| Stranger Comes to Town | ||||
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| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | 3 May 2010 | |||
| Genre | Rock, pop rock | |||
| Length | 49:46 | |||
| Label | Absolute (UK) Repertoire Records (Europe) | |||
| Producer | Steve Harley | |||
| Steve Harley chronology | ||||
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| Singles from Stranger Comes to Town | ||||
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Stranger Comes to Town is the fifth studio album from English songwriter and musician Steve Harley, which was released by Absolute in 2010. The album was produced by Harley.
Harley has described Stranger Comes to Town as "a sort-of protest album" and "a state-of-the-nation report". He told The York Press in 2010, "I'm not a grumpy old man but what's happening to this country? I don't like the dumbing-down from the moment our Prime Minister said 'Call me Tony'. I've been angry ever since. Kids are growing up in a world where there's no deference. What was wrong with 'sir' or 'madam'? The album is a new-fashioned protest album. It's not Blowin' in the Wind or 'Masters of War', but deep down, what are we coming to?" [1] He added to The Bolton News , "I'm sick of the greedy people running the country and the fact that everything is being dumbed down." [2]
Speaking to Classic Rock in 2010, Harley also commented on the album's theme, "The essence of the stories on this album is the 'Stranger' bit. That's the mystery. It's a metaphor, an allegory for modern life and invasions of privacy and all the things that have entered into the Western world and ruined it." [3]
Describing the album as a "true labour of love", [4] as well as being "hard work", [5] Harley described the album's development and style to Acoustic , "I've reverted to the type where you've got rather simple acoustic tunes, but with poetical lyrics and mysterious stories mixed in with the more bizarre production kind of things. I've come back to the young man that set out in the early '70s with a lot of ambition and no inhibitions. In the studio I got into my own mindset. I was just having fun in the studio." [5] He added to The York Press, "I've had five years of ripping my own ears off. It really doesn't get any easier. It's not the tune that's difficult, it's the words that are a struggle – and like John Lennon said, 'it's not about filler words'. You never rest as a songwriter. You're always looking for the muse to come and sit on your shoulder, and I can't take the stress. Well, every five years, I can... though this might be the last one. I've so much to say on this album." [1]
Speaking of the album's title, Harley stated it referred to "a man who feels estranged from what is going on around him". He added to The York Press: "I borrowed it. When I was up in Norfolk we went to a village pub to get the stress off with a pint of Guinness, and we heard these two people say 'Stranger Comes to Town'. They asked, 'What are you doing here, Steve?', so I gave them a line from Eccles in The Goons: 'Everyone has to be somewhere'." [1]
Harley and his band Cockney Rebel spent a month recording Stranger Comes to Town at Leeders Farm Residential Studios, Norfolk, in September and October 2009. [6] Harley booked the studio months beforehand, back in March 2009, and revealed in a diary entry at the time, "The notes are there, in notebooks and on scraps of mini-disc. Tunes and couplets, simple rhymes and deeper thoughts all jumbled, randomly acquired and noted over the past few years. There is only one way I will collate it all into coherent songs, and that is by booking a recording studio." [7]
Harley would typically spend 12 or more hours a day working on the album at Leeders Farm. [8] The band spent most mornings rehearsing around the studio's kitchen table. [9] Due to other professional commitments, guitarist Robbie Gladwell was absent for much of the recording, leaving Barry Wickens to cover the electric guitar parts on half of the album. [9] [10]
Speaking of the sessions in a 5 October diary entry, Harley revealed,
"Slightly shattered. Ten tracks recorded, some sung, others waiting for lyrics. It's like jet-lag. Coming down from the mad rushes of adrenalin that go with the producing/recording process. Been living-in at a residential recording studio. Odd to get up and share breakfast with the band. Odd, too, to share the dinner table each night, but they are all decent blokes and easy to get along with. I'm the one with the swimming head, tunes and words, production plans all juggled at the same time, so I'm the distant one over the boiled eggs and soldiers." [9]
By the end of October, nine songs were nearing completion and the remainder of the year saw Harley spend more time in the studio to finish the album, including recording vocals and mixing the tracks. [11] In a November diary entry, he revealed, "Got 10 new songs. Three of them are co-written with various guys. Tunes only. Not words. Only wish any one of them had a literary bent, too. The lyrics have been the toughest part, as usual." [12]
By the end of the 2009, Stranger Comes to Town was almost complete, except for the remixing of a couple of songs, as well as the choosing of the album's running order. Harley described some tracks on the album as "acoustic, almost entirely live" and others as "bigger productions". [13] With the finishing touches completed in January 2010, the album was mastered in February by Denis Blackham at Skye Mastering. [6]
