Music For The Divine

Im finally getting this. It's true what others have said it takes about 6-7 plays to get it. Now I can't get enough of the album and I'm already singing along to alot of it. And great, it's a change in direction and Glenn never gives us the same album twice. Only a couple of songs could be considered SM outtakes. And it's great to have strings back on a GH album again. I will definitely be playing this one over and over again in the next few months. Bravo!

John

Well, I've read all the reviews, I've sat and listened to the album while I worked, I sat and listened to it doing nothing else, and I have to say, no matter how often I play it, I think I must have got a different CD to everybody else. For my money this is Glenn's weakest album yet.

Before everybody decides to murder me in my sleep, I'll talk you thorough my feelings toward it. I didn't like "Soul Mover" as much as a lot of people on here. It was ok, but not the masterpiece people kept telling me it was. I've stated the best three Glenn albums for me are "Feel", "The Way It Is' and "Addiction", and the last one I liked in it's entireity was "SITKOR".

I played "M4TD" and found a decidely mixed bag. The good news is the funk is back big style. The bad news is there's some stuff on here I just cannot connect with.

"The Valiant Denial" opens the album, but is pretty repetitive. Glenn's put that twang in his voice that he uses sometimes, and it's an ok song, but at nearly 7 minutes it doesn't hold my interest for more than 4.

"Stepping On" is much more like it. Proper funk rock with some great bass work and a a more suitable vocal from Glenn. THIS is superb, with a great chorus and melody. Brilliant.

"Monkey Man" picks up the baton and runs with it - great groove, funk in abundance and another great chorus with a huge hook.

"This House" undoes all that good work. A melody and vocal that really grates on me. I don't want to say negative things because I've been a Glenn fan for ages, but I won't split hairs. I hate this song, which is a dubious distiction for "This House". The first song by Glenn I despise.

"You Got Soul" soothes the nerves with the most up front funk offering from Glenn for years, if not ever. Not perfect, but cool. Sounds more like a funk jam than a song written specifically for an album.

"Frail" restores the faith that "This House" attacked. A much better ballad from Glenn, and a vocal that is beautiful. Great chorus, great song.

"Black Light" brings back the funk, but it's a good job "Frail" was between this and "You Got Soul" or they may have blurred into one. I could see this on "Soul Mover". Good, but nothing special.

"Night In White Satin" was onto a loser before I played it. I've never really liked the song, and Glenn does a great job on it, but it takes more than a great vocal to change my mind on a song I've never liked to start with. Now it's just a song I don't like sung well.

"Too High" features more of the funky feel, which is always welcome, and a good, driving beat. A strong song, but the chorus is a little weak after the drive of the verse.

"This Is How I Feel" eludes me completely. Sounds like about three different songs to me. Nice to hear some strings in a Glenn song, but I don't like this track much.

Ending with "The Divine", this song has a downbeat feel. Another great vocal from Glenn, and strings featured much more prominently and effectively. A nice song, and a mellow ending.

While "M4TD" has some great moments, it also has some average and some uncharacteristcally poor moments to my ears. I have no intentions of fighting with anybody over this - this forum has always being about sensible discussion. So those are my thoughts.

While I'm delighted that Glenn is getting such great feedback for this effort, I will file this in the "Glenn albums I rarely play" section, along with "Soul Mover" and "Building The Machine".

JG

Hi James,

it's good that everyone has a different feel about songs in general.

What i don't get is why you like the album Play me out but you can't get into a song like 'this house' 'frail' or 'the divine'.
They are imho a litle bit up the same creek (or how do you say that in english:) )

Monkey man you like almost as much as you like 'stepping on'
For me there is a galaxy between the brilliance of 'stepping on' and the '13 in a dozin' of 'monkey man'

Like i said in one of my earlier posts
Glenn is like a diamond with many facets, one you like more, one you like less

cheers
Hiawatha72
www.burnermusic.nl

btw; james i love your website, its hilarious

its funny how we are all but yet we like different bits of glenns catalogue more than others.

like you James i have been listening to M4TD constantly since i got it nearly 2 weeks ago but havent posted my thoughts yet (hopefully track by track this weekend). its been on in my car, pc, and LOUD thru my big speakers on my hifi.

