Released 27th October 2017 on Big Scary Monsters, Jamie Lenman’s second full length solo album captures and relays a message somewhat prolific and prophetic. Devolver struck chords spookily fortuitous to these tired, heard-it-all-before king lears, and in an unapologetically modest battle cry, it has served as an inner reawakening of what an album should, and could be and the sheer craftsmanship that goes into this less than appreciated art form, in this hard copy rejection/digital revolution favoured present day… Great Scott Marty… the future ain’t what it used to be, but there might just be hope on the horizon.

I take music very, very seriously. It determines everything from whether I will get on with someone, to belonging and fitting in with a crowd, to sculpting political beliefs to such momentous life affirmations as career choice, ambition, partners, confidence levels and to fickle pleasantries such as fashion, relaxation, motivation or soundtracking and enhancing the measures of sexual peckish-ness… I can recite my life’s events through album releases and remember such intricate details of who/when/where, what I was wearing, the weather or even what colour my converse high tops were at the time… and probably even the size, whether it was purchasing Prince’s Batman soundtrack on cassette at Boots Aldershot branch with my mum in 1989 (I was rocking a shameless shiny lime green shell suite at the time) or being gifted my first official album In 1983; M.J’s Thriller on gatefold vinyl, that I HAD to play everyday for years and was actually played to channel hyperactivity and then calm down (side 2; Beat It to Human Nature usually did the trick) the drop of a needle, the digital swirl of a compact disc or churning cog driving cassette deck can stir instant memories, emotions and even sensory recollections… like hearing Hysteria by Def Lep instantly puts me in the back seat of my auntie Julie’s yellow MG convertible circa 1987, the late summer sun beating down, the wind enhancing my trademark Afro volume and my uncle Kev’s Joe Elliot inspired, highlights an all, Susan perb mullet flying all over the shop feeling like I was in a John Hughes movie… this is my happy place, and all it takes is those first few chords and I’m back there!

I could go on and on with this topic (and probably will) but music can also be life affirming/saving… when my grandfather (who brought me up and was a father to me in reality) passed away- the Unforgettable Fire by the love em or hate em U2 fellas bizarrely enabled myself to grieve and express such a weight of emotional outpouring that it now resonates so very personally to me and I find it hard to not well up during the first few bars off the title track or the haunting beauty of album closer MLK.

Secondary school was a difficult time, and each morning I would suffer such huge levels of anxiety that I couldn’t keep any breakfast down and felt utter terror as I entered the gates of All Hallows in Farnham/weybourne, so I would have my medicine… a carefully selected assortment of albums I’d load into my Walkman like bullets into a gun going into battle and I’d hit play as my feet crossed that line, suddenly I could do it, I was able and I walked with a clenched fist as Steven Tyler would scream the intro to Walk On Water (track 1, side 1 -Big Ones) as I grew older the music became more aggressive, rage against the machine, Sepultura’s Chaos AD and Roots, Pantera’s Vulgar display of Power and an abundance of quintessential mixtapes of Maiden, Ozzy, Sabbath, Priest, Crue, Roth era Van Halen, Ugly Kid Joe and Iggy Pop, the doors, led Zeppelin, sly and the family stone, Neil young etc etc… I had an album/song for anything and everything… like when I used to fantasise about winning Sarah O’Neil’s heart to Deuces are Wild by Aerosmith (a fantasy that sadly failed in reality) and each girl I crushed on I always unintentionally attached a song to them, we all do this… right?

Anyway, where was I? …I’ve gotten waaaay off track here haven’t I!

Over the years through the madness of my addictions I clung to music like a life saving raft amidst a sea of turmoil, and was always seeking out new music no matter how bad everything else got so the soundtrack continued to score my life (while I scored to get away from it). Then as I emerged from rehab last year, I started lucidly devouring music again, yet it failed to ignite that inner spark with anything I was feasting on and I was kinda losing faith in newer music, then my ole buddy from back in the day -Jamie Lenman released his newbie… DEVOLVER … and all was right again!

