Thea Gilmore has long been one of those "undiscovered" artists who's name is met with blank stares by people I know. It was therefore with great happiness that I read the reviews that greeted Harpo's Ghost. Surely this would be the classic that really made a name for her and shot her into the super-selling stratosphere.
So why is it, a week after purchase, that I am still finding it difficult to fall in love with this record to the level that I have done with some of her previous efforts?
Lyrically she is certainly at her best on this collection; Everybody's Numb lashes out out corporatism and the celebrtiy culture at large, Red White & Black muses on war and patriotism and We Built A Monster lampoons globalised capitalism. But whilst that's all too commendable, its the tracks that concern themselves with smaller things in the scheme of things, such as Cheap Tricks and The List that are the most memorable.
But still I can't help but get the feeling that the sum of the parts don't quite provide us with the whole. Whilst the album certainly has grown on me over the past week, there is still the sense that something is missing. This is a good record, and will delight Thea's many fans, but it's not quite the masterpiece that I, personally, was hoping for. Mind you, it still knocks the stuffing out of the likes of Sandi Thom and any number of the James Blunt clones we're being subjected to at the moment.
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