RPA & The United Nations Of Sound - The United Nations Of Sound

Nach "Urban Hymns" (1997) ging es stetig bergab mit Herrn Ashcroft. Seine drei Soloalben ("Alone With Everybody", 2000, "Human Conditions", 2002, und "Keys To The World, 2006) verloren zunehmend an Qualität und mit dem kurzzeitigen, aber eher unsäglichen Comeback von The Verve ("Forth", 2008) brauche ich hier erst gar nicht anzufangen. Aber zumindest in der Heimat stimmte der Erfolg, denn alle fünf genannten Alben konnten in England die Top 3 der Charts erreichen, die beiden Verve-Alben und der erste Solo-Versuch sogar Platz 1.

Nun nimmt Richard Paul Ashcroft, wie er mit vollem Namen heißt, als RPA einen neuen Anlauf und formiert mit The United Nations Of Sound auch gleich eine neue Begleitband mit US-amerikanischen Musikern, die eigentlich im Soul, HipHop oder R&B beheimatet sind. Die Kritiken sind größtenteils schlecht und das Album strandete auf Platz 20 der Charts.
Werden die Richter hier gnädiger zu Ashcrofts Wiedergeburt sein?

"Born Again" Video

How did the UN of Sound go so terribly wrong? Instinctually cool, Ashcroft is a borderline mystical figure, effortlessly outclassing his more lumpen peers, the Gallagher brothers. He has bone structure, and a fully operational sense of populist uplift. The United Nations of Sound should have been a lush, stirring work. Instead, it misfires wildly.

(...) There is even a song called "Beatitudes", a ghastly extended pun on beat/beatitude in which Ashcroft's half-raps makes even less sense up against Steve Wyreman's wah-wah guitar solos. More sins? "Royal Highness" steals baldly from the Velvet Underground's "Sweet Jane"; the falsetto on "Life Can Be So Beautiful"; the title of "Life Can Be So Beautiful".

The blues serve Ashcroft a little better. "How Deep Is Your Man" might be a little overcooked musically, but Ashcroft undersings it with a knowing smile in his voice, a quality fatally lacking elsewhere. More of this playfulness would have helped, as well as an honestly searching spirit. Ultimately, the soul men's expensive studio gloss holds Ashcroft back instead of lifting him. What a waste.
(Guardian)

"Are You Ready?" Video

Richard Paul Ashcroft has assembled that most ruggedly authentic of musical backings, a team of LA session players, and walked them through all of his most anodyne default settings, at a deadeningly flat pace.
(NME)

Ultimately, despite some innovation, United Nations of Sound cannot transcend the presence of its architect, who renders half the tracks fundamentally unlistenable with his horrible attempts to play gospel preacher or loverman.
(Drowned In Sound)