Customer Reviews

Songs of No Consequence

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4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
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I have now listened to Graham Parker's new album Songs of no Consequence 7-8 times in a couple of days and I get more and more impressed for each listen. This one is a real grower.

We GP fans, we're really blessed. How does he manage to keep on pumping out so much good music, and with the variety the last three albums represent? I must say there is NO one in his generation today that manage to sound so fresh and hungry as GP.

There is absolutely no fillers on the new album, I wouldn't want to replace any of the songs. The songwriting is top notch, the vocals are better than ever and the Figgs is a perfect match to our young oldie. They know both how to rock hard and to hold back when suitable.

In my book this is pop in its purest form. Melodies loaded with memorable hooks - spiced up with some reggae and rhythm and blues - and clever lyrics.

Vanity Press is a perfect opener. Elvis Costello should listen to this and remember what he used to be able to...

She swallows it and Ambivalent reminds me of the best songs from Struck by Lightning.

Chloroform has that killer groove that I love, and the scat song by GP in between the verses has to be heard to be believed. It's so good that you can forgive that the whole song is a rip-off from Obsessed with Aretha from Acid Bubblegum.

Evil is a solid reggae number, with some added pop hooks. One of the strongest lyrics on the album and the Figgs's playing is terrific.

Suck'n'Blow is a rocking thing, with some cool guitar licks. It's hard to describe but it is one of my favorites on the album.

Go little Jimmy is an acoustic bluesy number, different than the others, that fits in perfectly.

Local Boys is Local Girls #2 lyricwise. Musically it is more straightforward but is is as catchy as the original.

Did everybody just get old is very dylanesque, when he is in his most spiritual and enjoyable mood.


Did I say that I like the album?

//Ulf

With literate, razor-sharp lyrics and Graham's trademark hooks, this is truly a welcome release from one of rock and roll's greatest. The band has a looser, more rollicking sound than the country-flavored Your Country.

This one is strictly trademark rock and roll from top to bottom and fits perfectly into the Graham Parker Canon nicely. It's simply amazing that Graham has been so consistently prolific with his albums over the last thirty years. With a little more of a hard rock edge to it, this one is reminiscent of 12 Haunted Episodes, which I thought has quietly become one of his best albums.

There's a touch of reggae and blues infused into a few of these songs as well. Go little Jimmy and Dislocated Life stand out but there isn't a weak cut to be found.

With Deepcut to Nowhere, Your Country, and now Songs of No Consequence, Graham assaults the 21st Century with great music that any fan of rock and roll shouldn't ignore.

Originally written September 2005: British rock singer/songwriter Graham Parker (born November 18, 1950 in London) has just had another comeback. How many comebacks does that make since he emerged with two neoclassic rock 'n' roll records in 1976, Howlin Wind' and Heat Treatment, both inspired by the intensity and urgency of the music of Van Morrison, The Rolling Stones, and Bruce Springsteen? Not many to a hardcore fan like me, but its true that most fans have not stayed around for the ride, and his largest following in the late '70s has all but disappeared. Their loss. Before Parker hooked up with The Rumour he was the vocalist of the Black Rockers and Deep Cut Three early in his career, and to the best of my knowledge there exists no recorded music from these bands. No matter, with the Rumour Parker built a reputation as an incendiary live performer, with his passionate vocals and class-conscious lyrics that called for a renewal of rock music just as punk began to blossom in Great Britain.

Squeezing Out Sparks, released in 1979 and considered by most fans and critics alike as Parker's masterpiece, is one of the best records in the history of rock music. It was Springsteen who said at that time that the only band he'd pay to see were Graham Parker and The Rumour. Indeed, Springsteen later sang background vocals on a track on Parkers next release, The Up Escalator.

But after a remarkable six-record run (including the live Parkerilla), with one of rock's best backing bands, The Rumour, Parker split from the group; he's since released 13 records on proper labels, including the live The Last Rock And Roll Tour with the Figgs in 1997, as well as more than a dozen others including at least two other stellar live records, Live Alone Discovering Japan (1993) and !Live Alone: The Bastard Of Belgium (2005), the latter on his own Up Yours Records.

Despite all the various label-jumping -- and the '80s, which were Parkers most commercially successful years with well-financed recordings, videos, and radio play, plus the more recent release of one of his finest records, Deepcut To Nowhere (Razor And Tie, 2001), it appears that he's finally found a home now with Chicago's Bloodshot Records. Both Deepcut and Bloodshot's second Parker release, Songs Of No Consequence, harken back to the days of the hard-hitting backing vibe and punch of the Rumour, and Songs Of No Consequence represents the first studio recording with The Figgs, a terrific power pop-rock band, followed by a tour this summer that included a date at Chicago's Double Door.

