No apologies necessary…
This lowly subject was cast from the throne on 18 March 2016 and has now been served by Ian “The Unrepentant” Savage
So, if you’re reading this you’d probably like to know how good or otherwise Scott Sorry‘s first ‘proper’ solo album is, right? After all, it’s been nearly seven years since the full-on punk ‘n’ roll of Sorry And The Sinatras’ Highball Roller, and barring a tour or two on four-string duties for The Wildhearts he’s seemingly been pretty quiet.
If you don’t mind, I’ll illustrate the quality of When We Were Kings by the number of objective-music-review ‘guidelines’ I break in the next few hundred words – two points for each one broken. Clear on the rules? Okay, let’s go.
I’ve already breached the fourth wall to address ‘you’ directly, and used the first person out of sheer excitement, so there’s 4/10. I’ll now assert that ‘Broken Hearts & ’45s’ is the best opening track to an album I’ve heard in a decade: slap on another couple. Over the course of the next half dozen punk-charged poetic polemics and open letters to unnamed antagonists I can, in April, confidently say that WWWK will make my own Midlands Rocks ‘Top Five Albums of 2016’ (+2 points).
And we’re only two-thirds of the way through. Factor in the ‘sprint-for-the-finish’ ‘Rewired’ (as close as this album comes to the borderline-hardcore of ‘Highball Roller’), the singalong-a-soul-search of ‘Turning Ashes’ and heartfelt closer ‘Days On End’, and this is getting dangerously close to knocking it out of the park.
You know what? Sometimes an album’s so good that you know it’s going to be an aural psychotherapist for the rest of your days. Did I just deliberately word a review sentence so that it could be used on its own for album promotion? Yes I fucking did. Add two.
10 out of 10
Track listing:
- Broken Hearts & ’45s
- End Of Summer
- Close Calls
- Give It
- ‘Til All The Pieces Fit
- When We Were Kings
- Rewired
- Turning Ashes
- Carry On
- Days On End
