All The Lost Souls

2005年にリリースされたデビュー・シングル「You're Beautiful」が世界各国のチャートで1位を獲得！ここ日本でもCMに起用されたりと、お茶の間でもすっかりお馴染みの楽曲になりましたね。また2006年に巻き起こったUK新世代シンガー・ソングライター・ムーヴメントのきっかともなった稀代の吟遊詩人、James Blunt。そして全世界で1,300万枚以上を売り上げたデビュー・アルバム『Back To Bedlam』から約2年・・・待望の2ndアルバムがついに完成！心に深く染み入る美しいメロディと優しいハスキー・ヴォイスが、またもや世界を虜にする!!

For as big a hit as it was, "You're Beautiful" wasn't necessarily representative of what kind of a singer/songwriter James Blunt is. It wasn't necessarily inaccurate, but it was misleading, suggesting that all this tremulously tuneful singer/songwriter wants to do is be sensitive -- that he aimed himself squarely at the middle of the road, crafting gentle music for housewives. That's not quite the case, as his 2007 sophomore effort, All the Lost Souls, makes plain. Surely, Blunt is wholly mainstream, a slicker, spirited variation on David Gray's elegantly upscale folk-pop, but he's not crassly commercial, deciding to disregard the path toward stultifying adult contemporary -- a path that "You're Beautiful" certainly pointed toward -- but he's also choosing to not write happy, harmless pop like Daniel Powter, still dwelling on moody, introspective midtempos. In other words, he still adheres to the Gray template the second time around, but he opens things up slightly with some spacy textures reminiscent of Coldplay and a heavy dose of classic popcraft, learned equally from Elton John, David Bowie, and Paul McCartney. Oddly, the sum total of these influences turns Blunt into the heir to that forgotten strain of wimpy, wispy songwriter-driven British pop of the '70s embodied by such once-stars as Al Stewart, Leo Sayer, and Gilbert O'Sullivan. The ghost of Gilbert echoes throughout "One of the Brightest Stars," and while this allusion is quite likely inadvertent, it also doesn't seem to be a coincidence that the opening song (and first single) on All the Lost Souls is a song that celebrates "1973," because much of this album feels like it could have been recorded and released during that mid-'70s heyday of sensitive pop. The main difference is not the clean, modern production with its slight digital flourishes -- things that push the rhythms forward on "Give Me Some Love," one of the livelier moments here -- but that Blunt isn't some quivering bedsit bard; he's the babe who enthusiastically shed his clothes in the "You're Beautiful" video, somebody whose confidence infuses his brokenhearted laments and makes them feel not quite so melancholy. This makes All the Lost Souls soothing, not haunting, and it also removes many of the quirks that distinguished '70s albums by McCartney, O'Sullivan, Sayer, and Elton, so this won't quite seduce that kind of pop fan (although this may hold more interest for them than they might initially think), nor will it win over anybody who can't quite get past the garbled, strangled soul affections of his voice, which remains his greatest liability -- but it will seduce anybody already won over by his 2005 debut, Back to Bedlam, since it's a tighter, more assured record than that. But chances are, they were seduced by Blunt already. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine

全世界を“You Are Beautiful”旋風に巻き込んだデビュー作から2年、今度はどんなキメ台詞で私たちを落としてくれるのだろうと思ったら、先行カット“1973”は哀愁AORテイスト全開の意外な作風で勝負してきた（しかし、これが名曲!）。かと思えば〈I Really Want You～〉と連呼する前作路線の実直なバラードもバッチリ収録。音楽的な懐の深さと大衆性との絶妙なバランス感でもって、またしてもみんなのハートを鷲掴みだ!
bounce (C)田中 幹也