Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

To declare a finest achievement in a career that has been consistently sharp and forthright, is to perhaps rattle the soul of fortune, for few are comfortable with such an accolade, but is the preserve of the listener to affirm in their mind and state such an admiration for the artist.

Liverpool’s Alun Parry has once more returned with an album of such immensity that the socially conscious troubadour hits home with every ounce of its being, and in Invisible People’s very essence that sense of observation in the ordinary person, left out, abused by political dogma and the ever-increasing thought of isolation that has come our way through systematic exploitation of our thoughts and the violence within.

It is to Mr. Parry’s enormous credit that his observations and sense of justice have created such an album, poetic, expressive, sensitive and deeply moving. Invisible People covers a kind of space that is inhabited by The Beatles for example when they speak of Eleanor Rigby, not the tune, but the figure behind the lyric, taking a moment, an introspection of humanity at their most vulnerable, or even commenting on the artist’s own worth as they delve into their reactions to the moment of meeting another soul.

Across tracks such as the opener, Meet Me At The Bombed Out Church, The Devil Is A Debt Collector, the superb Your Kind Invitation, the decisive warnings of Man To Cling To, and When All Is Said And Done, Alun Parry’s vocals and music glide with the sincerity that the listener has come to expect, to enjoy and relish in a time when all around them is mired by the grief of damnation and the escapades of the intolerant and brow beating of liars and the prejudiced.

If we continue to be downtrodden, to be used and abused by those whose motives are nothing short of despicable, then as Invisible People we should hope that are found by the troubadours and the poets who say what they mean and go out of their way to observe us in our finest moments; the open minded and the ones who speak with alacrity and truth always making the hidden seen once more. To the likes of Alun Parry, we should be thankful for making them visible once more.

Ian D. Hall