The Korgis 2024
Dancing to his own tune, Caerphilly polymath corrals kindred spirits into a life-affirming swirl.
It was the plan all along: to follow-up THE KORGIS’ "UN-United Nations" with what became known as “ALienated Nation” which allowed one of the English ensemble’s members, Al Steele, to find a place for the surplus of tunes he wrote for the band’s double-barreled album – but drawing a line between this tripartite endeavor would have been difficult if not for their divergent line-ups. However, that aspect slips too, with the collective’s cofounder James Warren present here alongside other pals of Al’s; still, Steele skillfully managed to introduce slight stylistic differences to demarcate his solo effort from the group’s oeuvre. There’s no countries mapped on the veteran’s endeavor, yet there are country-music flavor applied to some of the songs on display, and then there’s “Putin And Trump – The Musical” appended to his record’s eleven numbers to tie the platter to time rather than geographical space.
Such a move might detach Al’s album from eternity all musicians try to embrace – only this vaudevillian addendum should bring to a close the circle which “Young ‘n’ Russian” from the ensemble’s 1979 debut opened by touching on the same subject, but while Steele didn’t go back to the (Red) square one, he effectively refreshed the familiar context. It’s in this extra offering that the top-notch pop-rock title track takes pride of place alongside the Al-ternative version of “Good Old Days Of The Cold War” – an inebriating, taking over the instrumental overture and the finale, role-dispensing pastiche the KGB would file away next to “Back in the U.S.S.R.” and “Rasputin” – from the KORGIS’ twofer, and it’s there that Sean McBride and Elaine Gilmore come to shine on the likes of “Keep The Blues Skies Above You” yet not before other guests make an appearance on the primary set of pieces.
Surprisingly, the listener is ushered into Steele’s world via Warren’s velvet voice elevating Al’s strings-drenched strum on “Thinking Of You” to sublime balladry and passing the baton to the main man’s alter-ego Wolfman whose deliberately, yet arrestingly, strident vocals on “Neverland” ride Andy Fairweather Low’s sharp riff and tasty shuffle. But if “In These Troubled Times” simply, albeit with a tad of swagger, rock ‘n’ rolls through social commentary, “Good Texas Leather” unfolds into a prairie-wide paean to love, and the psychedelically tinged “The Storm Before The Calm” proposes a trip towards hope eternal. Once there, the glitterball-highlighted “I Change” urges Lucy Lawson to step out and groove and Joe Matera to provide a series of stinging guitar licks, whereas “Long Way Down” sees Al and James duet and harmonize with a lot of gusto, preparing the scene for the scintillating “Summer Thing” that, helped by handclaps, warms it all up even more.
So although the almost orchestral “Moonshine” celebrates melancholy, it’s bookended with “The Perfect Song” and “The Last Song” which, in turn, infuse the album’s core with joie de vivre – respectively, sculpted as a spiritual hymn and an intimate anthem. This is the space apt to dissolve alienation and replace distance with affectionate, passionate, rapturous lust for life – this is the triumph of spirit Al Steele achieved ever so valiantly.
****3/4