Ed Harcourt Albums (7)
'Until Tomorrow Then: The Best of Ed Harcourt'
Release Date 10/8/2007
Tracks 16
Label EMI
See Album Tracklist and Review
What The Critics Say
Having launched a solo career seven years prior to this release, Ed Harcourt isn't quite ripe enough for a greatest-hits compilation. Still, his songwriting has been consistently solid since 2001's Maplewood EP, which lends a sense of cohesion to Until Tomorrow Then's 16 tracks. There are no dips here, no lapses in good judgment, no ill-advised forays into a genre that Harcourt isn't capable of pulling off. And even if this collection does seem a bit premature, it's still an engaging listen, with Harcourt's pop-based experiments veering between '70s-styled ballads and contemporary chamber pop. Also included are two unreleased tracks, "You Put a Spell on Me" (no relation to the similarly-titled song by Screamin' Jay Hawkins) and a demo version of "Whistle of a Distant Train." The latter track was taken from the Here Be Monsters sessions, and although it can also be heard in slightly different format on Maplewood, it's nothing short of beautiful here, with a plucked double bass anchoring the elegiac mix of piano, trumpet, and wistful vocals. Harcourt may be young, but he's one of the most promising songwriters in recent memory, bridging the gap between the confessionals of Jeff Buckley and the theatrics of Rufus Wainwright. For those looking to delve into his ever-growing catalog, Until Tomorrow Then is a nice place to start. ~ Andrew Leahey, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Ed Harcourt's accomplished fifth album Beautiful Lie is easily one of his most accessible and listenable efforts. Yes, the hallmarks of his tortured singer/songwriter status are still in place, as flagrant strings, grandiose arrangements, and rampant-but-quality peer-mimicry rule these 14 tracks. But even though his lyrics are sometimes overbearingly dark and too many vampire metaphors abound, the music and songwriting compare favorably to contemporary indie-centric, raspy-voiced artists like Beck, the Eels, Sparklehorse, and Tom Waits. Harcourt dabbles in many genres here, from acoustic folk to '70s style pop ballads to rootsy psychedelia to experimental lounge, all the while rooting the music's emotion in melodic piano. When he rocks out full-force on "Revolution in My Heart" and the carnival-esque "Scatterbrain," the fuzzy dynamics recall the Walkmen at their best. Those two tracks bookend the Mark Linkous-like "Until Tomorrow Then" which marries blues-styled singing with grainy, haunted samples suggestive of a gramophone. Harcourt's mastery of so many styles and his multi-instrumentalist talents might be what's made him a niche artist up to Beautiful Lie's release. With so much going on stylistically, it can be hard to grasp his albums as cohesive entities. It's a shame, but because of Harcourt's eclecticism, it's hard to pin him down as having a distinct sound. He's almost too talented. But Beautiful Lie is an invigorating and frequently gorgeous affair, essential for old fans and a good place to start for newcomers. ~ Tim DiGravina, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Can an artist be too talented for his own good? Multi-instrumentalist, multi-headed musical hydra, singer/song-summoner Ed Harcourt begs the question on his fourth studio effort, Strangers. From the opening guitar squelch that soars and cuts into the lead-off track, "The Storm Is Coming," it's apparent that Harcourt is on a creative rage. He layers piano, guitars, and keyboards all the while crooning and wailing. Similarly, "Let Love Not Weigh Me Down" builds weeping violin and smashing guitars on top of plinky piano as Harcourt cries on about how being in love is to affirm all that is positive about being alive. He even gets around to updating the Police's "Born in the Fifties" with "Born in the '70s," a deceptively jaunty plea for older naysayers to give his generation a chance or get out of the way. The overall effect ends up sounding something like a reworking of "Under Pressure" featuring Ted Leo and Rufus Wainwright backed by the Flaming Lips. Needless to say, Harcourt's exploding arteries of emotion can get a bit tiring as he insists on building the volcano of tension track after track. However, just when you think it's about time to call "uncle," Harcourt lets go of your arm with tracks like "The Trapdoor," a Nick Drake meets Neil Young-style harvest moon of a song that sinks into your gut. Despite being a crack melodicist with a knack for a catchy lyric and an iconoclast's taste for oddly disparate but somehow fitting musical influences that range from Chet Baker and Todd Rundgren to Sonic Youth and Screamin' Jay Hawkins, Harcourt isn't a household name. Occupying the same deeply harmonic and beatifically sanguine post-Radiohead space in the music scene as similarly inclined cult figures Andrew Bird and Eric Matthews, Harcourt seems the most obvious graduate of the post-rock class to succeed in a Badly Drawn Boy cum Prince kind of way. So, why hasn't it happened yet? Maybe it's because Strangers finds Harcourt in the uncomfortably enviable position of being something along the lines of a thinking man's Chris Martin, which is to say, Strangers is a devastatingly accomplished album. ~ Matt Collar, All Music Guide
