Jason Pierce – Spiritualized Helms-man’s previous album “Let it all come down” was released amid a hurricane of hype that would have made any self respecting publicist glow with pride. Boastings of a 100 piece orchestra and a kaleidoscopic sonic spectrum were always going to leave listeners feeling shortchanged (which it did), lacking direction and missing the mark song-wise “Let it all come down” never quite achieved the promised big splash.
With this in mind Jason Pierce embarked on writing & recording new album “Amazing Grace” using an altered methodology. Recorded in 21 days in a live environment “Amazing Grace” delivers results thankfully sharper and at the same time looser and shabbier in sound than its forerunner. Jason’s gospel rich evolution of the garage-swamp, feedback thick sound of Spacemen 3 gets more room to breath on “Amazing Grace” with typically madrigal lullabies “Oh Baby” and “Hold On” soaring highest. The new approach has reaped better results although the Spiritualized sound is beginning to tire, just like Jason’s personal excesses the highs just aren’t as high as they used to be.