Parker first became aware of Bloodshot when Jon Langford had him sing backing vocals on The Waco Brothers' "See Willy Fly By" for Bloodshots fifth anniversary compilation record. Last year Parker released Your Country, a spirited alternative country record that gave no clue as to what was to come. With Songs Of No Consequence, Parker recorded the record with the Figgs, sending the material to Bloodshot before they'd heard a single song. Good thing for Parker that Bloodshot knows a great record when they hear one.

It was the Figgs' Mike Gent who first impressed Parker with his knowledge and love of Parker's music, followed thereafter by a Figgs' cover of "Passion Is No Ordinary Word" on a tribute record, Piss And Vinegar: The Songs Of Graham Parker. At the time the Figgs were signed to Capitol Records, and Parker needed a backing band for his "Last Rock And Roll Tour" in 1996. After contacting Gent, the Figgs decided to pack their bags and follow Parker, and were subsequently dropped by Capitol as a result. Incidentally, when that tour rolled into Chicago's Park West I witnessed one of the tightest and hottest live shows that Parker had ever performed. It was extremely exciting, too, as the Figgs played in earnest but with smiles on their faces throughout, as if still in disbelief that they were playing with one of their heroes and hitting every beat and chord as well as the Rumour ever had.

In Parker's free time he's managed to publish a set of short stories, Carp Fishing on Valium, in June 2000 and a novel, The Other Life of Brian that was released in September 2003. He now lives near Woodstock, New York.

At the Double Door in Chicago I was fortunate to not only formally meet Parker, but to talk to him about the current tour, briefly about his family (I'd mentioned a photo of Parker that appeared in Rolling Stone in the '80s with him holding up his first born toward the sky. He immediately recalled that and said it was in the Caribbean, that his daughter hates that photo, but best of all his response was met with a precious smile), and his relationship with the Figgs, whom he met in the early-'90s when both shared a dressing room at an Atlanta club. I was also there to witness what became one of the best, hardest hitting, energizing and exhausting live rock and roll shows that I have ever seen. As for Songs Of No Consequence, it'll certainly be one of the best records I'll hear all year.

Fast forward to September 2006: Songs Of No Consequence was indeed one of the finest rock records of 2005, and one of the best of Parker's career. Get it...get it good!

Dave

Graham Parker has for years been a prolific, if underrated songwriter, carving out his own space for songs that are definitely not for pop radio. Yet, Parker has the structure down, and tears it apart as he goes.

Since being signed to Bloodshot Records (a Chicago based roots label), Parker has had some solid output (the recent "Your Country" another great one), and "Songs of No Consequence" will continue that.

Pairing again with the Figgs (ironically a Graham Parker tribute band when he met up with them), the man again amazes with a sneering, cutting and very direct look at the world around him. "Vanity Press" should be a hit, but of course the US radio stations will never play it (it would hit too close to home for the media companies that run them). "Leave your conscience on the editor's desk," Parker says, and how true (as a former journalist I was on the fringes of it, and sometimes I felt like I had to...hated it).

"Go Little Jimmy" is an upbeat bluesy track with a lot of harp, very nice...other good ones include "Dislocated Life," "Bad Chardonnay" and "Did Everybody Just Get Old?"

Parker fans and people looking for something more than the syrupy pop-rock songs will not be disappointed here.

You can count on Graham Parker to deliver the goods without grousing about it a la Van Morrison, or being just too precious for his own self a la Declan MacManus, and on this vitriolic and venomous release Parker's slings his poisoned arrows on target and with a beat you can dance to. I've enjoyed his momentary bucolic moments as much as trhe revved up rockers, and this fall squarely in the latter category. Recorded in tony Bryn Mawr, a more incongruous place for GP I can not imagine, the ambient sound is full and immediate and Parkers enlists an able ensemble of Main Line band mates to carry off the mission at hand. They are very much on the page with GP and each track crackles, pops, spits fire.
"Vanity Press" is classic bile with a steady beat and "Bad Chardonnay" casts the career of an aging rocker in proper focus way beyond the petulant whining of the fatuous Van. "She swallows It" uses sexual metaphor for the way some women will enable a liar to perpetuate his bad behaviour. You get the picture: Graham tackles the underbelly of common life with a sharp, incisive, sometimes ironic and always pointed approach.
One of the other things you can count on is that Parker has an unerringly bad taste in cover graphics. While not as bad as ACID BUBBLEGUM, this CD booklet is a real horror. But that what makes Parker such an enjoyable listen. He'll never accede to glamour and PR. He's a right prickly bramble and God Bless Him for it.

