Newton Faulkner - UFO EP EP Review

Newton Faulkner

UFO EP

EP Review

Now it is to a ginger dreadlock Acoustic guitar singer/songwriter who is known as Newton Faulkner. The problem with the music world of today is that Looks are as important as talent, and if you don't have one then in variably it needs to be made up through the other.

Newton Faulkner kicks off the EP with UFO and he vocally it's a bit like Paul Simon, but then you listen to lyrics and once you hear "anal probe", you find that your mind is at ease (well as best it can) as you realise it as Newton. So in reality, which lets face, it is not the opening song, there is not a great deal that can be done with just an acoustic guitar. Anyway we move onto 'Feels Like Home' & a more mature performance, the kind of track I was expecting to hear, it's just that I get the impression that Faulkner can't actually stay channelled to that kind of writing, this shines through with 'Full Fat'. Again a lyric like "God Is Sausage Roll", a fun track but if he wants to be taken seriously as an artist this surely is not the way.

The EP does have an interesting twist with some live tracks on it and Newton Faulkner does have a good relationship with his following, how big that following is, is debatable and there is no way that myspace is to be used as a measurement. Yet another twist in the tail is the Massive Attack cover Teardrop, what can I say, not bad at all given it is just him and a guitar.

Newton is shall we say a mixed bag when he is serious with songs like 'Feels Like Home' and 'Alone Again' there is a feel of James Morrison and at the moment the world is certainly his oyster. Its just tracks like UFO and Full Fat might add to his quirkiness but take away a lot of his credibility.

Mark Moore