An utterly inspiring record that hasn’t made me feel this good since Vex Red started with a strong and not so persistent desire! On this long player ole Lenny boy soars with sheer conviction, it’s a mental Mardi Gras locomotive, shapeshifting from New Orleans sludge jazz to the Seattle sparkle lounge, stopping off at a cliff edge overlooking a sinister yet somewhat serene Pacific Ocean blue, with strobe like rail track blue flashes punctuating an energy that insists on getting naked and dancing in the purple rain… and then it hit me, somewhere between Body Popping and Comfort Animal that I am indeed still a fan, not just of music but of the feeling it gives you when done right! It enables one to dust of the canvas in the brain that opens doors and inspires, comforts or excites us… audio inspired elevation baby!

With a juicy production that demands further deeper listens with quality headphones for a decent ear pummelling, you become aware that there is something new on offer upon each listen. So many layers and textures, influence melding and sheer lyrical brilliance, both intelligible and deeply identifiable to my understanding.

Bold, mature yet fun and catchier than a toddlers fishing net in an overly populated goldfish bowl, there’s something new around every bend, reinvigorating with enthusiasm galore! Sir Lenman plays to his strengths, then goes deep into the wayoutusphere of the trad rock alternative context, jazz, shoe gaze, shoe lace tying contemplation to balls out rawk to introspective euphoric delight – as warm and comforting as your Nan’s roast dinner by a cosy winter fireplace.

With a beaten up Yamaha tone as familiar as Springsteen’s trusted, road-worn telecaster, as modest as its master, amidst strum tantrums and the most somber of finger picking audio deliciousness, oriental, jazz tinged, soundscape, orchestral Pop eye punk, folk rock… Like a packet of Frazzles… there’s never enough in one serving, you just can’t help but keep wanting to devour this beauty over and over.

I’m not one for over exaggerating… but…

DEVOLVER made me shoot rainbow laser beams out of my soul and feel that familiar, but most recently, seldom heard call to arms on the musical battlefield, to seize a weapon/instrument of choice and charge headlong into an audio storm of epic storms, swells and intensity fuelled musical enthusiasm, IT MAKES ME WANNA PLAY AGAIN… bless the lenmeister of his royal jamieness for reinvigorating this musically jaded, heard-it-all-before, skeptic mind. It’s like an old friend just turned up out of the blue and made my day with this opus, it is a clear product upon years of likeminded musical binges, digesting all the good bits and using them to build a ‘compassionate shit kicker’ of an album like a hot rod with love hearts decals. Jamie is proof of a purist musical mind- as much of a fan as he is an artist, executing that stagnant anticipated frustration we all get with musical expectation, and focusing it all into a self disciplined, creative output that never disappoints. Like so many inspirational forces of musical nature before him, Jamie conjures that bellied excitement one gets with such juggernaut masterpieces as Antichrist superstar, the downward spiral or freak show/diorama to name but a few, I truly hold this piece of work up there and it deserves to get the praise it so evidently demands, as does the drumming of my good buddy Danny boy Kavanagh, who slays on this album and is one of life’s truly decent blokes!

What Jamie lenmonium dynamiteehee has is an inexhaustible engine fuelled by a tapestry of musical influences which he unashamedly fuses into a fuck off gat like audio sonispheric rain of fire… all with an endoskeleton of humble intelligence and hard earned craftsmanship. It’s like Jamie is a carpenter constantly evolving all the while harnessing all he was before, continually amassing chops, giving birth to tune after tune via his reliably beaten and long endured tools of the trade, fearless to embrace fresh ground while remaining true to a simple aesthetic, not genre or style, but ‘hard work + homework = results.’ Jamie makes the upmost of what he is and has to offer, unashamed and unafraid to be himself regardless of fashion or fickle minded genre tags.

And so, I tip my irrelevant hat to you my man, thank you for waking this weary, disenchanted soul from taking life far too seriously… for restoring and returning my faith in music, and for writing/recording perhaps THE perfect song in the 80’s tinged saucy snare echo title track/album closer… Devolver… an identifiably awesome anthem of humility!

Peace luv & hugz, Sammy x