{"id":81,"date":"2009-10-23T09:02:54","date_gmt":"2009-10-23T14:02:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=81"},"modified":"2009-10-23T09:02:54","modified_gmt":"2009-10-23T14:02:54","slug":"blast-from-the-past-julian-lennon-photograph-smile","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2009\/10\/23\/blast-from-the-past-julian-lennon-photograph-smile\/","title":{"rendered":"Blast From the Past: Julian Lennon – Photograph Smile"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here’s the final of five reviews covering the recorded work of Julian Lennon to date.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"JulianIn 1999 — eight years after his last album Help Yourself<\/em> — Julian Lennon<\/strong> quietly staged something of a comeback, albeit one than hardly anyone heard. Similar in that sense to Badfinger<\/strong>‘s ill-fated Wish You Were Here<\/em>, Julian’s Photograph Smile<\/em> finds him self-assured, freed from whatever pressures being on a major label exerted upon him. Plus, he was pushing forty. And as any good therapist can tell you — and as Julian’s dad poignantly wrote — life begins at 40.<\/p>\n

On Photograph Smile<\/em> Julian takes more command over the proceedings, seemingly paying heed to all he’s learned through his years of recording. For the first time, he’s credited as co-producer. His choice of musical collaborators includes Robbie Blunt<\/strong> (Robert Plant et. al.) on guitars, plus old friend Justin Clayton<\/strong>. Highlights abound on this, his finest record to date. The opening track “Day After Day” is a strong pop number that evokes much of what was good about late 1960s music; the tasteful string arrangement suits the songs perfectly. “I Don’t Wanna Know” (no relation to Valotte’s<\/em> “I Don’t Know” or Mr. Jordan<\/em>‘s “I Want You to Know” or even The Secret Value of Daydreaming<\/em>‘s “You Don’t have to Tell Me” or Photograph Smile’<\/em>s “I Should Have Known”) is a Britrocker in the tradition of, well, a lot of what was on the Beatles<\/strong>‘ Yesterday…and Today<\/em> LP. It’s an infectious, catchy rocker with a memorable hook; if Julian had released this on an earlier album, he well might have gotten a hit. The clean, spare arrangement of “How Many Times” is a true contrast from Julian’s sometimes overproduced earlier material, and the song features a strong melody. Throughout the record, the players sound more like a band and less like hired hands.<\/p>\n

Instrumentation is consistently interesting on Photograph Smile<\/em>. Bouzouki, slide guitar, tabla, and electric sitar are all used to great effect; they’re critical ingredients rather than pasted-on gimmicks. “Crucified” is Julian Lennon’s musical visit to Kashmir, and it’s a convincing one at that. The waltzing “Good to Be Lonely” is a fetching, intimate tune that ranks among Julian’s finest moments on record; it’s sort of Julian’s answer to “In My Life”. The slide guitar that opens “And She Cries” is unmistakably influenced by George Harrison<\/strong>; if the liner notes didn’t indicate otherwise, you’d seriously wonder if it was him.<\/p>\n

And the other songs are damn fine as well.<\/p>\n

Throughout Photograph Smile<\/em>, Lennon sounds self-assured, as if to say, this is who I am and what I sound like. Photograph Smile<\/em> is a criminally overlooked record. At fourteen tracks, it’s his longest album, and there’s not a weak track in the bunch.<\/p>\n

As of this writing (October 2009), Lennon has just released a single track online. The track, “Lucy”, is dedicated to the memory of a childhood friend who died recently. Julian’s childhood drawing of his classmate was the inspiration for John Lennon<\/strong>‘s “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds.” Julian promises a new album called Everything Changes<\/em> — his first in a decade — in 2010. Stay tuned.<\/p>\n

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Here’s the final of five reviews covering the recorded work of Julian Lennon to date. In 1999 — eight years after his last album Help Yourself — Julian Lennon quietly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[64,65],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-81","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reissue","category-review","cat-64-id","cat-65-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=81"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=81"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=81"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}