"Take the Men & the Horses Away" is an anti-war song which speaks of the UK's involvement in the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars. Harley wrote the chorus several years before the rest of the song was completed. During sessions for Stranger Comes to Town, Harley played the chorus to the band and the song was then developed into a full track, with four members of Cockney Rebel receiving co-writing credits. [9] Before the album's release, "This Old Man" was previewed to fans in November 2009 when Harley uploaded a short piece of footage to his website which showed the band rehearsing the song in the studio. [14]
"True Love Will Find You in the End" is a cover of a 1984 song by American singer-songwriter Daniel Johnston which appeared on his Retired Boxer album. [15] Harley recorded the song after using his website forum in 2009 to invite fans to forward their ideas of a song which could be covered for the new album. Graeme Blake suggested Johnston's "Story of an Artist" and Harley commented in a diary entry in November 2009, "The pointer towards Daniel Johnston by Graeme is indeed welcome. Had all but forgotten the self-proclaimed 'rejected unknown'. Maybe too many have covered the beautiful, poignant 'Story of an Artist' – irresistible, as it is – for me to attack it so late in its life. Maybe. But 'True Love Will Find You In The End' is less exposed. Maybe that one." [16] The song was the last to be recorded for the album in December 2009. [17] On 9 March 2010, Harley performed the song with Jools Holland and his band for Holland's show on BBC Radio 2, which was broadcast the following month. [18]
"No Bleeding Hearts" features Harley's son, Kerr Nice, on the piano. The idea of Nice performing on the track was suggested by the band's keyboardist James Lascelles after Nice arrived for an overnight stay at the studio. [10] [9] In 2009, Harley said about the song, "The song may seem mysterious on first listen, but I'm quietly hoping that those who have now heard it twice, some even three times on this tour, will have started to form some interpretation." [19] In 2010, Harley told Acoustic that he felt that the song sounded like the early Cockney Rebel and "could be very much my modern day 'Sebastian'". [5]
"Blinded with Tears" was written around 2000 with ex-Cockney Rebel guitarist Jim Cregan. It was originally described by Harley as a "slow, backbeat drama" in a September 2000 diary entry. [20] In October 2004, Harley published part of the song's lyrics in a diary entry, with the working title "Alone in the End". [21] "2,000 Years from Now" features six 10–11 year old children from Spooner Row Primary School in Wymondham providing backing vocals. The addition to the track was a last-minute decision, with Harley revealing to BBC News in 2010, "It's fantastic. We had a really good time – they worked very hard and picked it up so quickly. I'd almost finished this track and I said to my engineer, 'There's a primary school down the road isn't there, I'd like some school kids on this track because the lyric is about the future of the planet'. Three hours later they were all here and two hours later we'd done it." [22]
"Stranger Comes to Town" was released on CD on 3 May 2010 by Absolute (via Universal) in the UK and by Repertoire Records in Europe under license by Harley's own Comeuppance Ltd. [10] [23] [24] The album reached number 187 in the UK Albums Chart and number 20 in the UK Independent Albums Chart. [25] [26] The album's lead single, "Faith & Virtue", was released on 2 May 2010, and a second single, "For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn", was released on 27 June 2010. [27]
Harley originally intended to follow-up the 2005 release of the Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel album The Quality of Mercy with a new studio album in 2008. After The Quality of Mercy, Harley continued writing new material and recording demos, and in January 2007 he and his band entered the recording studio, at which time plans were announced for a possible new album release in spring 2008. [28] [29] The album's was given the working title Wide Screen, with an alternative being The Road Home. [30] Although Harley continued writing, [31] the proposed album did not come to fruition due to contractual issues that were left unresolved until early 2009. In a diary entry from March 2009, Harley revealed, "Finally wrapped up a contract wrangle which has kept me sometimes awake and regularly disturbed for almost three years. Cost me a great deal in all sorts of energies and resources to end this loathsome arrangement, but I knew in my heart I had to sort it." [32]
To promote the album, Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel embarked on a UK-based tour in late May, which included performances at the Isle of Wight and Glastonbury Festivals. The tour continued into June and also included a few concerts in Norway and one in Denmark. Later in October, the band toured Europe. [33]
| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| Record Collector |   [34] |
| Daily Express | [35] |
On its release, Terry Staunton of Record Collector felt Stranger Comes to Town had "little of the arch art rock of Cockney Rebel" but added "the lyrical adventure of old survives". He added, "It's sturdy, timeless singer-songwriter fare, Harley's acoustic guitar front and centre, caressing his still mannered vocal, embellished by piano and violin." [34] Simon Gage of the Daily Express concluded, "The music is simple, raw and thoughtful but the likeability is still there and the songs interesting. It won't do what 'Make Me Smile' did for him but it's an album he must be proud of." [35] Andrew Thomas of the Lancashire Telegraph described the album as "a striking set with three or four standout tracks" and "a welcome album from an innovative writer and performer". [36] Martin Hutchinson of The Bolton News felt the album was "Harley at his very best" and praised it for being "lyrically insightful" and "musically magnificent". He added, "Harley's anger and emotion comes across in the lyrics of the new songs." [2]
