The recent reissues of Royal Family & The Poor's early albums offered persuasive arguments that Liverpudlian Mike Keane was an underrated songwriter. This re-evaluation seems to have given Keane - now effectively a solo artist - the confidence to return to the studio and record his first album since 1999's 'Children Of Baphomet'. Granted his style hasn't changed much over the years; specialising in a brand of dark, relatively slow-paced electronica, free of artful trickery. Nearly all of it will please his cult following especially the Eastern-flavoured 'Midnight Symphony II', the effortless melody of 'Ratio' and 'Long Time Coming' that bears comparison with Peter Gabriel's 'Games Without Frontiers'. Only on the final three tracks does Keane come unstuck as he experiments with modern dance music. That apart it's a return to form for Liverpool's most elegiac son.
The recent reissues of Royal Family & The Poor's early albums offered persuasive arguments that Liverpudlian Mike Keane was an underrated songwriter. This re-evaluation seems to have given Keane - now effectively a solo artist - the confidence to return to the studio and record his first album since 1999's 'Children Of Baphomet'. Granted his style hasn't changed much over the years; specialising in a brand of dark, relatively slow-paced electronica, free of artful trickery. Nearly all of it will please his cult following especially the Eastern-flavoured 'Midnight Symphony II', the effortless melody of 'Ratio' and 'Long Time Coming' that bears comparison with Peter Gabriel's 'Games Without Frontiers'. Only on the final three tracks does Keane come unstuck as he experiments with modern dance music. That apart it's a return to form for Liverpool's most elegiac son.
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