IMHO this is not his weakest. Far from it. unlike a lot of others i really liked it on first play. some great stuff is on here. some of his best for me in fact.

the trouble is Glenn can, and does, write, play and sing in all different styles. and you can get a bit of everything on one album.

do i like this more than SM ? maybe yes maybe no. but thats the same for Addiction vs Blues vs SITKOR vs TWII. it depends!
Each has its merits and great moments.

Feel ,ROCK and BTM are the ones i hardly ever listen to and just play my favourites from, but i play Hughes Thrall and HTP as much as the solo albums.

Lets be honest here, how many other artists can produce such a consistently high standard of work so regularily? none that i know of.

Hiawatha, the reason I can't stand "This House" for example, is precisely as I stated - I think it has a horrible melody and a vocal style that does nothing for me. I love Glenn's funk and style normally, but this track in particular is all kinds of wrong for my taste. Glad you like the website though - it's in the process of being redesigned which is why I haven't updated it for ages!

Achim is absolutely right - I'm a die hard Glenn fan. He's done way more good work than he needs to to have me hooked for life. With a standard that high, it would be very difficult to maintain it without a blip that displeased someone out there. Personally, I haven't enjoyed his last two albums all the way through, but there was more on Soul Mover that I liked than this one, which I why I made the claim that for my money, it's his weakest album thus far. That doesn't mean it's crap - there's some great stuff present. But there is more stuff I've not liked on this CD than any other, so I have no choice but to say it's my least favourite as an actual album.

But as Wolfy states, we all like different parts of his career. I bought M4TD the week it was out, and that will never change. I've been a Glenn fan for a long time, and I will always buy his records. But at the same time I'm honest. If Glenn himself asked me what I thought, I'd tell him, just as I've told all of you. And unlike other websites, nobody is spouting abuse for doing so.

Yet.

JG

Quote from James Gaden

Before everybody decides to murder me in my sleep......

Not to worry, James.
I have....NO PLANS....to slice, dice, or puree you, for your opinion

Actually, I read both of your posts very slowly, giving the 'ole brain
enough time to absorb exactly what and why you wrote what you did.
(And you should know by now that we GHCPs got couth.)

The thing is, if you made a list of the gazillions of song titles beginning with
1992's GH Blues, you MIGHT think that "this guy" was cranking out sausages.
Is there somebody else that has composed and released as much as our boy?
Every album is different from the last. Can you put Glenn in......ONE CATEGORY?
Nope. It can't be done.

I believe that "coming back with a vengeance" is the correct phrase.
So.......M4tD isn't your favorite Glenn CD. No problem.
Like the renowned British weather; wait 5 minutes. It'll change.
So maybe THE NEXT GH CD has your name on it.

But I think that the most important thing that you wrote in your review, is:
"If Glenn himself asked me what I thought, I'd tell him, just as I've told all of you."

You've met the man, James.
You've read what other GHCPs have written, when they've met him.
Glenn respects his fans, and you know that he would seriously listen to your opinion.

PS.......I explained the story behind "The You Keep On Moving Collection ~ Variations On a Theme"
CD, at the recent New Jersey Birthday Party, and I asked Glenn to sign it for me.
He was VERY IMPRESSED with your handiwork.
Now all I need is for Glenn to record a CD to fill my empty "Yodeling Favourites"
plastic jewel case

Take care of yourself ~ and as always,
good luck with everything you're doing, in "The JG World."

Grace

(But I might chop up Achim {Let us stay alive} Schreiner, however.)

I believe that I could change my evil plan,

for a few hundred boxes of lebkuchen

Grace

From an observing point of view, I find it very interesting how mixed the opinions about this album are, and I have thought about this for quite a while now.

[Then I read Grace's and Achim's last posts and almost fell off my chair ]

Now - have you ever thought about that phenomenon, that you listen to certain artists/records/songs for a couple of days, maybe even weeks, and then you put them back into the shelf and you don't listen to them for ages again.
I have that all the time.
At the moment I listen to a lot of Keith Emerson and ELP, but believe me, I haven't listened to ELP in ages before that.
It's like a phase you go through. You really appreciate a certain kind of music/artist/album/style for a bit and then it changes again.
Now project that on an artist who has produced a catalogue as diverse as Big Daddy has.
See?
Play Me Out - Hughes/Thrall - Blues - From Now On - Feel - Addiction - TWII - BTM - SITKOR, Soul Mover, M4TD (those last three have evolved logically in that order - I wrote that in another post, I think)
Those are all very different kinds of albums - but it has been said many times before - those albums always reflect, where Glenn was at that time, personally and musically.
So basically I also have my various and different Glenn Hughes phases, but the difference to the other phases is, that I never listen to all those albums at one time (not simultaneously, of course - you can do that with a Flaming Lips record, but not with GH). I play them just as how I feel.
Before I went out to dinner tonight, I put on "Things Ain't Like They Used To Be", just that one song. That was exactly what I needed then.
And when I came back I played the Verviers Video of Black Light, Stepping On and the Sydney Clip of Frail.
(Remember, a couple of days ago, I listened to Until Tomorrow a dozen of times and had an eddie Hardin phase, but that's now over again )
But this, M4TD, is Glenn Hughes for me now.
I really love this album now, but there may be times when I don't listen to it.

