Onelinedrawing - reVisitor

I've been a fan of Jonah Matranga for a long time. Like most, I started as a Far fan, was bowled over by New End Original and then started seeing him live on his frequent tours of the UK. He has written a huge number of truly incredible songs, and it's always such a great experience to see him play them live.

However, I've struggled with a lot of his solo albums - I eagerly bought copies of And, The Three Sketchys (1999-2005), a live album and the There's a Lot in Here cd/dvd from his online shop when I discovered it. The live songs are always incredible (the live album is from July 15th 2009 and I fully recommend checking it out if you can) and And has some good songs (Not About a Girl or a Place is a favourite) but I struggled with The Three Sketchys, which really slowed down my desire to dig out all of the solo/Onelinedrawing releases. I listened to the songs from The Volunteer on the dvd but few really made an impression (dvds perhaps aren't the best way to consume music - I can't have listened to those songs more than twice).

This album is then a bit of a strange one - here we have the album Visitor, originally released on Jade Tree in 2002 but rerecorded in 2012. I've not heard the original version of Visitor and I feel I really should at some point. Whilst I can't say much about how these songs compare to the originals, I can say that reVisitor is a pretty nice album. In an age where I don't get along too well with Jonah's recent outputs it's nice to hear some great songs played well. I knew a lot of these from concerts and live recordings - Bitte Ein Kuss, Smile, Yr Letter and Softbelly are all fan-favourites and ones I really look forward to hearing. These versions are very nice - simple and stripped back but very true to the Jonah I'm used to seeing. Yr Letter is particularly great and Softbelly is so reminiscent of the darker Far songs I love so much. There are also songs that I've never really heard but enjoyed here - Candle Song and Sixes. Perfect Pair and Why Are We Fighting have always landed on the pile of Jonah songs I don't care for much and that doesn't change here.

I picked up this picture disc one of the most recent times I saw Jonah, in the Windmill in Brixton for £7.50 (as well as his latest album, You and Me Are Two). I was excited to hear both, but knew I'd get more out of this one. It ticks a lot of my boxes for what I want from a Jonah album, so it's a winner in that respect.

Format: 12" picture disc
Tracks: 11
Cost: £7.50 new
Bought: gig
When: 23/07/14
Colour: Picture disc
Etching: none
mp3s: no

Jonah Matranga - You're All Those Things and Then You're None (Versions 1 & 2)

I've been putting off writing about this record for the sole reason that I just don't like it that much. Theoretically I agree that there's a lot of worth in the phrase "if you have nothing nice to say..." and that there's way too much negativity in music writing as it is, but I set out to write about every record I own, including the ones I'm not that keen on. Let's see if I can write about this without sounding like a critical arse-hole.

All that said, the key thing to take from this is that I think Jonah is a great musician. He's written some incredible songs and been a part of some excellent bands (Far and New End Original). His solo career has been prolific and I could easily list about 20 solo songs of his that I genuinely love. Most of all his live shows are excellent and I try to see him every time he comes to town; I pretty much always leave smiling because it was so much fun and he played such brilliant songs. Possibly my all-time favourite Jonah-live-show moment was the acoustic version of Far's Joining the Circus that he played upstairs in the Garage a year or so ago. I love that song and it worked so well. Also, he seems like a really nice guy, and I really hope he doesn't end up reading this (if you do, Jonah, I'm sorry).

So hopefully I've now convinced you that I ordinarily have a lot of time for Jonah Matranga and his music. The problem is that I can barely listen to this album - there's hardly a decent song in the lot. The opener This is Who I'm Gonna Be is just about passable and I Just Died in the Air is alright but that's followed by the worst song on the album. Other than that every song has at least one part that makes me rub the bridge of my nose like the kid in Dazed and Confused whenever something awkward happens.

This album began life as a kickstarter project (I think, or something like that) with the twist that the album would evolve over time - the plan was to get people to record songs from it, or parts of them, and make a second version as a "full band". I thought it had potential (remember, I do normally enjoy Jonah's work) and got involved. I opted for the double vinyl+cd+t-shirt option and didn't mind spending £40 because I was happy to help Jonah out and keen to hear his new music. Of course, upon hearing the music I realised I'd been optimistic in how this would turn out. I got screwed, these things happen.

And I think that's the worst thing - I have two copies of this album. On paper you might think an army of musicians might be able to put something listenable on the second LP, but ultimately they're still the same songs and you'd be wrong (I just wrote something way worse, but had to censor myself. Turns out it's hard to not be a negative arse-hole when you don't actually like the album. I'm looking forward to writing about records I can get excited about again). I still, in theory, like the concept here but would prefer to see it executed on 10 different songs. Any 10 songs other than these. The version of Happy-Hee is just fucking painful.

Here's another terrible thing - I've not played this album in at least a year and a half. The last time was when I put the mp3s on my player and listened to them on the way to The Peel for a gig (evidence I really did try). By the time I got to the venue I'd pretty much lost all my faith in music and the bands had to work pretty hard to revive that. I've seen Jonah live since so I know he is still a great musician. Unfortunately the stain on his solo career is sat on two records and a cd in my collection.

So I apologise once again for having nothing nice to say, but saying things anyway. If you're a Jonah fan and you love this album, I don't think any less of you for doing so - it's just not for me. If you played on the album, I'm sorry (unless you contributed towards Happy-Hee. Jesus wept). If you're not familiar with Jonah's music but you've read this far anyway, then please do check him out. His live albums are especially excellent and a great starting point. Just don't start here.


Format: double 12", cd
Tracks: 20
Cost: £40 new
Bought: Website
When: 16/07/11
Colour: Clear and transparent orange
Etching: none
mp3s: CD