006
quality......: VBR/44,1Hz/Joint-Stereo
Url..........: http://www.cerysmatthews.info/
track title time
01. Streets Of New York 04:37
02. A Bird In Hand 03:32
03. Oxygen 04:31
04. Open Roads 03:47
05. This Endless Rain 04:12
06. Blue Light Alarm 03:42
07. Morning Sunshine 02:31
08. Seed Song 05:05
09. What Kind Of Man 01:18
10. Ruby 03:21
11. Elen 08:45
Runtime 45:21 min
Size 61,3 MB
Release Notes:
Three years on from her countrified debut
Cockahoop, and a full five since Catatonia
disintegrated, Cerys Matthews continues her
personal and musical journey on Never Said Goodbye,
her second solo release.
The album retains Cockahoop's wilful sense of city
ennui and small-town longing, as illustrated in the
opening Streets Of New York: "I'm somewhere I don't
want to be, the city's moving over me, and I think
I'm going to stay," she sings. "Please don't be
alarmed - I'm not the star of something."
Whereas the carefree Cockahoop felt like a
cathartic wipe of the musical slate, Never Said
Goodbye is a more complex affair. Matthews' band is
punchier than before, with the rolling drums and
bass cutups on Ruby providing a musical highlight.
It also sees the return of the inimitable larynx
gymnastics that made her name, not least on Oxygen,
which Cerys has described as "completely out of my
range and not really the way [music] teachers want
you to sing. It's a huge release."
Thematically, she describes the album as being
about "a boy gardener in the midst of all the
global troubles tending to his own place. It's
about keeping your personal energy up to deal with
what is going on on a bigger level."
That theme is most evident on Seed Song and Morning
Sunshine, the latter co-written with SFA's Gruff
Rhys, who also appears on the closing Elen.
Never Said Goodbye looks set to give Cerys Matthews
her highest profile since the days of International
Velvet. That may be a delicious irony given its
yearning for a simpler life, yet it's nothing less
than she deserves.