Truelove's Gutter

It's always disappointing when an artist you respect turns in an album that doesn't measure up to their best. That, for me, was the experience of listening to Richard Hawley's 2007 album Lady's Bridge. After the dark genius of Coles Corner, Lady's... sounded as if Richard's label, Mute, had smelled money and requested something more commercial. If that's what actually happened, Mute can't have been disappointed with Lady's Bridge. Okay, it wasn't commercial in the sense that anything on it was about to set the charts on fire, but it was hummable, melodic, well-produced... and sadly lacking that indefinable spark of genius that made Coles Corner an instant classic. I don't expect Richard Hawley knows any more than anyone else what magical quality it is that makes some songs timeless whilst others are destined to remain good but functional pop tunes. But I suspect he learned from Lady's Bridge, because what I've heard of his latest offering, Truelove's Gutter, out this week, suggests a return to the power and integrity that are the high watermark of Hawley's undoubted genius.

A voice like that demands to be set against something more than efficient rockabilly knock-offs. The Hawley croon (sorry, but there is no other way to describe it) is a thing of darkness and fog, a voice made to echo down empty streets late at night.

I'm not sure whether this is significant or not, but TG is Hawley's first album since Late Night Final not to take its title from a place name in his Sheffield hometown (unless I'm missing something and Truelove's Gutter is just off Eccleshall Road).

I haven't even heard Truelove's Gutter yet, so I'll save a full review for later - but what I have heard, though fragmentary, is impressive... possibly even magnificent.