Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *
You may know where you are headed, the path that you have taken could be so well mapped that every detail of memory is overflowing with description, an endorsed narrative which is not ashamed of the lows but also is modest about the successes, every border etched and underlined, all places and achievements of interest highlighted.
You may know all about yourself, you could even traverse through the life of another and roughly guide them by the hand, and perhaps if you were so inclined, make them despair at all they had gone through, or you could be like Liverpool musician and songwriter Alan O’ Hare and celebrate the good that comes with going one step further in human understanding, the pleasure of appreciating someone else’s Emotional Geography.
We may feel as though we comprehend other’s passions and needs, but we can never truly grasp the complexity of their emotions, of what makes them the way they are. As Only Child, under the perceptive, touching heart and eyes of Alan O’ Hare and the expressive production of Jon Lawton, Emotional Geography is arguably a moment in which we can feel the sensation prick our skin and our soul that life is more than just an impression, it is a reaction to all that has influenced us, a dramatic indication of what can come out of the ether and how we set the goal as high as possible for others to follow.
There has always been the train of thought in some short-sighted quarters that a supporting musician may only add a small percentage to the final offering but you cannot have a visible sunrise proudly blazing without adding the scenery, the beauty of the sea or the aura of indefatigability that accompanies it, and as songs such as Scouse, Lookin’ For A Song, Beautiful Bobby Dylan, She Comes When I’m At My Saddest, St. Oswald Street and Thinking Of A Place combine Alan O’ Hare and Jon Lawton’s detailed mindset with Lee Shone, the incredible Amy Chalmers, Stuart Todd, Howard Northover, Fionna McConnell, Matt Lawton and Julia Fiebelkorn on their chosen instruments, what comes through is that golden hue lighting up the vision fulfilling its destiny before you.
An album of handsome beauty, an album that will bring more than a tear to the eye, that will raise the spirits and set you on a course to understanding empathy as perhaps a spiritual experience; Emotional Geography is a lesson you must not miss.
Only Child’s Emotional Geography is released on February 22nd.
Ian D. Hall