Customer Reviews

Play Me

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Ike Moriz - Play Me (Mosquito Records London)
Recorded in London in April 2005, Ike Moriz' second album release on his own Mosquito Records London imprint continued the work he'd done on "Mirrors and Shade". Though many of his recent recordings have found Moriz immersed in the songs and easy style of the 1950s and `60s, his early recordings were very much rooted in the English alternative pop style, pioneered by David Bowie, and enthusiastically sustained by later groups like Suede. As with all Moriz' releases from this period, the songs were written and produced by the artist.

He's a skilled pop songwriter, and has indicated in subsequent interviews that because of the rise in popularity of the download, his approach to writing albums was to treat every track as a standalone single. It's a system that obviously works, as the listener is enveloped in a collection of infectious melodies, sing-a-long choruses and enough hooks to fill a fisherman's tackle box. It's no surprise that radio picked up on these songs and they were much played throughout Europe and Moriz' South African homeland. Some six years after their original release, they retain much of their freshness. Many fans of grown-up pop will find a great deal to enjoy, whether it's the all-out sunshine buzz of the title track or the wistful lament of "The Sad Songs".

He has been described as "Bowie without the glam meets Oasis without the self-importance teamed with UK chart alternative without the boredom". However, Moriz confides that while the constant comparisons with Bowie are flattering, they do get a bit tiresome. After all, it's natural for every artist to want to be defined in terms of his or her own style and not be known as a pastiche of others, but most people, it seems, feel the need to fit new musical endeavours into their frame of reference. Nonetheless, if you're going to be compared to anyone, The Thin White Duke himself is not a bad place to start... And Bowie himself once voted Moriz's song You Could single of the week on his website - quite an endorsement. So who exactly is Ike Moriz?
Blonde, blue-eyed and distinctly Scandinavian-looking, Moriz is truly a citizen of the world. Thanks to his parents, he had a jet-setting childhood, and was fortunate enough to study music in South Africa, Germany and the Netherlands.As a child, he was "an early Shakin' Stevens fan" (brave of him to admit that) and also listened to the Eurythmics, Bowie, Lou Reed, Iggy Pop, Velvet Underground and the Talking Heads, shaping, no doubt, his affinity for indie pop/rock with a distinctly English flavour.