Very much a song driven album this one, and very good songs they are too. Mr Norsworthy wrote all 11 tracks on the album and his vocals are the focus on all of them. He is a fine wordsmith but the songs are more than mere words and musically it is a delight as well.
Adam himself is well-established on the UK scene. For 20 years, he’s been the frontman (singer, guitarist, primary songwriter) of four-time British Blues Award nominees The Mustangs. He’s also guitarist and songwriter in The Milk Men, whose latest album ‘Deliverance’ enjoyed Top 40 chart success.
Adam Norsworthy has attracted some fine players to work with him on this, his fourth, album – Wayne Proctor on drums & percussion, Oli Brown on bass guitar(!) plus a couple of lead guitar solos, Bennett Holland on keys, Rich Young on piano with Wayne Proctor also co-producing and applying the finishing touches mixing and mastering.
There is a slight 80’s/90’s feel to the album with strong drumming and spacious soundscape but it is also quite timeless, every song feeling natural and unforced and he deals with some pretty heavy themes including love, loss, mortality, the environment, the human drive to explore the cosmos and to find not only meaning to life, but new worlds as homes on the high frontier and beyond. But he doesn’t overstretch his concepts so that the songs are listenable to on multiple levels.
Musically, he touches on Blues, rock, pop but he is, first and foremost, a singer/songwriter.
There is little point in focusing on individual tracks as the quality runs all through the album and I found that once started, I didn’t want to pick on individual tracks.
A bloody fine album, one of the real quality offerings I have had this year.
