New Albums
BOBBY GILLESPIE & JEHNNY BETH
Dystopian divorce duets from Scream and Savages singers
Utopian Ashes SONY
8/10
Pairing most of Primal Scream with Savages singer Beth, Utopian Ashes is a loose concept album charting the trials of a married couple in crisis. It is also the most emotionally mature and fully realised work Gillespie has delivered in years, laying grainy, soulful, impassioned vocals over sumptuously old-school chansons clothed in vintage orchestral country-rock arrangements. The gloriously sardonic waltz-time ballad “English Towns” sounds like Jacques Brel covering Suede, while the ironically cheery sneerfest “Sunk In Reverie” finds Gillespie in classic Jarvis Cocker class-war territory. Sadly, Beth’s piercing Gallic voice is underused throughout, but still provides devastating counterpoint on forensic relationship post-mortems such as “Living A Lie”. Deliciously bitter chemistry.