Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
The clown, the comedian, the one who persistently smiles no matter what life throws at them, those are the ones in which we should hold closer than most, for in their laughter is the silent sound of unhappiness and sorrow; in their eyes is the hope that someone, somewhere, will take them by the hand and let them not be bound by the joke that everyone sees.
It is an old joke, one that has encompassed clowns and comedians alike, Pagliacci in opera and Grimaldi and Garrick, the joke has been handed down through the age and perhaps will encompass the clowns of the modern age, Hancock, Williams and Freddie James Prinze. The Doctor’s solution to a patients state of despair is to tell him to go and see Grimaldi that night at the theatre. “But Doctor, I am Grimaldi”, is the heartbreaking answer.
It takes a band of warmth, who can light up a stage with their presence and who can command an audience through wit, observation and promise, to evoke the being traumatised by his own doubts whilst all around him laughs at his antics. For Hegarty, the image is sedate, powerful, full of intelligent deep meaning and one that makes their second single from the new album such an incredible song to immerse yourself in.
To feel the pain of another Human being is not weakness, it is the very act of compassion, to see someone in pain after they open themselves up to you in the street, in the pub, anywhere in the real world which we live in, is to know there is a connection, a hopeful imploring and one that rightly Hegarty acknowledge in Even The Joker Cries Sometimes.
The slowness of the music, the sense of gravity in the voice of David Hegarty is not only to admired but should have the listener enraptured, have the very act of compassion flowing overwhelmingly over them.
To take such a song, to have the band perform at a level of introspection that they might not have thought was possible as they dig deep into their own psyche and angle of the words, is nothing but poetic genius, a searing high for a band that does nothing by halves.
Even The Joker Cries Sometimes, a classic track by a band of musical wealth, quite arguably one of the greatest tracks of their career.
Ian D. Hall