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Faith & Virtue" | Steve Harley, Barry Wickens | 4:50 |
| 2. | "Take the Men & the Horses Away" | Lincoln Anderson, Stuart Elliot, Harley, James Lascelles, Wickens | 4:11 |
| 3. | "For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn." | Harley | 5:00 |
| 4. | "Stranger Comes to Town" | Harley | 4:10 |
| 5. | "This Old Man" | Harley | 5:27 |
| 6. | "True Love will Find You in the End" | Daniel Johnston | 3:46 |
| 7. | "No Bleeding Hearts" | Harley | 7:05 |
| 8. | "Blinded with Tears" | Jim Cregan, Harley | 5:02 |
| 9. | "Before They Crash the Universe" | Harley | 4:30 |
| 10. | "2,000 Years from Now" | Robbie Gladwell, Harley | 5:39 |
Musicians
Production
Design
| Chart (2010) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| UK Albums Chart [25] | 187 |
| UK Independent Album Breakers Top 20 Chart [37] | 7 |
| UK Independent Albums Chart Top 50 [26] | 20 |
Two digital singles, "Faith & Virtue" and "For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn", were released from Stranger Comes to Town. [38] [39] Both releases used the same artwork as the album.
| "Faith & Virtue" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single by Steve Harley | ||||
| Released | 2 May 2010 | |||
| Genre | Rock, pop rock | |||
| Length | 4:48 | |||
| Label | Comeuppance Ltd | |||
| Songwriter(s) | ||||
| Producer(s) | Steve Harley | |||
| Steve Harley singles chronology | ||||
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The album's lead single, "Faith & Virtue", was written by Harley and Barry Wickens. It was released on 2 May 2010 as a digital-only single, [40] with some promotional CD copies issued to radio stations. [22]
Harley first announced the release of "Faith & Virtue" as a single in a diary entry of 3 March 2010, "All the team is now set up for the big push. We have radio/TV plugger Jackie Gill, who will do everything she can to get the single play-listed on Radio 2, and all the good TV she can muster." [41] The song received its first play on BBC Radio 2 on 19 April on the Jools Holland show, when Harley appeared as the show's guest. [42] The song was also given away as a free MP3 for anyone signing up for email updates on Harley's official website. [43]
"Faith & Virtue" dated back ten years before it was recorded for Stranger Comes to Town. Speaking to The Bolton News in 2010, Harley commented, "The single was being played on the radio and my wife said 'I've always loved that song'. I explained that I'd only just finished the song when I realised that I'd actually been playing it on my piano for the last ten years and hadn't got round to recording it." [2]
Track listing
| "For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single by Steve Harley | ||||
| Released | 27 June 2010 | |||
| Genre | Rock, pop rock | |||
| Length | 3:59 | |||
| Label | Comeuppance Ltd | |||
| Songwriter(s) | Steve Harley | |||
| Producer(s) | Steve Harley | |||
| Steve Harley singles chronology | ||||
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The album's second single, "For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn", was written by Harley. A 'radio edit' of the track, which cut the song's duration by a minute, was released as a digital-only single on 27 June 2010. [27]
The release of the single was first announced in Harley's diary entry of 31 May, "Over lunch, will make notes re edit of 'For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn.' which we have agreed to release as a download single. Radio 2 airplay? Not much chance, to be honest. It's tough to get on their playlist if you're not represented by Universal or Sony. But Stranger Comes to Town is a major project, so we'll suck it and see." [44] The song received its first play on BBC Radio 2 on 23 May 2010 on Johnnie Walker's Sounds of the 70s show, when Harley appeared as the show's guest. [45]
"For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn" had its origins dating back a decade, with Harley first mentioning the song in an online diary entry in September 2000. Speaking of new additions to the live set, Harley revealed, "And a new lullaby, a longing, yearning lullaby where a terrified young man is saying, 'No. It cannot be what it appears to be; nothing living lies that still.....' beside his helpless wife's bed." [20] Harley began working on a new studio album in 2000 and revealed in a 1 December 2001 diary entry that he was going into the studio that week to record "For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn" and "The Last Feast". [46] While no album materialised, Harley later recorded the song again with Cockney Rebel in February 2005 during sessions for The Quality of Mercy. The song did not make the album's final track listing. [47]
Track listing
Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel were an English glam rock band from the early 1970s from London. Their music covered a range of styles from pop to progressive rock. Over the years they have had five albums in the UK Albums Chart and twelve singles in the UK Singles Chart.
