Will Richards - Ready To Talk Now
‘Ready To Talk Now’ may have been two years in the making, but lets see how it shapes up.
It begins with a rather restrained nature. ‘Be A Better Man’ has a relatively slow pace due to the acoustic folksy feel surrounding the song. Other tracks follow the same method of pursuit. ‘Over Him’ has the acoustic guitar to set it alight. This when accompanied by synths and strings fills my mind with images of sitting on one of those American style porches you see in all the movies. The track is relaxed and comforting. ‘She's In Love With Me’ follows in mood but with keys and gentle taps of piano becoming the focus of my attention.
To slide alongside the mellow tunes are some more upbeat ones in the form of ‘Ready To Talk Now’ with its jumpy beat, the can’t help but dance number that is ‘I Didn't Want To Kill Them’; I couldn’t help but want to get up and dance, and the electric ‘Sweet & Lonely Lullabies’. The central instrumental that is present shows all elements working on different levels to make this track great.
When listening to the tracks on ‘Ready To Talk Now’ there were two in particular that had me reminiscing of tracks from other artists. ‘Travel Sick’ had Westerns style guitars that made me think of Jon Bon Jovi in the ‘Blaze Of Glory’ video, and ‘Good As Gold’ had a Plain White T’s ‘Hey There Dahlia’ style beginning which is then strangely, attractively situated with Phantom of The Opera style organs which made it all kinds of spooky.
Just like the variation in music, the vocals follow the same flow. Vocal harmonies for chorus of ‘Be A Better Man’ are excellent, especially with the folksy feel. The harmonies of ‘Good As Gold’ have a slight zombie creep about them, which is weird. The vocals became jazzy on ‘Sweet & Lonely Lullabies’ and gave me a sense of upset and heartache on ‘Ready To Talk Now’. One particular line from ‘The Colour Of Money’ that became wedged in my mind for no apparent reasons was the catchy “I got the colour, I got the colour of money, gonna put it in the factory”.
When you first hear an album with only nine songs took two years to put together it’s a little disturbing. You never know what to expect. Have the two years been trying to figure out exactly what to put on the album and how to even begin or has it taken so long as the record is a worthwhile listen and is amazingly entertaining. Will Richards has produced tracks I categorise in the later respect. Each track is appealing and very well created.