Following the drawn-out demise of the Stone Roses, Ian Brown made a complete break with his former band's sound. In place of the predominant guitar pop (and later Led Zep blues-rock) Brown unveiled a stark, lo-fi minimalism on 1998's Unfinished Monkey Business. However, that album was to be rendered a mere prologue as the singer unveiled an aesthetic based on richness and depth, a layered stew where electronics jostled alongside samples, organic instrumentation of all stripes and a throw-everything-in-the-mix approach that revealed new details on each listen. This process began with 1999's Golden Greats and continued until 2007's The World Is Yours where a more unified, string-heavy sound became prevalent.
So Many Soldiers:
One of the highlights of Golden Greats, "So Many Soldiers" melds acoustic guitars, soaring electronics and vocals that drift in and out of the soundscape. This song is a microcosm of the album as a whole, neo-psychedelia that begins as social commentary and rises into the mystical spirituality that characterises Brown's solo work: "this road you walk/this path you tread/sweet I shall see/and heaven fed."
Stardust:
Similar to "So Many Soldiers," "Stardust" seamlessly mixes the acoustic and the electric, the synths bringing the mellotron to mind, again positioning Brown's work in the neo-psychedelic sphere. As for the lyrics, they concern the idea that the building blocks of humanity (and all organisms) arrived from celestial bodies - truly trippy within this musical context, and proof that Brown's subject matter is wider and a lot more interesting than most other mainstream musicians.
Solarized:
The title track from the 2004 release, "Solarized" is often overlooked by casual Brown fans. That may be due to its subdued set-up, but even a cursory listen reveals this to be an intriguing effort (it certainly caught my ear on first listen, remaining for me the stand-out non-single on the album.) The cold flame flickering of the synths alongside tablas, backwards percussion and prominent bass coalesce to create an ominous mood, a creeping sense of disquiet that taps into the darker side of Brown's sound. That's not to say that the song itself is a depressing one - on the contrary, the lyrics are hopeful, ending with the half-spoken finale "the light that she lives for in the dark she'll always find." And that sums the track up, a sense of escape rather than surrender.
These 3 songs represent a minute portion of Brown's discography, and I'd urge anyone who hasn't paid him any attention to listen to the 3 masterpieces he created from 1999 to 2004, Golden Greats, Music of the Spheres and Solarized. Some critics in the past portrayed his career as that of a Britpop cast-off, but acclaim has also followed him in the post-Roses path, and rightly so. As can be gathered from his recordings and his interviews, he is fiercely individual and wary of living off past glories - and with a catalogue as rich as his, I can only say that I see his point.
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