'From Every Sphere'
Release Date 3/4/2003
Tracks 12
Label Astralwerks
See Album Tracklist and Review
What The Critics Say
On his stylish and refined sophomore album From Every Sphere, Ed Harcourt waives the murky soundscapes that overshadowed his 2001 Mercury Music Prize-nominated album Here Be Monsters, for a stripped-down, intimate effort. Instead of fighting adolescence's last days and ignoring adulthood like he did on his first album, Harcourt embraces the fact that he's growing up. Only 25, he's a touch wiser and enjoys his newfound confidence as an individual and as an artist. From Every Sphere, which was initially planned to be a conceptual double album entitled The Ghost Parade, is heavy in spirit while Harcourt relishes in his personal and professional growth. The Bono-like inflections and the quasi-Nick Cave growl are relieved by an inquisitive croon and Tchad Blake's basic approach from the production seat gives From Every Sphere the time and space to simply arrive. The swanky power pop number "Watching the Sun Come Up" is soaking in space rock threads and a polished brass section, while pianos slowly take shape in the beautiful paranoia of "The Birds Will Sing for Us" and the heart-rending "Bleed a River Deep." When "Ghostwriter" saunters in with its sexy wannabe Tom Waits impression and jazzy abstracts, From Every Sphere doesn't lose ground. Harcourt experiments in more ways than one on this album, never overindulgent in the process. He works with what he knows from personal experience without being redundant and in today's business you have to have beaucoup talent to pull that off. From Every Sphere affirms Ed Harcourt's potential. ~ MacKenzie Wilson, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Ed Harcourt certainly has a grasp of atmospherics, and he's steeped -- some would say marinated -- in his influences. There are some really marvelous tracks on Here Be Monsters, the songwriter's debut album. "Something in My Eye," which is lush with trumpet and strings, has an evocative tune and a vocal in a languid stupor, while "Beneath the Heart of Darkness" sports a great lead-in and such witty, ear catching lyrics as "spluttering like an army of artillery sporadically firing." The ending veers into the experimental, with a hurricane of noisy static before a calm resolution. "Wind Through the Trees," sounds like the forlorn hand of Erik Satie skittering its way across a piano, with the dreamy refrain "You can't run from me/'cos I'm the wind through the trees." Beautiful. Other tracks warranting further ear time are "These Crimson Tears," with its cello and muted trumpet wafting after-hours from some jazz club alleyway, and "Apple of My Eye," which has a mock Motown/spiritual vibe, with handclaps and a much beefier vocal than the one featured on the earlier Maplewood EP. What remains is less noteworthy, and the penultimate track, "Shanghai," comes with an awful, possibly ironic guitar break, and sounds like a Buggles reject. It's a baffling puzzler given what preceded it, making one wonder about the artist's allegedly vast back catalog and his possibly tenous hold on quality control. This artist contains multitudes, though, and it looks like the gifted ones are in the ascendant. Follow his upward trajectory. ~ Mark Joseph, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Originally released in 2001, this EP marks the beginning of Ed Harcourt's solo career. The specter of Tom Waits looms very large (with a bizarre stop off at Bill Frissell's Ghost Town) on "I've Become Misguided"; there's even talk of "an old trombone" and "weird things happening under the floorboards." In "He's Building a Swamp," he sings of "living in a burnt out Cadillac/sleeping in a sack/never leaving the track." Remember, this is somebody from the South Coast of England; a beige Mondeo doesn't have the same resonance, so instead we have tired pastiche. Similarly, "The Whistle of a Distant Train" struggles to be poignant, but sounds like a mournful karaoke over a backing of "In the Neighbourhood." Elsewhere there are hints of Beck, especially the chorus of "Hanging With the Wrong Crowd." The ventriloquism continues apace with Bono taking full possession of the Harcourt vocal cords in the strangely free-associative track, "Apple of My Eye": "I'm sick of this angst/don't need thanks/you're the apple of my eye." The best track is "Attaboy Go Spin a Yarn," which is saved by some welcome irony: "I'm not one for nostalgia/don't really like the past...it seems so easy to reflect on times gone by/I expect you'll spin a yarn 'til you die." Hardcourt has some talent, but he really doesn't have his own voice yet. Give him a few more years, and if the originality doesn't kick in, a lucrative career as an impressionist beckons. ~ Mark Joseph, All Music Guide
