Glenn Tilbrook released Happy Ending

Happy Ending Glenn Tilbrook

Released: April 8, 2014 Peak: -- Sales (in millions): -- Genre: adult alternative singer/songwriter

Tracks: Song Title [time] Ray [3:57] Persephone [3:26] Mud Island [2:41] Rupert [3:00] Everybody Sometimes [3:20] Dennis [3:05] Hello There [2:49] Bongo Bill [2:29] Kev and Dave [3:36] Fruit Cake [3:08] Peter [3:11] Ice Cream [1:32]

Rating: 3.574 out of 5.00 (average of 8 ratings) Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Album: This is Glenn Tilbrook’s fifth outing sans Squeeze. In that group, formed with Chris Difford more than 30 years ago, Tilbrook wrote the music and Difford the lyrics. “Without the comfort blanket of Chris Difford’s lyrics to wrap himself in, he has written all the songs here (bar one co-write) by himself.” PM While Tilbrook is “one of the greatest British songwriters of all time” APS his “work has not always been consistently brilliant and so a new solo album from him doesn’t…mean that it will be a work of genius.” APS This one may not “endure as a fan favorite for years to come” APS but is “enjoyable in parts.” APS Tilbrook has “shown the priceless ability throughout his career to pen a melody, and Happy Ending houses enough of those melodies to make this LP a pretty pleasurable listen.” PM “The instrumentation and arrangements are first class. His voice never dips, and showcases its great quality when it soars. Above all, it’s an album which leaves you in a good mood.” PM Happy Ending finds Tilbrook in acoustic mode with no electric guitars and his kids sing backing vocals on a couple of the songs. PM “The stand-outs shine splendidly. None more so than Everybody Sometimes,” PM “a slice of classic Glenn Tibrook with a very pleasing melody, interesting left-field chords and a warm, beautiful chorus.” APS It is “a relentlessly upbeat song that combines a wry look at business intentions and practices with a gorgeous chorus — ‘There’ll always be another day,’ and who could argue with that? — backed up by an on-the-money shuffle beat, ukulele, bongo drums and some beautiful soothing noises that sound like they have been coaxed out of a glockenspiel. The way the song wanders up major chords then slides down minor ones is a master class of pure pop tune-smithing. Plus, the Tilbrook soaring tenor, always a prime selling-point of the best Squeeze songs, is in fine form and losing none of its lustre.” PM “If there is a criticism of the album as a whole, it is somewhat stop-start both in terms of its quality and pace. Hence, ‘Everybody Sometimes,’ a song that sounds like a ready-made introduction to Spring, is followed by the disjointed Dennis, which fails to find a groove, succeeds for a fleeting moment, and then manages to lose it — the track that lost its mojo.” PM “The Indian-flavoured Mud Island is difficult to love, the drums, kazoos and tuneless vocals all adding up to a cacophony of noise that the lyrics cannot rescue.” APS “Happy Ending offers some other pop pleasures, like Hello There, a track with ’60s harmonies, George Harrison-like slide guitar embellishments, and a feel that (the Tilbrook idiosyncracy again) evokes a mid-’70s Flaming Groovies power-pop vibe.” PM Ray is “a rather gorgeous shimmering, melodic song about an older, cantankerous soul.” APS Persephone is “another one of the album’s minor triumphs.” PM It is “a delightful chamber-pop composition about a female free-spirit.” APS It has “an interesting and aesthetically pleasing instrumental and arrangement.” APS “Its insistently chugging Easybeats’ ‘Friday on my Mind’ rhythm is complemented by a luscious string arrangement and some delicious Indian raga touches.” PM It “is absolutely impossible to dislike.” APS Rupert is “about phone-hacking, is presumably meant to deal with one R. Murdoch…his more objective narrative…performs a public service of sorts with a hint of lyrical sardonicism, as he sings ‘Rupert was humbled and terribly sorry.’” PM “The LP builds to a strong finish…Kev and Dave, Fruitcake (a paen to his slightly ‘bonkers’ loved one), and Peter are an excellently tuneful run of three.” PM “Kev and Dave” is “an excellent song…with…terrific music, melody and lyrics” APS but “if it was given the full Squeeze band treatment instead of the sparse, minimalistic arrangement here, it could be so much more.” APS “Peter” “has an enjoyable pop sensibility to it and tells the story of the kind of great character Chris Difford usually excels at which demonstrates how good a lyricist Glenn has become over the years.” APS The album wraps with “the jokey Ice Cream” APS which Glenn says his grandfather used to sing to him, “so it is easy to understand the sentimental value of the song.” APS

Resources and Related Links: APS Album Preservation Society PM Pop Matters album review by Richard Folland WK Wikipedia Other Related DMDB Pages: First posted 2/6/2022.

