Dodgy: Homegrown - 1994

Here I am doing another BritPop album. What has come over me? I guess there was so much stuff released in the early/mid-nineties that completely passed me by that I feel strangely compelled to explore. Guess what? I'm liking a lot of it too. So there you go. 

A year after their acceptable but not outstanding debut, Dodgy upped their game considerably for their (album reviewers' cliché alert) sophomore offering. While it is considered one of the archetypal BritPop releases, for me much of it is actually quite conventional, retro in places rock. A lot of the its predecessors slight introspection, musically, has been replaced by a catchier, poppier sound. While the first album was a good one, I have to say that this one is really much more instant and has something about it that The Dodgy Album lacked. Just that certain something. 

The album's cover sums up that whole getting a cheap camper van and going off to a festival thing that was becoming so popular.

Anyway, it begins with a genuine BritPop "anthem" in Staying Out For The Summer. It was a track that had all the prerequisites - a breezy, singalong beat and melody, lots of drums and guitars, laddish, whiny vocals and lyrics with a vibe connected to drinking and taking drugs all summer long. It was one of those "festival" songs, for sure. Whatever, it's great. Furthermore, while it is a powerful number, its bombast level is not as high as Oasis's and singer Nigel Clark has a less grating voice than Liam Gallagher. Check out that fuzzy, wah-wah guitar solo near the end too. Great stuff.

Also of top quality is the Stone Roses with a pop veneer sound of Melodies Haunt You. It has a fine hook, lots of kicking brass and a general jaunty airiness that is so summer. I am playing these two songs on a late June morning and they are ideal. 

So Let Me Go Far is less poppy but it has an attractive mid pace melody to it and some strong, tuneful backing. It is a bit difficult to describe but there is something comfortably competent about it from beginning to end. The song's big chorus is very late sixties too, in its vocal harmonies. The mid-song guitar solo is very seventies. Lots of retro influences. The sound quality/production is excellent too - warm and bassy, something that is not always the case with BritPop albums. 

Crossroads has some late sixties Beatles hints in, especially in the verses and the Ringo-esque drum rolls, the Lennon-ish tone to the lead vocal and also the vocal harmonies. Once more there is a sort of early seventies rock chug to the song in places. I love the trumpet solo too. There are a lot of diverse sounds packed into this. Talking of varied influences, One Day starts with some Madness-like piano and some vaguely funky wah-wah before the BritPoppy vocals kick in. They are what makes it a 1994 song, I guess. 

We Are Together is a robust acoustic meets electric rock ballad. It could be seventies but there is just something so very rock nineties-style about it. You know it when you hear it, but I'm buggered if I can properly describe it. 

Now we get a frantic, lively piece of irresistible nineties pop with an early Beatles vitality and enthusiasm to it in Whole Lot Easier. The song rocks beautifully, just jam-packed with youthful joie de vivre. I like it a lot. It even reminds me of The Rubinoos, just in places. Even more so is the new wave-ish glory of Making The Most Of, a song that is considered a copper-bottomed BritPop classic. I can hear that but for me it just screams "Rubinoos", especially on the chorus, the backing vocals and the mid-song guitar solo. Just check out that brass, drums and vocals build up bit towards the end. Wonderful. I can't let my late seventies go, can I? I'll link everything back to the seventies eventually. 

Waiting For The Day is a corker too, featuring some fine organ and a deeper, more soulful, brooding vocal. There's more seventies-inspired guitar here too. Man, this is a really good album, I have to say. How did I let it pass me by? I unfairly dismissed a lot of this stuff at the time, that's why. I was wrong. Already in my mid-thirties at the time, I just felt it wasn't "my generation". Rock is rock, however, and this is rock, whatever label you hang on it. 

What Have I Done Wrong? is a short acoustic semi-interlude of a song that has hints of Ronnie Lane and The Faces in its instrumentation. It is doleful and melancholic in ambience. The album then ends with the grandiose piano introduction of the late-night torch song feel of Grassman. This could easily be a mid-seventies number. It sums up all sorts of links back to that time for me, too many to list. They fly in and out of my brain while listening to it. I'll make a point of mentioning the mid-song guitar freakout, though and the wailing female backing vocals too (for which I can't find credits for). Seriously good, man. This massive number is a bit of a mini-masterpiece.

Lord above - what a surprisingly fine album. I certainly wasn't expecting that. Music always has the capacity to surprise and delight, doesn't it?