GARFUNKEL & GARFUNKEL: Father And Son (BMG)
Verdict: Classy covers
Performing with his former classmate Paul Simon, Art Garfunkel was one half of America’s greatest pop duo. Now 83, he’s re-booting his career with a new musical partner… his 33-year-old son Art Garfunkel Jr.
Fans expecting any insight into the workings of the Garfunkel family dynasty — or, indeed, Art Senior’s often fraught relationship with Paul Simon — won’t find much to interest them here. Father And Son, its title lifted from the Cat Stevens song that closes the album, is a straightforward covers collection split between swing standards and pop hits from the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. What the two Garfunkels do bring to the table, though, is a rare artistic chemistry and some superb harmonies.
Art Senior’s voice is deeper than it once was, but his smooth, mature tone is an effective foil to his son, who can still hit the high notes. With Italian arranger Davide Rossi adding lush strings and brass, the results are richly melodic.
The elder Garfunkel has been quiet of late. He and Paul Simon last sang together in 2010, but recently met for lunch, and Art hasn’t given up hope of the pair reuniting. His own career has been fitful, however. He curated a compilation of his greatest hits, The Singer, in 2012, but his last solo effort, Some Enchanted Evening, came out in 2007.
He still has presence though. He’s in his element on Paul McCartney’s Blackbird, covered earlier this year by Beyoncé, and trades verses with his son on Vincent, Don McLean’s homage to Vincent Van Gogh.
Art Garfunkel’s re-booting his career with a new musical partner… his 33-year-old son Art Garfunkel Jr
Art Garfunkel and his son Paul at the 45th Annual Grammy Awards, at Madison Square Garden, New York City, New York USA
Simon & Garfunkel sang the Everly Brothers’ Bye Bye Love in 1970, and there’s another Everlys cover here in Let It Be Me
Art Senior’s voice is deeper than it once was, but his smooth, mature tone is an effective foil to his son, who can still hit the high notes
Art Garfunkel and Art Garfunkel jr. perform onstage during The New York Pops 41st Birthday Gala honoring Clive Davis at Carnegie Hall
The younger Garfunkel, who was born James but changed his name to Art, can’t pace a song with the same skill as Dad, but he’s a talented vocalist who cut his teeth singing easy-listening pop in Germany, where he lives. His forte here is the 1980s: Cyndi Lauper’s Time After Time showcases his piercing falsetto; it was his decision to cover the Eurythmics’ Here Comes The Rain Again.
Elsewhere, his father is more prominent. Simon & Garfunkel sang the Everly Brothers’ Bye Bye Love in 1970, and there’s another Everlys cover here in Let It Be Me. Garfunkel’s affection for 60s doo-wop is also apparent in new versions of Blue Moon and Once In A While.
But the most daring inclusion is a revamp of Simon & Garfunkel’s Old Friends, a 1968 track about two elderly men looking back on their lives as they sit together on a park bench. It’s a heartfelt homage… but one that will only add to the clamour for a reunion with one old friend in particular.
PRIMAL SCREAM: Come Ahead (BMG)
Verdict: Patchy but funky
Come Ahead is an album on which Gillespie broke with tradition by writing the words and music at home before flying to Belfast
Gillespie, who is married to fashion stylist Katy England, has had issues with addiction in the past
Bobby Gillespie was the first to concede that Primal Scream needed a break after 2016’s Chaosmosis. The band had zig-zagged their way through a variety of styles since forming in Glasgow in 1982 — jangling guitar-pop; leather-trousered rock’n’roll; acid house-inspired psychedelia — but were drawing on their influences so blatantly that it was hard to take them seriously.
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So the singer put the band on hold and branched out, penning his 2021 memoir Tenement Kid, recording an LP of torch songs with French singer Jehnny Beth, writing a film score and working with Paul Weller. A Primal Scream album wasn’t on the agenda until he was cajoled back into the studio by Belfast DJ David Holmes.
The result is Come Ahead, an album on which Gillespie broke with tradition by writing the words and music at home before flying to Belfast, where producer Holmes added dance beats and drum loops. Multi-instrumentalist Andrew Innes then overdubbed guitars, keyboards, synths and mandolin. The results are somewhat patchy, but Primal Scream sound like a band reborn.