Sarah McLachlan Fumbling Towards Ecstasy

Fumbling Towards Ecstasy Sarah McLachlan

Released: October 22, 1993 Peak: 50 US, -- UK, 5 CN, 102 AU, 5 DF Sales (in millions): 3.0 US, -- UK, 3.5 world (includes US and UK) Genre: alternative rock

Tracks: Song Title (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to charts. Possession (9/10/93, 73 BB, 19 A40, 19 AA, 16 MR, 26 CN, 8 DF) Wait Plenty (26 DF) Good Enough (7/19/94, 77 BB, 16 MR, 9 CN, 4 DF) Mary (7 DF) Elsewhere (29 DF) Circle Ice Hold On (3/1/94, 29 MR, 59 CN, 14 DF) Ice Cream (10/16/99, 12 A40, 9 CN, 2 DF) Fear Fumbling Towards Ecstasy (58 CN, 8 DF) Possession [unlisted alternate version] (10 DF) Total Running Time: 57:50

Rating: 4.151 out of 5.00 (average of 20 ratings) Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About Sarah McLachlan Sarah McLachlan was born in 1968 in Nova Scotia, Canada. She started music at an early age, playing the ukulele when she was four and later studying classical guitar, classical piano, and voice at the Maritime Conservatory of Music. She fronted the band October Game while still in high school. After their first concert McLachlan was offeed a recording contract with Nettwerk, a Vancouver-based independent record label. WK She wouldn’t sign with them until two years later after finishing high school and a year of school at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design at the insistence of her parents. WK She released her first album, Touch, in 1988. It peaked at #132 on the Billboard album chart and eventually went gold. Her follow-up album, 1991’s Solace, would also achieve gold status in the United States and again dent the lower regions of the Billboard album chart (#167). Three singles charted in her native Canada where the album reached #20 and sold 200,000 copies. American Success Fumbling Towards Ecstasy, her third album, was “a slow-burning success story.” SL It saw McLachlan reach the Billboard Hot 100 in America for the first time. While the album only peaked at #50, it would go on to sell three million copies. About the Album It is “a softly assured album that combined the atmospheric production of Pierre Marchand (a former apprentice – and evident disciple – of Daniel Lanois) with some of McLachlan’s strongest songwriting to date.” AM “Tales of sin, lust, and love are delivered alongside piano arpeggios and electronic flourishes.” AM “At the center of everything was her voice, an ethereal, lilting soprano that helped pave the way for Paula Cole, Lillith Fair, and a decade’s worth of successful female songwriters. McLachlan utilized the crack between her chest and head voice, emphasizing the changing tones as her melodies climbed into the vocal stratosphere.” AM “Fumbling Towards Ecstasy takes most of its strength from the lush, rhythmic dreamscapes that dominate the album.” AM It is “alternately dark and shimmering, intimate and ornate, soothing and slyly unsettling.” AM “McLachlan’s work was rarely as raw or honest as it is on this record.” AM The Songs Here are insights into some of the individual tracks. “Possession” Possession, the album’s lead-off single, “is a jarring love ballad with lyrics inspired by a stalker’s correspondence.” AM It “is an intensely dark account of a man (or woman) who becomes obsessed with a pop singer and ultimately finds satiation in dreams.” SL “There’s a double-edged quality to the song’s eerie lines – ‘I’ll take your breath away,’ ‘I won’t be denied,’ ‘Just close your eyes, dear’ – and Marchand underscores that tension by setting McLachlan’s melodies to a nocturnal trip-hop beat.” AM The song “took its time fluttering around the bottom regions of the pop charts, but it’s ultimately become one of the artist’s signature songs.” SL “Good Enough” Good Enough, the second single, gave McLachlan her first top-ten hit in Canada. Like “Possession” it would also crack the Billboard Hot 100’s lower regions and reach the modern rock chart. “Allusions to forbidden love, temptation, and shame are littered throughout tracks like ‘Good Enough’ and the propulsive Wait.” SL “Ice Cream” Ice Cream would also reach the Canadian top-ten, although it wasn’t until it was released as a live version in 1999. The song “likens love’s sweetness to decadent deserts.” AM “Hold On” Hold On was a minor hit for McLachlan, reaching the Canadian pop chart and the American modern rock chart. It “was inspired by the AIDS documentary A Promise Kept, and serves as a woman’s impassioned plea for God to keep her dying lover safe both in life and death. “ SL “Ice” “The foreboding Ice finds McLachlan imploring, ‘You enter into me a lie upon your lips / Offer what you can, I’ll take all that I can get.’ The track begins with an anxious acoustic guitar riff, a serpentine saxophone winding its way in between the beats of a pulsing drum machine and menacing kick-drum.” SL “Elsewhere” and “Plenty” “Longtime producer Pierre Marchand expertly stacks McLachlan’s vocal harmonies one on top of the other, as on the exquisite Elsewhere, in which the brittle percussion chips away at the ‘heaven’ she claims to have found and on the stunning Plenty, where Marchand’s ‘found sounds’ mingle with McLachlan’s hesitant vocal overdubs.” SL “Fumbling Towards Ecstasy” So much of Fumbling Towards Ecstasy is about restraint, so that by the time she (and we) reach the album’s title track she truly is on her way toward ecstasy. The trouble with the album’s title, however, is that she never fumbles. Not even once.” SL

Review Sources: AM AllMusic.com review by Andrew Leahey SL Slant Magazine (6/30/2003). “Vital Pop: 50 Essential Pop Albums” by Slant staff WK Wikipedia page on Sarah McLachlan Related DMDB Links: First posted 11/14/2008; last updated 12/10/2024.