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The Psychomodo is the second studio album by Cockney Rebel, released on 2 June 1974 by EMI. It was produced by Steve Harley and Alan Parsons.
The Best Years of Our Lives is the third studio album by Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, which was released by EMI in 1975. It was the first album to feature Harley's name ahead of the band's. The album was produced by Harley and Alan Parsons, and contains the band's only UK number one, the million-selling "Make Me Smile ".
Love's a Prima Donna is the fifth studio album by Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, which was released by EMI in 1976. It was produced by Harley, and would be the band's last album before splitting in 1977.
"The Last Goodbye" is a song by the British rock band Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, which was released in 2006 as a single from their 2005 studio album The Quality of Mercy. The song was written by Harley and ex-Cockney Rebel guitarist Jim Cregan, and produced by Harley.
The Quality of Mercy is the sixth and final studio album by English rock band Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, which was released by Gott Discs in 2005. The album was Steve Harley's first studio album in 9 years and the first in 29 years to be released under the Cockney Rebel name. The album was produced entirely by Harley, with Jim Cregan co-producing the track "A Friend for Life". The album's title is based on the Shakespearean phrase.
The Cockney Rebel – A Steve Harley Anthology is a remastered three-disc box-set anthology by Steve Harley, released in 2006. The anthology features material from Cockney Rebel, Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel and Harley's solo career. It covers all of Harley's albums, spanning over 33 years, from 1973's The Human Menagerie to 2005's The Quality of Mercy. The anthology was released by EMI Music UK. It was released on CD in the UK only. Today, the physical CD release is out-of-print.
Anytime! is a live acoustic album by Steve Harley, released under the name The Steve Harley Band and featuring members of the Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel line-up of the time. It was released in 2004.
"Tumbling Down" is a song by the British rock band Cockney Rebel, fronted by Steve Harley. It was released in 1975 as the third and final single from the band's second studio album The Psychomodo (1974). The song was written by Harley, and produced by Harley and Alan Parsons.
"A Friend for Life" is a song by British singer-songwriter Steve Harley, which was released by Intrinsic Records in 2001 as a non-album single. The song was written by Harley and former Cockney Rebel guitarist Jim Cregan, and produced by Cregan. Harley's first release of new material since his 1996 album Poetic Justice, "A Friend for Life" was later included on Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel's sixth studio album The Quality of Mercy (2005).
Acoustic and Pure: Live is a live acoustic album by English songwriter and musician Steve Harley, released in 2003. The album features ex-Cockney Rebel guitarist Jim Cregan, while certain tracks also include other members of Cockney Rebel.
Birmingham is a live album by Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, featuring the Orchestra of the Swan and Chamber Choir. It was recorded live at the Birmingham Symphony Hall on 24 November 2012, and was released on both CD and DVD in 2013. A DVD version of the performance was also released at the same time.
Stripped to the Bare Bones is a 1999 live acoustic album by English musician and songwriter Steve Harley. The album was produced by Harley and features Nick Pynn.
"Sebastian" is a song by the British rock band Cockney Rebel, fronted by Steve Harley. It was released as the band's debut single in 1973 from their album The Human Menagerie. The song was written by Harley and produced by Neil Harrison.
"The Best Years of Our Lives" is a song by the British rock band Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, released in 1975 as the title track from the band's third studio album The Best Years of Our Lives. In 1977, a live version of the song was released as a single from the album Face to Face: A Live Recording.
"Ordinary People" is a song by the British singer-songwriter Steve Harley, which was released as a non-album single in 2015. It was written by Harley, Jim Cregan and Robert Hart, and produced by Harley. The song was Harley's first new song of five years, following the release of his fifth solo studio album Stranger Comes to Town in 2010.
Barry Wickens is a British musician, multi-instrumentalist and composer. Primarily a violinist and guitarist, he also plays mandolin, viola, Appalachian dulcimer (psaltery), dobro and keyboards. He is best known for being one of the longest-serving members of Steve Harley's rock group Cockney Rebel, and for being a former member of the pop group Immaculate Fools. He is also a violin teacher for Brighton & Hove Music & Arts.
Uncovered is the sixth and final solo studio album from English singer-songwriter Steve Harley, released on 21 February 2020.
