Steve Hiller's Perfect Tense, a Guantanamo suicide bomber and the Kingsize Five debut single

by Parsley on Sat, 2008/05/10 - 8:31am Post to Twitter

PARSLEY'S COMMLOCK

CD Review : The Perfect Tense, Stephen R.R. Hillier
Some people nurse a long unfulfilled ambition to learn a foreign language. Others like Stephen R.R. (a.k.a. Steve) Hillier, want to create their own solo album, and from 2003 to 2007 he worked on it. This review is coming with a similar lack of haste. Steve is a very good friend of mine from college days and after we lost touch in the late eighties I thought that he would either become a very serious and successful musician, as he is frighteningly talented, or he would turn his back on it and do nothing with it at all. Well neither was strictly true, as although you've probably never heard him, he has retained his talent and extended it into the netherworld of the home studio. This is one of the results.
1. Jewel – Everything But The Girl cocktail shimmy.
2. Perfect tense – haunting smooth track with lyrics conveying a private hell.
3. True colours – Steve feels no shame in creating an uptempo alternative to Cyndi Lauper’s song.
4. Elegance – man and acoustic guitar in ballad harmony, joined by classic eighties fretless bass.
5. Best days – Stevie Wonder-esque piano backing to pop funk track.
6. Famous friends – conveys the whole of Steely Dan in 2 chords
7. Leaving you someday – multiple key changes and harmonies somehow conveyed as relaxed.
8. All because of you – catchy key changes hook you in a sad smooth way.
9. Beautiful girl – Level 42 number about daughter Ruby, who takes delight in telling me I can’t sing.
10. Suddenly – slightly Terrahawks build from piano song to orchestral harmony effort.
11. Long time gone – short country acoustic chat.
12. What a way to go – Oasis style ramble missing a scouse drone, but featuring his clan’s voices.
It’s a highly professional swirling maze of Todd Rundgren, Weather Report, even Cliff Richard’s later efforts and the like, topped with Steve’s own distinctive voice. He’s avoided overbusy drum backings that I used to rib him for, and the whole thing is very well measured and paced. He’s also avoided the lengthiest tracks with several around 3 minutes or less. The inner CD sleeve deconstructs the whole thing for you musically, if you’re interested. My musical palette is extremely spoilt by sixties twangy stuff, and I have an almost sibling tendency to criticism of Steve. I would have liked to hear more of the bitter gritty guitar he plays when he’s playing in my band. His wah fuzz solo at the end of my song ‘Stupid Shirt’ has been highly acclaimed. Nevertheless, he’s long enough in the tooth to transcend my criticisms and become comfortable with his own chosen musical style. Hear some for yourself at http://www.myspace.com/stephenhillier

Security Review: Man released from Guantanamo is suicide bomber
Perhaps people in America could watch the film 'Watermelon Man', in which a white man wakes up to find he is black. Sorry to spoil it for you, but although it's a comedy, by the end of the film the protagonist has suffered such bad treatment that he joins a movement seeking justice through violent struggle. This week a US military spokesman informed us that someone released without charge from illegal imprisonment in Guantanamo Bay was found to have become a suicide bomber. The 'told you so' attitude was not exactly impressive. Apparently they didn’t know what motivated him. Might I gently suggest that anyone held in such a way would not be positively disposed to their captors? Several of them have committed suicide whilst in there. It speaks volumes that it is such 'shock' news. I'm sorry, but I assumed that the fact the USA held this person for so long in this way, was based on at least the slightest clue that they might do such a thing. Am I being naive? The fact that they could not find enough evidence to justify real captivity, and then didn't monitor subsequent movements sufficiently to prevent a bombing, is hardly a ringing endorsement of their approach. Meanwhile as I stand at Green Park tube station I am forced to remember the rats that share these tunnels with us. Apparently when the '7/7' bomb went off on the Piccadilly line, some of the city's worst paid workers were sent in to clean up the mess. They found that the rats were eating the dead bodies. I can hardly conceive what cleaning dead rat-eaten bodies from an underground tunnel does for someone’s mental attitude. Doing it for very low wages in one of the richest countries in the world seems unlikely to improve the experience.

Internet tip : http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?id=276154382
Type in this link and it will take you to the Kingsize Five iTunes pages. From there you can download their debut single, several times, and ensure they get on Top of the Pops, or Lift Off or whatever. Apparently it's not hard to get in the Top 40 these days, but they need your help to prove it.
And it's really good too. You'll love it. Allegedly.

parsley@gardenrecords.com [www.gardenrecords.com]