Soulful strings and a gospel choir dominate the opening tracks. Ready To Go Home mixes lyrics about mortality with a disco backbeat. Love Insurrection takes its cues from the string-driven Philadelphia soul of the 1970s.
Deep Dark Waters, which warns of the horrors of war, is well-meaning but clunky. The Centre Cannot Hold identifies the cult of wellness as a symptom of a failing society.
His personal songs are better, with Heal Yourself a ballad about addiction in which a male protagonist is saved by the love of a strong woman.
Gillespie, who is married to fashion stylist Katy England, has had issues with addiction in the past, and his tale of redemption will inevitably be seen as autobiographical.
Come Ahead takes its title from a Glaswegian phrase meant as an aggressive rallying cry, but it’s the album’s tender moments that deliver the most telling blows.
Both albums are out today. Primal Scream start a UK tour on March 31, 2025 in Bristol (ticketmaster.co.uk).
MICHAEL BALL & ALFIE BOE: Together At Home (Tag8)
Duetting with power and precision, the pair stick faithfully to the existing arrangements on Peter Gabriel’s Solsbury Hill and Gerry Rafferty’s Baker Stree
Abandoning the show tunes that have become their calling card, musical theatre stalwarts Michael Ball and Alfie Boe turn instead to pop standards on their sixth album.
Duetting with power and precision, the pair stick faithfully to the existing arrangements on Peter Gabriel’s Solsbury Hill and Gerry Rafferty’s Baker Street, while Take That’s Rule The World remains a billowing ballad.
The second half of the album is more interesting, with an appealing take on Ewan MacColl’s Dirty Old Town and a raucous medley of Irish folk songs.
TWINNIE: Something We Used To Say (IKAW)
Some tracks verge on the generic, but there’s slick, Shania Twain-style pop on Lonely Long
West End actress-turned-country artist Twinnie-Lee Moore deserves maximum points for ambition and lyrical output on her second album. A 22-song double LP lasting a full hour and 17 minutes, it documents the end of a long-term relationship while marking the end of the Yorkshire singer’s ‘sad girl’ era.
Some tracks verge on the generic, but there’s slick, Shania Twain-style pop on Lonely Long, and an infectious, carefree spirit as Twinnie teases a former lover on Girl In Your Songs: ‘She’s your girl… but I’m the girl in your songs.’
BRITTEN: The Prince Of The Pagodas
(Hallé CD HLD 7565, two CDs)
This is only the second complete recording — even Britten’s own was cut — and it is beautifully executed by the Hallé Orchestra
It is possible to love Benjamin Britten’s compositions without even realising that he wrote ballet music such as this mid-1950s score.
This is only the second complete recording — even Britten’s own was cut — and it is beautifully executed by the Hallé Orchestra under its 38-year-old new chief conductor Kahchun Wong from Singapore.
Britten had already been commissioned by Sadler’s Wells Ballet when he and his companion Peter Pears went on a world tour in 1955-56; their visit to Bali (and exposure to the local gamelan music) was a revelation.
Kahchun Wong has loved the ballet since his student days, when he was amazed to discover that the composer had recreated the gamelan music for Act II Scene 2 using Western percussion instruments.
This fairy tale in dance has an enormous quota of individual numbers, all of which are unfailingly tuneful; and the recording quality achieved in Hallé St Peter’s, Ancoats, Manchester, is life-like.
R. & C. SCHUMANN: Oboe Music
(Chandos CHAN 20295)
The sessions were held last year at Potton Hall in Suffolk and they clearly went smoothly
Two senior British musicians, oboist Nicholas Daniel and pianist Julius Drake, give a lesson in bel canto ‘singing’ on their instruments.
Can it really be 44 years since Daniel won the BBC Young Musician competition? He still coaxes a lithe, elastic tone out of what the great Leon Goossens called ‘an ill wind that nobody blows good’.
This is the best version of Robert Schumann’s Three Romances since the classic record by Holliger and Brendel; and the Fantasy Pieces, originally for clarinet, sound here as if they were made for the oboe.
Daniel has cleverly arranged Clara Schumann’s Three Romances for violin, probably her best-known pieces; and various other transcriptions of music by Robert, including the song Mondnacht, work well.
The sessions were held last year at Potton Hall in Suffolk and they clearly went smoothly; Drake is a fine accompanist and the two men could hardly be in greater accord. Lovely, luminous recordings.
TULLY POTTER