mail: daniel_fjall@hotmail.com
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escapology live at knebworth
Escapology Released: 2002 Rating: 6/10 Track listing: 1. How Peculiar/ 2. Feel/ 3. Something So Beautiful/ 4. Monsoon/ 5. Sexed Up/ 6. Love Somebody/ 7. Revolution/ 8. Handsome Man/ 9. Come Undone/ 10. Me And My Monkey/ 11. Song 3/ 12. Hot Fudge/ 13. Cursed/ 14. Nan’s Song EMI re-signed Robbie Williams for an amount of money that Luxembourg would be happy to turnover in a decade. The goal was obviously to stabilize Robbies position in Europe and hit big and hard in America. After the dissolute to the land of evergreens and Frank Sinatra on his last album, Robbie is his old-self again. He’s singing well produced pop melodies to radio friendly arrangements. Still, he manages to deliver quality. True quality that sounds emotional and sincere. Often when listen to the radio the weakness of the songwriting is discovered in clean production, a nice danceable rhythm or whatever. I can assure you that most of the songs on Escapology easily would have worked just as good, performed with a lonely guitar or piano. Robbie is a great singer and surely don’t need to hide behind clever arrangements. He can carry a song on his own. Especially now when the songwriting is really good. Some people says this album is sprawling and unfocused. Another more positive word is diversity. There’s the ballads, the groovy dance tracks, some loud, noisy rock songs and absolutely magnificent pop songs. The single "Come Undone" is just great, catchy pop music with good, but simple lyrics. "Revolution" and especially "Something So Beautiful" recalls the highlights and soul-ish ballads Keith Richards did on his solo albums. "Sexed Up", despite its title, makes you think of the great soul music that was created in the American south during the 1960’s. This is the kind of music you wish Robbie would persue. The results could be stunning. He had a huge hit with "Supreme" the year before and of course there are some follow-ups here. Most notable is the melodic and sarcastic "Me And My Monkey". While the ballads and the pop-oriented material works really well, the more rocking side of Williams is a bit less impressive. Soaked with heavy electric guitars and not quite as melodic as the rest of the album, songs such as the obvious Blur-nod "Song 3" seems somewhat out of place and fails to deliver what it was set out to. Anyway, what separates Robbie Williams from other acts is class. He’s got charm, he is a diverse singer that handles most genres and, evident here on Escapology, a good songwriter.
Live At Knebworth Robbie Williams toured Europe during the summer 2003 and finished it off by doing three sold out concerts at Knebworth, in front of 375.000 ecstatic people. Whilst many of Williams’ peers uses playback and rarely singing live either, Williams has gathered a killer band and he is hardly lip singing. Throughout the complete show he is praising the audience and making short speeches in which he declares his love and gratefulness. Sometimes even in the middle of the songs, which can be frustrating after a while. There’s hardly no need to flirt with the crowd like that, but it works and he manages to create a warm bound between him and the obviously young crowd. Whilst one could argue about a relatively weak set list and his overbearingly arena rock attitude (but what else did you expect?), it is hard to deny the energy put into these performances. When these numbers work, they really work. The adrenaline rush in opening “Let Me Entertain You”, the fun inclusion of “Mr. Bojangles” and the ironic and sarcastic “Come Undone” are all highlights, featuring some pretty convincing singing from Robbie Williams. Some of the songs remains anonymous and forgettable (“Monsoon”, “Hot Fudge”) and there are a few stinkers, “Me And My Monkey” is probably the worst, but it is slightly more successful than the studio version. Williams is gaining a lot thanks to the less slick format and I’m sure that if you’re already a fan you’ll enjoy it endlessly. Others will find the jumps between sighing and really exciting numbers a bit to tiresome and should stay away, even if Live At Knebworth does make a decent introduction for the unaware. I suggest you get the DVD instead, though, as Williams’ ability as an entertainer is lost without vision and it has more songs, plus a pretty good documentary.
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