I've never written a music review here before, but I must make an exception for "Songs of No Consequence" which is Graham Parker's strongest release since The Mona Lisa's Sister. Graham is clearly one of the greatest and underappreciated artists in rock, and this is an example of why he's regarded by those in the know as one of the strongest, most soulful and talented singer/songwriters of the last 30 years. Every cut here is excellent, but several stand out as being among Graham's best efforts ever. I would rank "She Swallows It", "Chloroform" (which is a derivative of "Obseessed with Aretha" from Acid Bubblegum), "Ambivalent" and especially "Dislocated Life" in this distinguished catagory. "Dislocated Life" is probably the best song Graham has written since "I'm Just Your Man" from Mona Lisa's Sister or "Blue Horizon" from Deepcut to Nowhere. I've seen Parker live in small venues several times, and he is the real deal. This guy has more talent in his fingernails than most other artists have in their entire bodies. The Figgs have given Graham a great fuller rock sound for his incredible hook-laden songs; they make a potent combination. My biggest disappointment is that Graham has informed the world that he will never again play in my home town ("I'll Never Play Jacksonville Again"). I keep hoping he changes his mind! If you get the chance to see him live, don't let the opportunity pass you by.

I'm afraid I must be the first contrarian among the initial reviewers and report a lukewarm reaction to Graham Parker's latest. I think that there's so much hunger out there for GP to make a real rockin' album like back in the glory days, that people will seize on anything with a solid beat and hail it as a grand return to form. To my ears, "Songs Of No Consequence" just doesn't live up to the high hopes and high praises it has received.

Fundamentally, there are 2 reasons why this CD is only so-so. First, the Figgs just lack the firepower to pull off a great GP rock album. They are perfectly competent, but they can only approximate the solid crunch and stinging guitar leads of GP's best albums, both with and without The Rumour. The perfect example is the new reggae song "Evil", which sounds remarkably similar to the classic "Don't Ask Me Questions", only the lead guitar has nowhere near the bite of the earlier tune. This CD is in fact much more similar in sound to the fairly recent "Acid Bubblegum" than to any of Graham's pre-"Mona Lisa's Sister" efforts.

The second concern is the songs themselves. In the past decade or two Graham has grown to become a superlative songwriter, but his best efforts have tended to be mature tales of mid-life love, parenting, and growing comfortable with the march of time. He's usually presented these songs in quiet, stripped down settings that were appropriate but could become bland over the course of a full album. But on "Acid Bubblegum" he showed that he could present these types of songs in a more rock 'n' roll context and make it work. Graham doesn't really try much to adapt his best lyrical capabilities to a rock setting on "Songs Of No Consequence". And maybe the title is telling us he knows it. Instead he gives us a set of underwritten songs that highlight his Angry Man persona, venting over various targets such as duplicitous lovers, vacuous former hipsters and tabloid journalism. Not that that couldn't have been great too. But it isn't. These lyrics sound rushed and often clunky rather than insightful.

Still, some songs stand out as worthy additions to the GP canon. The best cut is probably the one with the best lyrics, "Dislocated Life". "Chloroform" rocks convincingly, "Did Everybody Just Get Old?" displays Graham's characteristic wit to good effect, "Go Little Jimmy" is a nice bluesy diversion, and "Suck 'N' Blow" romps.

Overall - an enjoyable CD, but not the tour de force others have presented it as.

Buy this record. It's great, fun, and tasty. The comparisons that other writers have made between this record and other ones by Graham are boring. I don't know what they are talking about. I do know that Graham must have been feeling his power when he made it. I'm not gay (probably), but I love you Graham, and your new record made me feel gay (but not in a gay way). I plan to buy a crate of copies of this record and give them away to people. God bless the Figgs. Graham and the Figgs definitely feed off of each other's energies. Please keep recording together and come back to Milwaukee.

I saw Graham Parker at Moe's Alley in Santa Cruz this past month. I'd forgotten how smooth his voice is. Just him and the guitarist from his new band the Figgs (the name escapes me now but I think he used to be with the FIXX. Starting out with "Watch the Moon go Down" followed by a mix of old and new. Was great to see him again and good to see him in a small club. Just two guitars and two great voices. No flashy lights and smoke just good music....

I just recently got back into Graham Parker . I had tuned out after ..Episodes and ....Bubblegum , both of which I thought were on the mediocre side, but I bought all of the 2000 releases just to complete my collection . This one is by far the best of the lot and his best piece of work since Burning Questions imo. Vanity Press , Bad Chardonnay , Go Little Jimmy and There's Nothing On The Radio are standouts .The whole Cd is solid from top to bottom ...good to hear music with some substance for a change .