Category: reviews

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fensepost feature

Fensepost did a featured artist article on me a few weeks back which I am going to take the liberty of printing below

After last years wonderful EP release, I Love Leonard Cohen, the time has come for London’s Robin Grey to go all out and show why he is truly one of the greatest hidden treasures in the European underground. Hard at work on his sophomore full length release due this fall (follow up to 2007’s Only The Missile), this man seems to be at his best. The transformation of his character is more than impressive. It would certainly not be premature to say that he is at the top of his game.

The charming track “Younger Looking Skin” spills out from his veins like a severed history. He sings to the fools, the damned, and the loved. With every word, every sound composed, he speaks of only the truth on the matters of life that often go unnoticed and the travesties of inadequacies. The most beautiful part of a Robin Grey song is the power of understanding you can feel without actually relate to his experiences at all. Just crack open your finest four dollar wine, and suffer through life with the greatest of ease. Mr. Grey can help you through it all.

Wow. Someone likes my music then. Thanks Ron. The original can be found here – http://www.fensepost.com/main/2009/07/17/robin-grey-feature-artist/

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a few random links

My music has been popping up in some new places on the web the last month… Younger Looking Skin was played on an american internet radio show ShockPop! which is aired on scrubradio.com every Sundays at 5pm.

It was also featured on CD-RWu podcast in Poland here… http://cd-rwu.blogspot.com/2009/07/0037.html.

Most randomly, German online Magazine http://www.chip.de used the track “These Days” in a ScreenCast-Video presenting new Desktop-Technologies which can be seen here:  http://www.chip.de/c1_videos/Gnome-3.0-Revolutionaerer-Desktop-Video_37308944.html and here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_B7VpIwdiY

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fatea album review

fatealogorev

‘Only The Missile’ has been reviewed in the latest edition of Fatea Magazine, appearing alongside another review for good friend of mine Sarah MacDougall who has been staying with me whilst on tour here from Canada, which made me happy. You can read it below or on their site alongside all the others here – http://www.fatea-records.co.uk/magazine/releases.html.

“There are still people that believe that songs have power, that pens, words, notes and guitars are mightier than the sword, that people still take the time to listen. Robin Grey is just such a person.

In “Only The Missile”, he’s put together a set of ten songs that reflect how society can be viewed and the observation of the life that goes on around him. It’s more personal than some, less political with a big p, but none-the-less sharp and cutting. “The Last Time I Saw David” looks at faith and it’s relationship with religion and how it impacts the individual. It’s deep, but not hard going.”

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catching the waves review

robinholga3

Last week my album ‘Only The Missile’ received an enthusiastic and insightful review on creative commons music blog Catching The Waves. I have reposted a slightly trimmed review below, if you’d like to read the original in all its full glory please click on the following link:  http://soundthefreetrumpet.typepad.com/

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“Only The Missile is a 10-track album that will appeal to lovers of Leonard Cohen, folk music, introspection, pointed lyrics and open hearts.

The album’s transparent mix warms the listener’s ears while giving centre stage to the understated vocals although Robin can be feisty as well as fluffy. Take ‘The Last Time I Saw David’, an unflinching tale about overcoming religious hypocrisy to reach an atheistic/agnostic state of mind, ensures that Robin will not be booking a gig in America’s Bible Belt any time soon. It’s refreshing to hear a heartfelt song that isn’t all: “I wuv ‘oo; ‘oo wuv me.”

Then there’s the soothing lullaby of The Finchley Waltz (play it to any baby and watch them drop off), a quintessentially English response to the terrorist bombings in London on 7/7:

“I daydreamed for hours in the traffic jam
As the good guys and the bad guys stopped play”

I could recommend any track, but I’ll be unoriginal and suggest the opener These Days, an uptempo mandolin and banjo-laden number with a paradoxically slow but optimistic chorus that will get you singing in the bath and, if you’ve suffered because of the credit crunch, because you’ve taken a bath.*

The title track is a toe-tapper with some wailing harmonica – do harmonicas ever do anything else but wail? – and Your Man is another in a seemingly endless supply of huggable love songs. Swan Song and Five (featuring some very welcome ethnic percussion – bongos, tablas, that sort of thing) bring things to a dreamy close – they’re the aural equivalent of a favourite jumper.

Goodness, what a lovely album. It never ceases to amaze me at what talent is lurking in the darker corners of the net. Please think about sending him a little cash, or, failing that, bake him a cake. He likes cake. A lot. Finally, if I may venture a little advice to Mr Grey: tuck your shirt in, young man. This is the internet – we have standards.”

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fensepost review

I just got home from the streets of London to discover a truly lovely review from a US blog called fensepost which I have printed in full below as it made my day…

‘Here is an artist that seems to revel in acoustic sweetness. London’s Robin Grey invites you into his coffee shop friendly world on his latest release. “I Love Leonard Cohen” is a five-track EP so splendid Mr. Cohen himself should be more than honored to have such a talented fan. Anyone looking for a fun-filled depressive state, look no further.

Grey reminisces of greater times on the title track “I Love Leonard Cohen”. This is a masterful folk bit paying a strange tribute to anyone with a regretful memory, as well as simple odes to Meat Loaf, Jeff Buckley, R.E.M., and, more so than others, outplayed Weezer CDs. The blindingly smooth “Shakes and Shudders” is a beautiful backdrop while reading Kerouac’s tale of strength defying times at Desolation Peak – calm, beautiful, and a bit resentful of the pretentious normalcy.

Robin Grey will not need to do too much to prove himself an incendiary artist in the world of folk music. His calmly exquisite mannerisms seem to bring you back to a simpler time and place, whenever you want it to be. There is literature in his words. And “I Love Leonard Cohen” is a beautiful story, desperate to be told.’

taken from http://www.fensepost.com/main/?p=1439