Galore: Reviews

Q Magazine

The music business still has certain expectations of a female artist. It's preferable that she adopt the guise of either babe, priestess or lad and she should at all costs avoid reaching 30. Kirsty MacColl's commercial strike rate as described in this collection - one hit every four years since There's A Guy Works Down The Chip Shop Swears He's Elvis reached Number 14 in 1981 - underlines how difficult it can be to venture into the public eye without an image that can be scribbled on the back of a matchbox or much of an appetite for live work. Two of her three biggest hits, Days and A New England, were covers, from Ray Davies and Billy Bragg, which doesn't seem just. She's always written strong material with collaborators like Johnny Marr or Fairground Attraction's Mark Nevin, and on the 1989 album Kite (1989), she pulled together a collection of postcards from the waning boom which shamed the competition, most of whom took themselves far more seriously. If there's a better song about Thatcherism than Free World or a better one about promiscuity than Don't Come The Cowboy With Me then we'd all benefit from their release.

Her first single, They Don't Know, which came out on Stiff Records in 1979, is a nod to Grease with its piercing four syllable Baby! and the double-tracked harmony which has since become a trademark. Its tone is far removed from the woman who addresses Shane MacGowan as scumbag, maggot and cheap lousy faggot on Fairytale Of New York, the best thing The Pogues ever had a hand in and the only great Christmas record of the last 10 years. There's a similar relish in her version of Cole Porter's Miss Otis Regrets from the Red Hot & Blue benefit album.

Other highlights include the title track of her last outing, Titanic Days, a melodic but disturbing account of a violent sexual encounter in a none too cheap hotel, My Affair, in frisky praise of a bit on the side, and the new single, Caroline, which deals chirpily with the mixed feelings of the self-confessed homebreaker. Her songs are built from the stuff of real people's real lives, not the moonings of an imagination stalled on the tour bus, and they underline the fact that great pop music is still among us if we only know where to look.

David Hepworth

PAUL FREEMAN San Mateo Times Correspondent

If you haven't heard of Kirsty MacColl, you're forgiven. Her previous albums went relatively ignored in the United States. But if you miss out on her latest effort, "Galore",you should be ashamed of yourself. I.R.S. Records is doing its best to promote this remarkable pop talent. "Galore" features 18 of the best songs from her 15-year career. Among the highlights are the single "Caroline" and the rockabilly "There's a Guy Works Down the Chip Shop Swears He's Elvis". Well known in the United Kingdom, MacColl is overdue for recognition on this side of the Atlantic.

Galore: Reviews

Q Magazine

PAUL FREEMAN San Mateo Times Correspondent

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