CD REVIEW: THE QUIREBOYS – St Cecilia & The Gypsy Soul

Shane | 30 July 2015 | Reply

CD REVIEW: THE QUIREBOYS – St Cecilia & The Gypsy Soul
Off Yer Rocka
30 March, 2015
Reviewed by Shane Pinnegar
6 ½ /10

If there’s one thing London’s finest have learned over their decades of trawling the clubs and bars and festival stages of Europe and further afield, it’s that less is often more. Recent years have seen them firmly embrace their gypsy hearts on Halfpenny Dancer and trade their glammier Faces-swagger for a rootsier, multi-instrumental approach with more heart and less bluster – and to great effect.

On paper, St Cecilia & The Gypsy Soul combines these different motivars with presumably excellent results. They’ve pushed the piano up in the mix, guitarists Griffin & Guerin are playing less, and doing so with more maturity and conviction than before. There’s mandolins and pedal steel and cellos, and lead singer and band mainstay Spike is… well Spike is Spike. He hasn’t changed much, his gravelley Rod Stewart-like vocals purring and growling with soul and passion.

St Cecilia is so full of heart, and full of promise, that as a long-term fan it pains me to say that it just doesn’t gel.

Where Halfpenny Dancer, Beautiful Curse and Black Eyed Sons all embraced their gypsy souls and toned down the oomph, they still managed to retain an electricity and a spark and energy levels which are all sorely lacking here.

One person’s mellow is another’s soporific, and while St Cecilia isn’t boring by any stretch, it does sound like a band who are tired or over-rehearsed and desperately needing to be connected up to the mains.