Jamie Cullum - The Pursuit

SPLINK (spotify link, you see)

It is a truth universally acknowledged that some preconceptions are just right; Coldplay really are a bit too pretentious, Lily Allen's accent is ridiculous and, in respect to today's topic, Jamie Cullum's kind of slappable.

...and he's mean to pianos

So I'm sure you can imagine my surprise when I listened to The Pursuit (his last album, it's not new or anything, I just thought I'd accidentally slap something if I listened to it) and found that his music is entirely non-slapworthy. If you've listened to Amy Winehouse's Frank and thought "This is quite good, but I just wish she was a man, I'm not a bigot or anything, I just think women should stay in the crack-den." then you might just agree with me. Now, that's not a perfect analogy for at least 2 reasons. 1, that you could well like it if you haven't thought that and 2, that you might not like it if you have. But what can you do?

The album (remember the album, this is a blog about the album*) is a jazzy, poppy, rocky, hippitty-hoppitty affair but with the emphasis heavily on the jazzy bit. Of course, Jimmy C's pianoing fingers feature heavily, and there's solos and scatting and organs and saxes and bongos and everything you'd expect from a jazz thing. That being said, most of the tracks are pop-music lengths and there's "Rawking on the Daancefloor, actin nawty", which is something they do quite a lot in popular music isn't it? It's accessible, often loungey jazz that's hardly going to cause any revolutions but equally won't scare anyone away.

The overall tone isn't overly different to, say, Frank and is surprisingly varied. It can be upbeat-OH, Youtube video! Sorry, it's been a while.


As I was saying, the album does stuff like that, and then goes and does something verging on proper jazz and will then go spiralling off into actual pop like you've blown the tail rotor right off it's helicopter. Luckily, before crashing into the wooded hills of normalcy it uses a big jazzy parachute and somehow soars into the sky, breaking all laws of logic as it does so. I think I love is pure lounge, well it's got a string section too, but apart from that it's just James and his piano in a slow, plinky-plinkplonk-plonky. Then KABOOPH! straight in with We Run Things Another Way an odyssey in drum loops and layered synths. Then comes a cover of Not While I'm Around, that song from the end of Sweeney Todd.

The Pursuit may not be cutting edge stuff, but it's a well-thought out, stylish album that'll appeal to most of the people with ears. It's well balanced, diverse and manages to pull off everything it tries to do. It's even got a couple of singles that you'll have heard. Wheels, I'm all Over it, Mixtape, you may not be able to hum any of them at the moment but you'll remember them if you listen through the album.

Speaking of which, for all I know you've already listened to it, it could be popular for all I know. I'm so out of touch. He's got a new one out now, Devil May Care, which I'd have reviewed if I'd have listened to it yet. It's much more "proper jazz" than this one and will almost certainly be worth a listen. It looks like this:

Cullum is also host of Radio 2's Jazz show (LINK) which is definitely worth a listen every week.

The moral of this post is that just because you want to physically hurt a person doesn't mean they don't make an excellent album. Well probably 2 excellent albums. And a radio show. And actually, seeing as I haven't listened to any of his older albums, they're probably good too. And he's friends with Clint Eastwood.

Moral...


*500 points if you can name me that reference


EDIT: Devil May Care appears to be a compilation of collaborations, so I'll let myself off a bit.