The Bluetones - Expecting To Fly (Expanded Edition)

(Muso's Guide, March 23, 2009)

Album review

There’s a heavy weight bearing down on bands when it comes to naming début albums.

It could make people pick up or turn away - it could make the difference between a lasting career or a brief day basking in the warming sun of musical success.

The Bluetones’ 1996 début was named Expecting To Fly, which spoke more volumes about the band than they could have with their music.

It was a record that tied up their fearful ‘dare to hope’ attitude with a small amount of self-assurance, well-placed in their understanding that they had talent, dammit, and people would see that.

And they did, for a time. Expecting To Fly fired Oasis’ (What’s The Story) Morning Glory? from the number one spot, which was a grand measure of popularity indeed.

Now, 13 years later, The Bluetones are out on the road again and a new revamped version of this Britpop classic has been unleashed. So, is it a must-have for the diehards, a might-have for the newbies? Or essential listening straight outta Hounslow?

From the initial bass rumble, opener ‘Talking To Clarry’ is a leader. giving way to confidently crashing indie guitars, it was clear that The Bluetones were going to be smarter than the average indie band.

And smart they were, nodding to Brit poet Adrian Mitchell and his poem Celia, Celia with the memorable lyric from single ‘Bluetonic’ - “When I am sad and weary/When all my hope has gone/I walk around my house and think of you with nothing on”.

A lovely dark slice of infatuation, it retains its uniquely minor-key misery even now, perhaps thanks to singer Mark Morriss‘ easily-recognisable, uniquely tremulous vocal.

In the old days, ‘Carnt Be Trusted’ was the first track on the second side of the Expecting To Fly cassette.

Now, it still forms a change of pace in the record. A lovely, melodic ode to the pitfalls of relationships, it boasts delicious harmonies that would make Brian Wilson blush, and does the business in under four minutes. That’s proper songwriting.

Closing on ‘Time And Again’, it stays with the band long enough to exhibit a darkly sweet menace that says, “We could never really hurt you - but we might shake our fists a bit”.

The new material which adds to this expanded edition includes a whole other disc of Bluetones paraphernalia like previously unreleased live tracks and BBC archive material.

Aside from the inclusion of the undisputed single of 1995, (’Are You Blue Or Are You Blind?’, in case you’ve forgotten), it doesn’t do a terrible amount of new stuff, more augmenting the glory of the original album release, but that’s worth it just to get Expecting To Fly back on the shelves again.

Ejaculated by a genre which had already sounded its death rattle with the likes of Menswe@r and Heavy Stereo, The Bluetones were unfortunately timed. Were Expecting To Fly released anew in 2009, there is no doubt that its vast landscapes of melodious melancholy would rocket, and Mark Morriss would be smiling his ever-enigmatic smirk across the music channels.

As it is, this LP signifies a fantastically well-presented selection of incredibly intelligent, heartfelt songs for which 1996 should always be remembered - that ‘daring to hope’ frozen in time.