End Of Chapter 1

ah, and Grace, please spare Achim - I plan to visit him next month

Cheers,
Christian

Quote from chrisloeb

Now project that on an artist who has produced a catalogue as diverse as Big Daddy has
......those albums always reflect, where Glenn was at that time, personally and musically.

I totally agree with you Chris, and understand where you're coming from with this viewpoint.
Plus, when you haven't listened to a particular GH CD in a long while, it's almost like meeting up
with an old friend that you haven't seen lately. An "old - new" Glenn Hughes CD to listen to.

Other times, I just feel like having a day of "You Keep On Moving"
I just hit the repeat button for one of the versions, and I'm all set to go........

Quote

ah, and Grace, please spare Achim - I plan to visit him next month

HOORAY!
Lebkuchen from Germany, and now Austria, too.
Heh, heh, heh.

Grace

Well well

Isn't this album dividing the fans!! Have to say that i can understand where everyone is coming from. There are moments on individual songs that i love, parts of the songs i dont like so much. Overall i really like it. I think the slower, less rocky/funky tracks such as Frail, This is how i feel [which my six year old daughter loves with a vengeance, and for that matter, so do i], and the Divine are the stand out tracks on the album. Even the two that i were not initially keen on, This House, and Nights in white satin, have grown on me. I think Glenn does an absolutly fantastic job vocally on the album, although he is a bit more restrained on the fantastic harmonies that only he can pull off.


What would be the point of bringing out the same album over and over again like Iron Maiden, and AC/DC. Only kidding all you Maiden and ACDC fans out there!!

Glenn, you can please some of the people some of the time, but not all of the people all of the time!

Take care everyone, see you on the Music for the Divine tour

Paul

Quote from Paul Johnston

What would be the point of bringing out the same album over and over again like Iron Maiden, and AC/DC. Only kidding all you Maiden and ACDC fans out there!!

Glenn, you can please some of the people some of the time, but not all of the people all of the time!

Take care everyone, see you on the Music for the Divine tour

Paul

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Well said, first I love to bits this album, the thing is each song gives me different vibes, different feelings, and that's what I love, what get's under my skin and through my spine

if is it perfect? I do hope it doesnt!!!! Thankfully perfection doesnt exit, cos if you get it... what's next? where's the challenge or the feeling of going on and improving, or trying to outdid yourself if you get perfection...

anyway music is about feelings and nothing so perfectly imperfect as feelings

I.xo

Like so many of you, I've been a big fan of Big Daddy all the way back to the beginnings of Trapeze. With each record/CD, Glenn has evolved somewhat musically, and, in just about every case, I have been right there with him - loving most everything he has put out for over 30 years. It is not reasonable to assume that this would continue ad infinitum, and M4TD is the CD that breaks the string for me. Some of it I love - it starts out great with Valiant Denial, Stepping out, and Monkey Man, but most of the rest just doesn't do it for me. I do acknowledge that there is alot of quality work here, and Glenn's voice is, as always, in fine form. I've been playing it for a little while now, and I just can't really connect with it. I hope it sells millions, and helps get GH back on the road in the US, and in the studio for lots more CD releases. I will buy them all. Like someone said, the next one will probably sound like it was written to suit my individual taste. Til then, I'm still waiting to hit that Eureka point with M4TD.

Tom

It's funny how some have taken a while to get into it. I was worried when Chip told me he took a few spins too but I loved it first play and still have it in my car now.

Even heard my wife singing Monkey Man to herself while doing the ironing the other day!

That is another classic GH catchy chorus - where does he keep getting all these great songs from

Those tour dates cant come soon enough David

Not exactly the greatest review, but it did get a four out of six.

A couple of months after its release, what is everyone's lasting impression of M4TD?