Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
The world can be cruel, not just physically but mentally as well, it is the realisation that in times of trauma, we might want to hide away, we might find the solace needed to repair ourselves and come out fighting but above else nobody wants to be lost forever, we just want to recover and Get Found.
It might sound as if the premise is awkward, perhaps even a way of looking at the issue of art and trauma in a different way, yet Get Found by Ben Marwood is in the greater sense a set of songs that hone in the way a sentence can be manipulated by others to make your own words seem distant and yet as Mr. Marwood conveys with a truth and edge of anger in each track, distance is relative to the miles of heroic steps it takes to become at one with both yourself and with the pleasure of the Universe.
To admire Ben Marwood is to feel humanity at its very best, that life can be overcome, that despite all the efforts of politicians and self serving social media therapists, our minds choose the moment when it is comfortable to be back in a world which tries everything in its power to beat the individual with the biggest stick possible; it is in that choosing that drives the art, that makes the artist stand up and tell them they are wrong and gives resolution to the mess created by others.
Get Found is not so much a plea for help but a request to fight back, to shout that we all have the right to be heard and even if the body doesn’t like the fight, then the finest weapon in the world, the human brain, is ready to scrap for every ounce of respect it deserves.
It is respect that the listener cannot but help feel as they listen to Ben Marwood, the unearthing of a new album when it could be argued there might never have been another is nothing short of cool, of understanding that the spirit of anyone can be indomitable. In tracks such as The Church of No Commandments, Enraptured, I’m Wide Awake It’s Boring and the glorious The Devil Makes Work For Jazz Hands, Ben Marwood is not just alluding to the illness that kept him from being the man he is, he is confessing all, the depth of feelings which can overwhelm and frustrate but ultimately can be kicked where it hurts, for as the artist shows, nothing can beat the spirit of one who fights back.
A super album, one that is unexpected but also one that is held highly in the esteem, Get Found is creative freedom in all its resolute glory.
Ian D. Hall