Who is A.R. Pinewood? Well, he is the alter ego of Adam Ross from Randolph’s Leap, in country mode but with odd things like yodelling and vocoders. It is a “full band” record in terms of the instruments but BM is not sure if he played them all or not – but quite possibly…
Following debut ‘No Life‘ from last June, this is the second album in less than a year and Ross clearly enjoys the persona, although the tracks are more gentle this time around…
The title track is lovely, whatever you think of the vocoder treatment, with some good ol’ country fiddle, a nice ol’ organ solo, and all the rest…
These are songs of love and appreciation of the world around, whether in Covid times or not… ‘Wallpapering’ (great title) has more vocoder and is another lamentation on the troubles of life, with some great squelches of synth…
‘Destiny’ is a real corker, with nifty guitar lines and more vocoder, the treatments actually work really well with Adam’s voice – again a song of rejection but with an upbeat message.
Moving on, ‘Forever It Goes’ continue in the same direction, and again this track has some great instrumentation with a catchy chorus – for some reason BM is thinking here about Babybird, another artist who has a similar prolific output and never fails to disappoint.
The closing pair of tunes ‘Ravenous’ and ‘Competent Human’ are more jolly, and it sounds as if Adam has shed the Pinewood persona a wee bit and his actual personality shines through…
Once again, BM is impressed by the quality of the songwriting – in whatever mode, Adam Ross is a real talent and this record demands repeated listening…