For this first post I want to share with you a little golden oldie review I did a few years ago but have never shared...
James Morrison - The Awakening * * *
 |
| The Awakening album cover |
After a three year wait fans can express
a sigh of relief as the soulful singer, James Morrison is back with his debut
album, The Awakening. Following the
critical yet successful previous album Songs for you, Truths for me, James
revealed in interviews that he is fed up of writing and singing pop love songs and
just wants to write meaningful songs that people “just get.” So has he pulled
it off?
It is safe to say there is no one on the music scene like
James Morrison. He constantly experiments with his music, combining various
genres of music in order to get the best feel. So as James is such a fantastic,
talented, artist, it is disappointing to say that his debut album doesn’t pay
off. James wrote the tracks on this album after experiencing the death of his
beloved father. So you would think that the songs would be oozing emotion, but
sadly this is not the case. The album seems to lack any emotion or passion, and
this is coming from a big James Morrison fan.
However, it’s not all bad; there is a great variety
between up-beat songs like ‘Slave to the music’ and ballads like ‘In my
dreams.’ James has also incorporated another duet after the duet with Nelly
Furtado, ‘Broken Strings’ from his previous album became a number one hit. The
new duet, ‘Up’ features R&B icon Jessie J; the contrast of their musical
genres is actually very fitting and is guaranteed to be big.
It would be extremely harsh to say this album is bad. The
awakening is a decent album with some good songs to sing-a-long and dance to,
the album just lacks the emotion and passion that it should have. It also does
not have as many hits as his previous albums. However, it is still recommended
to give the album a listen; it’s a grower.
Best
tracks: Up, I won’t let you go, One life
