Athlete – Tourist

Posted on 10th Feb 05 by Contributor | 0

Artist: Athlete
Author: Gary

Judging by some of the hype surrounding Athlete at the moment”
their second album” Tourist” is going to reach multi”platinum
sales” help them sell out tours on both sides of the Atlantic
and probably make them millionaires by the end of 2005. Of course”
that doesn”t necessarily mean the album is going to be any good.

Compared to their first outing Vehicles And Animals 2 years ago”
Tourist sees the London 4 piece strip away the jangling guitars
and trying to create a larger” more vast” landscape of sound” i.e.
Mercury Rev size string sections and gospel choirs. Also gone is
most of the uncertainty and vulnerability that portrayed their debut.

The album starts with Chances with lead singer Joel Pott singing
“Take all the chances while you can” you never know when they”ll
pass you by”" Initially” it”s sounds like Elbow playing a Coldplay
song but then the swishing strings slide in and take the song off
somewhere completely different. Next up” Half Light “amp” Tourist are
quite unthreatening songs with Pott”in his unassuming voice” doing
the soft verse/loud chorus as good as is musically possible. These
songs would warm the ears off any 96fm listener but utterly they
are quite forgettable.

The one classic moment on the album comes in the form of Wires.
At first it just sounds like a sweet” catchy song” nothing very
interesting. But when you find out that the “wires” in the song
are the ones that were connected up to Joel”s newly born baby”
“who was placed in intensive care after she was born prematurely”"
then the song takes on a whole new meaning.

“You got wires”goin in”/you got wires” comin” out of you”re skin/
You got tears makin” tracks/I got tears that are scared of the facts”.

It”s a beautiful song that will go straight to the heart of even
the most cynical listener.

Other highlights on the album are Yesterday Threw Everything At Me
and Street Map. The former is a short” gracious number with Pott
singing “You are the first on my list/when everything everything
around is gone”. The former is a soft piano led ballad” with the
singer telling his lover “One day it”s gonna happen/ I don”t know when
I”ll be on your street /But I know one day it”s gonna happen /You”re
gonna be swept off your feet”.

Tourist is a good album. Potts voice isn”t the strongest but it”s
the vulnerability in it that might entice some listeners. It”s an
album that won”t blow anyway away” but at times” some of the poetic
lyrics accompanied by the swelling strings provide what could be
many people”s soundtrack of 2005.

Rating: 7/10