Babyshambles - Shotter's Nation
Shotter's Nation is the second studio album from Pete Doherty's Babyshambles and the it is the follow up to their 2005 debut effort Down in AlbionTrack List :
1. Carry On Up The Morning
2. Delivery
3. You Talk
4. UnBiloTitled
5. Side Of The Road
6. Crumb Begging
7. Unstookie Titled
8. French Dog Blues
9. There She Goes
10. Baddies Boogie
11. Deft Left Hand
12. Lost Art Of Murder
What a difference a good producer can make. "Down In Albion", Babyshambles' troubled debut album, wasn't short of ideas, but their execution was frustratingly ham-fisted: indeed, the record sounded half-finished, despite a lengthy gestation. This follow-up (and major label debut) was recorded amid apparent spiralling chaos in Peter Doherty's personal life, yet sounds 100 times better. The reason, you suspect, is that someone (Parlophone, perhaps) decided to replace hands-off producer Mick Jones with a certain Stephen Street.
Erstwhile producer of The Smiths and Blur, Street is famed for his meticulousness. With Babyshambles, it could have gone either way. He could have decided the band weren't up to it and made off with the master tapes (as he once did with Primal Scream), but instead he's licked Babyshambles into shape. Crucially, Doherty has been forced to assay more than one vocal take per track. The guy no longer mumbles or sounds exhausted; rather, he's alternately innocent, impish and infinitely melancholic. The band, meanwhile, have abandoned meandering ska and general horsing about in favour of pacy, rambunctious rock'n'roll. Here again, you can hear Street cracking the whip.
Maybe Street's intervention isn't the full story, though. Babyshambles have had a line-up change since "Down In Albion", and though new guitarist Mik Whitnall has an unpromising CV (ex-skinhead; member of Kill City), his style is markedly less flashy than that of predecessor Patrick Walden and, as it turns out, its simplicity suits Doherty's songwriting. Essentially, Whitnall seems to have made Babyshambles sound more like The Libertines, most strikingly on "Side Of The Road". It's simultaneously a step back and a step in the right direction.
Lyrically, "Shotter's Nation" brims with the insight and eloquence with which Doherty continually surprises you. Narcotic references are predictably abundant; so too are agonised tales of relationship strife (Kate Moss has four co-writing credits). Opener "Carry On Up The Morning" fairly sets out the stall: when Doherty sings, "It wasn't easy getting you out of my head", you know what's coming next. "It's too easy getting out of my head…" He's similarly direct during "UnBiloTitled" ("You said that you loved me…why don't you f*ck off?"), a song written with Peter Wolfe that evokes both the tender "For Lovers" and Doherty's desolate Littl'ans collaboration, "Their Way".
Elsewhere, Doherty shows plenty of depth: the compelling, Orwell-referencing "Lost Art Of Murder" is equal parts savage self-laceration and wide-eyed escape fantasy; "Baddies Boogie" finds empathy with an addict's put-upon partner; and "UnStookieTitled" rails against false friends and hangers-on with pleasing venom. Of course, the debate about what Peter Doherty needs will continue, but this album teaches us the surprising, anachronistic truth that what Babyshambles needed was a controlling major label and bossy producer. Who knew!
Source : yahoo music
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