Peter Steward

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In memory of John Stewart 1939-2008, Harry Chapin 1942-1981, Dan Fogelberg 1951-2007 - Three great American singer-songwriters


Join With us - The Feeling - The difficult second album but just how did they cope? Pretty well is the answer	kd Lang - Watershed - More songs about love and relationships as kd navel gazes once again and this time it gets rather tedious.	This Gift - Sons and Daughters - There is some talent in this Scottish foursome but it doesn't really surface here.	NY75- The Strawbs - Released last year this concert was recorded in 1975 and features one of my all time favourite groups

Ringo Starr - Liverpool 8 - On first hearing I disliked Ringo's latest offering. Then I cast aside my prejudices against the guy and realised I was actually enjoying it	British Sea Power -Do You Like Rock Music? - BSP from Brighton write literate intelligent rock songs and this album is full of them	Tom Baxter - Skybound - Record of the week on Radio Two, Tom grew up in Suffolk and has produced my favourite album of the year so far.	Rufus Wainwright - Rufus Does Judy at Carnegie Hall - A strange offering where our gay icon tries to reproduce a Judy Garland concert from 1961.

Peter Cincotti - East of Angel Town - Billy Joel meets Elton John meets Jamie Cullum in this fine jazz/rock/fusion album firmly rooted in the streets of New York City	Marc Almond - Stardom Road - An excellent album of covers that takes us through a musical journey of Almond's life.	Chrome Dreams 2 - Neil Young - Young has the ability to confuse fans and critics alike. Much of this album harks back to the 80s and the aborted Chrome Dreams project	Jimmy Webb - Live and At Large in the UK - Jimmy has slowly developed a wonderfully easy going style over the past few years as is shown on this new live album

	Re-visited Album Reviews

From the Witchwood - The Strawbs - An embryonic folk rock band prepares to rip into the crazy world of rock. We revisit this 1971 offering	Grave New World - The Strawbs - One of the most powerful albums ever as the Strawbs find their feet and find their style - a classic	An Old Raincoat Won't Ever Let You Down - Rod Stewart opened his long career with this rocker. There was better to come.	Gasoline Alley - Rod Stewart. Gasoline continued the road to rock stardom and was a more confident offering than the previous.

Every Picture Tells A Story - Rod Stewart. One of the classic rock albums of all time where all the promise came to fruition	Never A Dull Moment - Rod Stewart. The last of Stewart's rock quartet of albums. Had the downward spiral begun?	Wednesday Morning 3 am - Simon and Garfunkel. S and G first album is a beautifully understated collection of traditional songs and Paul Simon originals.	Sound of Silence - Simon and Garfunkel. Paul Simon comes of age, writing 10 of the 11 tracks on this album as he turns into the world's great folk/rock poet

Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme - Simon and Garfunkel - Some have likened this to Sergeant Pepper and Pet Sounds. Is it that good?	Bookends - Simon and Garfunkel - S and G tread the well worn path of folk stardom with a further selection of excellent songs	Bridge Over Troubled Water - Simon and Garfunkel - A sublime collection of songs that have a lasting and important place in the chronicles of Folk and Rock history.	Neil Young - Neil Young - A quiet and reasonably efficient solo debut album that hinted of the glories to come

Everybody Knows This is Nowhere - Neil Young. This first effort with Crazy Horse was a rather rambling affair	After the Goldrush - Neil Young - Young comes of age with a vengeance and records one of the great folk/rock albums	Harvest - Neil Young - Another groundbreaking album full of atmosphere and sublime tunes	Twelve Stops and Home - The Feeling- Sussex seems to have produced some excellent Brit-pop bands. Here is one of them

In Memoriam

Classic albums by artists sadly no longer with us


The Innocent Age - Dan Fogelberg - A great album of childhood, manhood and life itself with some classic songs	California Bloodlines - John Stewart - Timeless country rock and one of the greatest albums of its genre	Lonesome Picker Rides Again - John Stewart - Cowboy Stewart comes of age with some timeless material.

The reason for my music review section is partly one of self-indulgence but hopefully it will be of interest to a few people who pop by either intentionally or purely by chance.

It has been set-up to reflect my love of music. The object is not to educate the reader about the bands/artists with in depth biographies. They can be found in proliferation elsewhere on the internet and in reference books by the thousands.

The object is to review individual artists from my existing record collection along with important new releases. The reviews will reflect the part the music has played in my life rather than academic assessments.

Music has managed to somehow keep me sane for more years than I care to remember. Simply listing artists takes me on a journey through my past.

This review section is my attempt to analyse my own music journey through albums that have had some affect on me - whether it be good or bad.

It is not my intention to compare albums with those by different artists but to take each artist individually, comparing tem against their own output. I am also much more likely to comment on the album from my own views and experiences. Each album will be given a mark out of 10 which will be based on a number of factors. Again the ratings should only be taken within that artist's output and not used to compare with albums by other artists.

Each artist will also have a page divided into four sections to highlight essential albums, albums well worth investigating, average albums and handle with care.

Obviously I will be building the reviews over a period of time. So bear with me and please return. If you want to make any comments about my reviews or review the albums yourself please e-mail me by clicking here and I will include them alongside my own. Click on the links to read the reviews. The number in parenthesis after the review refers to the number of albums by each artist reviewed.

To see a full list of ratings go to here

Current number of albums reviewed - 92

Almond Marc (1)

America (2)

Barclay James Harvest (16)

Baez Joan (1)

Baxter Tom (1)

Bowie David (7)

British Sea Power (1)

Byrds (2)

Cash Johnny (1)

Chapin Harry (5)