Ex-Lightning Seed Ian Broudie’s debut solo outing, Tales Told, has been no less than four years in the making, with the making of the album interrupted by Broudie’s production duties (with The Coral and The Zutons). Despite this, Tales Told weighs in at a rather paltry 30 minutes…though it’s fair to say that it’s probably bigger on quantity than quality.
Gone are the exuberant, Scally anthems that Broudie and his cohorts were known for during the Britpop years. In their place is a rather watery succession of lachrymose, introverted ballads. ‘Song For No-One’ is a maudlin, if lightweight, ditty, while ‘Got No Plans’, with its diluted Scouse skiffle feel, is about as animated as it gets.
At best, Tales Told sometimes evokes the pastoral calm of Badly Drawn Boy (but, sadly, without the endearing quirks or hooks), yet there’s little argument that Ian Broudie’s songwriting has rusted in those fallow months. Alarmingly, without the upbeat sounds of his fellow Lightning Seeds to back him up, Broudie’s voice is exposed as being decidedly underwhelming. With the likes of Tom Baxter and Aqualung snapping at his heels, Broudie stands little chance of reasserting himself in today’s musical ecosystem as anything other than a fine producer.
Don’t let that tastefully designed album sleeve fool you, for Ian Broudie’s first solo album makes for dispiritingly artless listening.