Younger readers / listeners could be forgiven for drawing a blank on Colin MacIntyre and his band, given that Mull Historical Society’s heyday was nigh on two decades ago.
However, his brand of highly crafted but accessible music immediately displays the form that gave his cult ‘band’ several minor hits all those years ago – chart-friendly but cerebral, somehow retaining DIY credentials amidst its multi-layered in production.
This collection gathers together his first three classic albums – ‘Loss’ dealing with the death of his father, while there’s the debut hit single, the seven-minute ‘Barcode Bypass’, about the demise of the small local shop. 2003’s ‘Us’ was the most successful of the trio of long players, brushing the Top 20 and spawning the single chart hit ‘Watching Xanadu’.
The third CD in this box set is ‘This Is Hope’, containing MacIntyre’s final chart hit ‘How ‘Bout I Love You More’, but of most interest to hard-core fans will be the bonus fourth rarities CD including cover versions ranging from Radiohead to Ms Dynamite.
But for the uninitiated, this may be the ideal time to get into the band – after all, as MacIntyre sings in the eponymous track, the Mull Historical Society are “here for you and me”.
Archaeology is out now. This article originally appeared in the Portsmouth News.
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