Rocker Weller is fired up with flower power
Paul Weller: Saturns Pattern (Parlophone) Verdict: The Modfather reaches for the stars
PAUL WELLER’S solo career since the break-up of The Style Council in 1989 has fallen into two distinct chapters. The first was underpinned by a solid grounding in traditional rock and soul. The second, from 2008’s 22 Dreams onwards, was jet-propelled by madcap experiments in free-form jazz, folk and synth-rock. With his 12th solo album, The Modfather embraces the best of both worlds. With its special-effects and random cosmic bleeps, Saturns Pattern retains some of those left-field leanings, but it also reiterates its maker’s enduring affinity with blues-rock and Sixties beat.
Weller, 56, made his name in the punk era with The Jam, but he has never disguised his love of The Beatles, The Kinks and the whimsical English psychedelia of Pink Floyd, Small Faces and Traffic — and the spectre of pop’s flower- power era is prominent again here.
A return to a rock-orientated approach is clear from the outset. Opening number White Sky sets the tone, built around a Led Zep- style blues riff, while the piano-led title track sees a resurgence of the heavy soul of Weller’s early solo years.
Elsewhere, there are nods to The Velvet Underground on Long Time, a two-minute rocker illuminated by searing slide guitar from Irish teenager Josh McClorey, of retrorhythm and blues band The Strypes.
As the nine-track album progresses, softer styles come into play, most notably on I’m Where I Should Be, a gentle ode to contentment, and the languid These City Streets.
And, while the famously spiky singer fires off the odd salvo to rock’s young pretenders — ‘you can be king for a day, but still have nothing to say’, he growls on White Sky — the over-riding mood is upbeat.
On the funky Phoenix, Weller salutes ‘the blue sky and the cool of the morning’, although there are plenty of frustrated motorists who will baulk at the sentiments of In The Car . . . in which he declares: ‘I RASH could spend my summer nights driving around the M25’.
RASH travel advice aside, Saturns Pattern maintains Weller’s recent purple patch while adding another unexpected twist.
The past year has already seen him f i re one bolt f rom the blue by co-writing a song, Let Me In, with former X Factor runner-up Olly Murs. In producing a record that wouldn’t have sounded out of place in 1967’s summer of love, he has delivered another.