Richard Ashcroft Alone With Everybody (Virgin)

Richard Ashcroft

Alone With Everybody (Virgin)

Alongside Keith Richards and ex-Stone Roses frontman Ian Brown, Richard Ashcroft has the most prominent cheekbones in the whole of modern pop (not counting, of course, Charlie Sexton). Considering the sorry state of affairs that is Ashcroft's first post-Verve album, perhaps that's not such a bad thing. When the Verve collapsed two years ago (in Houston, no less), Ashcroft jettisoned his mates and struck out on his own, keeping only longtime drummer Peter Salisbury for this new recording. What we've ended up with, however, is the distressing sound of a great British vocalist resting on his not inconsiderable laurels. Fans of the Verve's terrific, post-Brit-pop oceanic swells, such as those on A Northern Soul and Urban Hymns are bound to be disappointed by the weepy, overproduced balladeering that accounts for 95% of Alone With Everybody. This is less "Bittersweet Symphony" than the whiny, self-aggrandizing mopiness that shotgunned Damon Albarn's sales figures 18 months ago in the wake of the Justine Incident. Opener "A Song for the Lovers" works well enough, but only just. Without the crunchy, epic guitars of Nick McCabe, Ashcroft's proto-ennui vox fall back against lilting flutes and Primal Screamer Duncan MacKay's occasional blast of trumpet. The deadly dull "You on My Mind in My Sleep" is enough to send anyone straight to the Hacienda for a dose of booty-snapping speed garage, while the striving-to-be-upbeat non-pop of "C'mon People (We're Making It Now)" seems labored in a way that even Ashcroft photo-op buddy Tony Blair would despair at. Alone With Everybody plateaus early on and never fully recovers, limping toward a late-night cigarettes-and-Merlot conclusion ("Everybody") that could only sound smart after you're already halfway inside the bottle and half-past that pack of triple nickels. In this case, more is definitely less.