The Coral - Roots & Echoes (2007)

2007 album the eccentric Britpoppers. The album was recorded at Oasis EWheeler End Studios and produced by Craig Silvey (The Magic Numbers) during the opening months of 2007 and mixed in London throughout April. The Coral are one of the UK's most successful bands with eight Top 40 singles since their debut in 2001 the Coral find themselves as the possessors of four Top 5 albums at an age when many bands are still breaking through. Lead singer, James Skelly is the oldest member at just 26. The influence of the Coral on a generation of bands is hard to overstate, they returned the art of British Pop song writing to the charts and gathered influential fans along the way. One being Alex Turner of the Arctic Monkeys who has invited the band to support them on their European tour this summer and Lancashire County Cricket Ground shows. Columbia.

Roots & Echoes marks something of a change of scenery for The Coral. Not so long ago, it was all lepers, sea shanties, and lonely suicides round their ends, but this-the follow-up to 2005's The Invisible Invasion--tells quite a different tale. Recorded at Oasis' home studio in Buckinghamshire at the personal request of the Brothers Gallagher, this record captures the band casting out much of the bad vibes and concentrating on making a warm, vintage-sounding record with classic appeal. Of course, they can't help throwing in the odd spot of heart-in-mouth high tragedy-"Remember Me", a fraught tale of a very one-sided love affair, concludes with a howl of guitar and a final spasm of drums as vocalist James Skelly discovers the girl he carries a torch for has a ring on her finger. Elsewhere, though, there's beautifully recorded excursions into classic soul ("Put The Sun Back"), acoustic-tinged bossa nova ("Not So Lonely"), and Doors-like organ jams ("She's Got a Reason") which prove, as if there were any doubt, that this band have chops beyond the ability to bash out a ragged sea shanty or two. It is, in short, the sound of a more mature Coral, and while there are surely some fans who'll choose now to jump ship, disappointed at the lack of piratical adventure, all in all itll be their loss. -Louis Pattison