James Blunt’s heartfelt clichés are easy on the ear in Who We Used to Be — album review
The English singer’s latest album slots neatly into his usual emotive pop groove
Twenty years after ‘You’re Beautiful’, James Blunt has run rings around his opponents © Michael Clement
Pop’s most famous Household Cavalryman is leading a double-flanked assault on us. One part of the pincer movement is the publication of James Blunt’s memoir, Loosely Based on a Made-up Story. It prances into view with cavalier tales of drug-guzzling, sexual swashbuckling and super-starry encounters, as when Bill Clinton congratulates our hero for his soldiering with the Life Guards in the Kosovo war.
The other flank is his new album Who We Used to Be. With a cover showing Blunt as a boy with a toy plane, it’s intended as an accompaniment to the memoir. But autobiography is here conducted in the piping tones of a troubadour who wears his heart on a cautiously-tailored sleeve. “We’re leading fake lives, I read the truth between the white lines,” he flutes earnestly on “Cold Shoulder”. The lifestyle described with comic vim in the book is intolerable to the album version of Blunt.
This personality switch isn’t new. It represents the singer-songwriter’s response to the derision directed at him since his megahit “You’re Beautiful” came out in 2004. Taunted as a simpering posho who had about as much right to be in the charts as a minor member of the royal family, he has disarmed the haters with quick-witted banter on social media. He makes better fun of his music than they do: he claims it’s played to dispel drinkers at closing time in the Chelsea pub that he owns. But the persona he projects in his songs has remained unchanged. No concession to critics is offered there.
Still active almost 20 years after “You’re Beautiful”, Blunt has run rings around his opponents. His new songs slot neatly into the usual groove. They’re efficiently assembled and easy on the ear. There are heartfelt clichés about life being like a carousel and tunes that press emotional buttons with military precision, all surging major chords and downcast minor ones. The joshing Blunty we encounter outside the recording studio is inaudible. Which one is the real person? It doesn’t really matter. “All warfare is based on deception,” as Sun Tzu said.
‘Who We Used to Be’ is released by Atlantic Records
Am I looking older?
'Cause, girl, you look the same
Did I see a sadness
Written on your face?
One life
Did I leave it too late?
Realized that I didn't say the words like I should have done
I never felt this way for anyone
There's something I forgot to tell you
Something only I knew
All the love that I ever needed, I got it from you
I know it's hard to believe it
With all the shit that I do
But all the love that I ever needed, I got it from you
Did I give you pleasure
Or did I give you pain?
Did I leave you sleepless
Thinkin' I won't change?
One life
Did I leave it too late?
Realized that I didn't say the words like I should have done
I never felt this way for anyone
There's something I forgot to tell you
Something only I knew
All the love that I ever needed, I got it from you
I know it's hard to believe it
With all the shit that I do
But all the love that I ever needed, I got it from you
It took some time to realize
That every day you saved my life (You saved my life)
And all the love that I could find, I got it from you (I got it from you)
There's something I forgot to tell you
Something only I knew
All the love that I ever needed, I got it from you
'Cause, girl, you look the same
Did I see a sadness
Written on your face?
One life
Did I leave it too late?
Realized that I didn't say the words like I should have done
I never felt this way for anyone
There's something I forgot to tell you
Something only I knew
All the love that I ever needed, I got it from you
I know it's hard to believe it
With all the shit that I do
But all the love that I ever needed, I got it from you
Did I give you pleasure
Or did I give you pain?
Did I leave you sleepless
Thinkin' I won't change?
One life
Did I leave it too late?
Realized that I didn't say the words like I should have done
I never felt this way for anyone
There's something I forgot to tell you
Something only I knew
All the love that I ever needed, I got it from you
I know it's hard to believe it
With all the shit that I do
But all the love that I ever needed, I got it from you
It took some time to realize
That every day you saved my life (You saved my life)
And all the love that I could find, I got it from you (I got it from you)
There's something I forgot to tell you
Something only I knew
All the love that I ever needed, I got it from you
CODA: Blunt dropped the gentle piano-driven song that finds him reflecting on a meaningful relationship. Here, he professes his love for the woman who had an irreversible impact on his life.
There’s something I forgot to tell you
Something only I knew
All the love that I ever needed, I got it from you
I know it’s hard to believe it
With all the shit that I do
But all the love that I ever needed, I got it from you
… he sings in the cinematic chorus.
All the Love” is the second release off Blunt’s upcoming album, Who We Used to Be, following lead single “Beside You.” “It’s a bit of a celebration,” Blunt described in a press release about “Beside You.” “An upbeat banger about finally being with the one you’ve been searching for your whole life.” The album is set for release on October 27.
