Those Liverpool mystics "The Coral" were always a smart bunch of musicians with tunes to spare and PhD's in clever pop songs. They could incorporate all styles in their music from Cossack rhythms to Howlin Wolf blues. Amongst there number was a young guitarist by the name of Bill Ryder Jones who left the band in 2008 and has since collaborated with such luminaries as Alex Turner from the Arctic Monkeys and Blur's Graham Coxon. This is Ryder Jones first solo album and it is at this point that a concept album alert is issued since it is a musical adaptation of Italo Calvino's 1979 postmodernist novel "If on a Winters Night a Traveller" an intriguing tome about the hunt for a mysterious book. This is a title that was also purloined for another album this time by the Tantric Geordie minstrel Sting, which if truth be told can't hold a candle to this astonishing debut.In the form of "If" Ryder Jones has produced a cinematic beauty full of elegant soundscapes, half whispered lyrics and icy chill. Its almost nearly all instrumental, but not quite, and strangely prefigures the forthcoming winter wonders promised by Kate Bush in what sounds like her best album in years "50 words for snow" The title track of "If" kicks off the show with considerable aplomb. With its combination of sad Debussy ivories and then vast orchestral sweep it amounts to an immediate knock out blow. This mix of classical melodies combined with huge emotions continues on the next track "The Reader (Malbrock)" which conjures up that wonderful melancholy that Shearwater tapped into on their outrageously lovely "The Golden Archipelago" especially "Hidden Lakes". The mood shifts with the entry of the strikingly powerful "By The Church Of Appolonia's" with its almost funereal drumming and dramatic weight of its middle crescendo. Then suddenly everything is tripped right back to Ryder Jones, an acoustic guitar and "Le Grand Desordre" which Elliot Smith fans will swoon over throughout its four minutes of austere drama. Other songs like the standout "Enlace" alternatively start with that dark German quality that Radiohead have so successfully moulded on albums like "Amnesiac" but grow into a far more luscious and warm affair. It is rumoured that Ryder Jones does much soundtrack work and from listening to this track, which finally mutates into a Dave Gilmour sounding guitar work out, you can understand why. Seek out in addition "Intersect" with a sweeping cello that would warm the heart of Yo Yo Ma and is music of such depth that it deserves a huge audience to sit in rapt wonder. The presence of the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra throughout anchors the album with an inspirational set of musicians. On "Give me a name" all these factors come together perfectly with Ryder Jones understated vocal, huge strings that tug at your heart and a slow piano backdrop which sounds like snow falling. Truly splendid stuff and demanding repeated listens
This album is full of ambition, elegance, depth and intimate composition. Indeed in one sense "If" represents a scale of departure so radical that it can only be compared to the type of musical epiphany experienced by composers like Mark Hollis when he produced Talk Talk's masterpiece "Spirit of Eden". Quite how such promising musicians who have never really threatened such evocative grandeur reach a time and place when music of this quality is possible is a just remarkable and a cause of true celebration. Bill Ryder Jones has pulled off a minor miracle here and those of you who love beautiful music are about to be richly rewarded. 10/10
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