Mediocre Singer/songwriter Fare
It's a common story: young singer is signed by major label and blows his advance on drugs (and friends allegedly), but Phil Campbell is no Ryan Adams and lacks the gritty songwriting that makes Adams misdemeanours more charming than disgraceful. This Glaswegian songwriter may be able to write, but the tunes are the typical chart filling ballads that your mum, and fellow X-Factor fans, will adore. There is plenty of substance to Campbell's tunes, but they simply fail to strike a chord when there are so many more instantly engaging songwriters out there at the moment.
The title, 'No Love Songs' must be ironic as there are soppy ballads a plenty, 'Isn't She Beautiful' and the simpering 'Joy', almost reach James Blunt's level of insipidness and tales of fallen men that need the love of a good woman to redeem them in some kind of modern attempt at reverse feminism like, 'Maps' and 'A Little Hand'. There are the occasional tense indie tunes like, 'Should've Stayed Home' and the aching guitar melody, 'Same Old Me' which hold a little spark, but the majority just drag on with little impetus. 'Hey Mama' shows a rare moment of rock integrity, with brash, swaggering guitar riffs kicking a lazy and funked up rock melody that steers away from tunes pining about and reverts more towards the usual rock cliché of adoring them. Closer, 'After The Garden' swells with drama in its piano and violin instrumentation, but it also feels far too much like its attempting to copy US singer songwriters; it's a shame because there are some nice lyrics, "I can still taste the bitter flame of the life that I chose".
In his favour, Campbell's voice is warm and endearing and his tunes all have pretty tales to tell, but it's the manner of their telling that's so unexceptional and sadly average. It's all very nice, but it's highly mediocre and therefore not much more than nice.