Heart of a Punk Soul of a Rasta

RPA & The United Nations of Sound
Manchester Academy 15th June 2010

Troubled Man versus The Troubleman.

Mad Richard is mad and there's no escaping that fact. He's as mad as a box of Amazonian Tree frogs, as daft as a yard brush and as dotty as a left handed cucumber. He's three bricks short of a hod, one storey short of a bungalow and pottier than Michael Bentine's Potty Time. Why for? Did he start out that way? Was it the FAME, fame (What's your name). Was it the drugs? I don't know! But hey I'm not talking his youth centre misdemeanour here. Oh no, that was quite normal.

For me Mad Richard is mad because ever since '97, when he was finally acknowledged as the greatest English songwriter of his generation, he's been trying to make albums like "What's Going On" by Marvin Gaye and "Roots" by Curtis Mayfield. OK so at least he's not alone in this mania (or raison d'etre). Mr Weller of the South has been trying to do the same thing since he was acknowledged as the greatest English songwriter of his generation too. Why do they do it? Well I could try to tell you but "there's not enough paper in the world".

Anyway it seems a very long day has past since last I saw RA & The Verve @ The Roundhouse in 2008; I thought it was a blistering return. But then what do I know. And it seems like almost 4 years and a month since last I saw RA and his "Keys to the World" back in May 2006. Strange.

This time round there hasn't been much promo hype around Mr Ashcroft's continuation. OK so he hasn't exactly sidled silently in through a side door, but neither has he been putting himself about blowing Vuvuzela, and shouting look at me I'm back.

All the same Richard Ashcroft is back and with a new band, and with a new name for a new band: RPA & The United Nations of Sound. The choice of personnel for the forthcoming album seems to be pointing unflinchingly towards the dreaded field of R&B. Oh shit shit shit. So in the ultra violet darkness of the Manchester Academy I stood waiting to see if R&B is where RPA is truly going. Alongside the massed entwined lovers of Manchester I waited. All age groups and orientations were there along with the poor unloved bastards like myself. And all of us hoping against hope that the DJ would eventually stop pissing about with his knobs and just play the records straight. It was never going to happen. Ego, ego, all is ego.

And then the lights went down.
And The United Nations of Sound bustled on.
And the chain was slipped off.
And "Are You Ready?" opened things up.
And after several bars the coated and jacketed and bespectacled RPA dashed low across the stage Took up the mic, and began to evangelise.

Before a Spector-esque wall of sound, with all the force Martin Luther King speech, RPA passionately set about bludgeoning us into accepting the path of the righteous. There was nothing to be gained by resisting, I decided to go with it.

"Born Again" followed, as it will do on the new album. Then "Song for the Lovers" with RPA's wife Kate Radley (nee of Spiritualized) gently rattling a tambourine and plinking a few Keys in the shadows. (Paul & Lynda? I'm not even going to go there). Then came another new track "Beatitude", and this is generally how it panned out. "Music is Power" had a damn good airing with Steve Wyreman using more wah wah than George Harrison did on "Wah Wah".

And so to the unplugged segment. The songs and song writing stripped bare. This is where the importance of Richard Ashcroft resides. "Lucky Man", "Check the Meaning", "Brave New World" and "Sonnet". Songs where RPA takes the intrinsically personal and makes it universal. Perfect. Powerful. If taking the personal and making it universal isn't ART, then I don't know what ART is. As far as the crowd were concerned this was where RPA was at his most evangelical. The rest of the gig played itself out, leaving behind it the moment of most significance. When the end came I wondered off across the city to The Factory to see if I could catch the end of John Power's set cos I was still hungry.

Richard Ashcroft is a driven man, a man of passions, a man of manias. If he chooses a path that musically and lyrically not "of himself" for him there's no faking it; his undeniable power is lost. For me when RPA sung "America" from the new album there was nothing of Ashcroft there. Was it the trite lyrical connections or the R&B backing I don't know. But it could have been anyone singing; anyone playing.

Somewhere in the lyrics of AE Housman, the music of Elgar, and the colours of Stanley Spencer is where Ashcroft should be. Not looking at a yellow dog on the sidewalk. But then, Richard Ashcroft is as mad as a box of Amazonian Tree frogs, as daft as a yard brush and as dotty as a left handed cucumber. He's three bricks short of a hod, one storey short of a bungalow and pottier than Michael Bentine's Potty Time. Cos when all is said and done all Richard Ashcroft of Northern England needs to be is Richard Ashcroft of Northern England. Will he be that on the forthcoming RPA & The United Nations of Sound album? We'll soon be finding out. CLICK HERE FOR MORE