Brand Gallagher gives you what you want, just don’t go expecting too much:

Riverman: Here comes the same clipped acoustic riff of old and it’s as if he never left 1995, trapped in a warp of time, imitating himself, treading waters too deep and treacherous. The production lifts it as Xanax would affect a bored housewife. This is MOR rock but with a sweetly phrased guitar solo that makes you think it’s 1972 and Santana is jamming in the studio, just for fun.

In The Heat Of The Moment: Kicks off like Franz Ferdinand would and, with tonnes of reverb on the guitar, you soon grow benumbed, a back beat straight out of Clem Burke’s bag of tricks. With too many shades of Blondie, it’s a tune that is eminently remixable for the dance floor (deliberately so) with a “Nah Nah Nah Nah Nah” refrain. It washes over you like surf.

The Girl With X-Ray Eyes: Nice Fab Four chord progression to open accompanied by a Nordic wistfulness a la Benny Andersson. By this third track it is discernible that Gallagher has changed musical styles as he would his postcode. The production presses itself too insistently into the mix. It’s a deliberate move to polish the rough Oasis corners. Too slick for some, perhaps, who might be looking for the Noel of old. It’s music for coffee drinkers, not swillers of beer. With a nod and a wink to Bowie, beware its derivativeness.

Lock All The Doors: This one drives from the off, the crashing chords very much reminiscent of Bonehead as Gallagher’s voice is obliterated by the production again. Like late Oasis, the rattling of musical sabres is all that can be heard. The lyric is lost. Like an Oasis tune discarded and refound, it exists perhaps only to pad.

The Dying Of The Light: Another four chord shuffle around the chord of D. “Have I heard this song before?” you ask yourself. Mr G sings that he’s “tired of watching all the flowers turn to stone”. Gallagher’s limitations as a crafter of lyrics are all too apparent in this song but at least he’s doing what he’s good at rather than failing spectacularly, in an attempt to experiment merely because others might expect it of a man like he, who enjoys a position of near total creative freedom.

The Right Stuff: This song disposes with the anthemia of the previous songs and heads into Charles Stepney country, evoking ‘I Am The Black Gold Of The Sun’ or ‘Golden Ring’ by American Gypsy. It swings and surges as a duet, tasteful and very promising for what may yet come. A lazy alto sax cuts in through a more restrained production. It’s the best track on the LP.

While The Song Remains The Same: A shuffling, musical arrangement of echoes and Neil Young-style introspection that ups the ante, the LP with this track has shifted gears into a new aural territory, almost as if Mr G has got the crowd-pleasing, A Minor chord songs out of the way so he can now offer up his new tastes.

The Mexican: Americana rears its head with Mr G posturing in leather (one might imagine) before it gets very T-Rex meets Roxy Music, then its ends in a storm of bluesy power chords. “I was only waiting for a revolution,” he sings, “waiting for the right time and watching the clock”. Quite.

You Know We Can’t Go Back: Rock by numbers best sums up the penultimate track, the lyric anodyne, such as “a one horse town that will bring you down and will love you for all time”. You roll your eyes as Brand Gallagher hits you with another (albeit upbeat) anthem.

The Ballad Of The Mighty I: With Johnny Marr adding much needed muscle to this final track, Mr G’s voice raises itself as a smoked-cured Mancunian contralto to wrap itself around what sounds like a Bond theme that never was. Surely not a tie-in for the forthcoming film? Perish the thought.

Chasing Yesterday is released on 2nd March via Sour Mash Records Ltd.

Jason Holmes

@JasonAHolmes