| Magpie | - Do You Want To Come With?
- What's That You Say Little Girl
- Run
- Bad Bad You, Bad Bad Me
- Rose
- Lost Without You
- Emily
- Lines
- Play
- Brother
- New York
- ----
- Rain
- If You Go
- Out on Fiction
- Rating: 7/10
- Reviewer: Chris Long
|
That wait was punctuated by two gorgeously exciting EPs, 8 Songs and The Lines, that offered up the kind of gently tender, fire-bellied singer-songwriting that gets many a Mancunian over-excited. There is plenty of beauty to be found in Fretwell’s first long player. Of the songs that made the jump from the EPs to here, Run, a slow-burning belter with one of the most world weary choruses you’ll hear all year (a beautiful tree/it’s a shame that the root of it’s me), sticks closely to its origins and retains the power, while Emily still beguiles and swoons in a vicious manner. Elsewhere, fresh songs like Bad Bad You, Bad Bad Me with its terse and stripped approach, the sublime Rose (featuring the fine voice of Isobel Heyworth), the bare emotion of Rain and If You Go’s low-slung stride all highlight Fretwell’s ability to mix charm with a crushing blow. That ability is summed up in live favourite New York, with its combination of heart wrenching delivery and deadly brutal lyrics. It is a slight disappointment to find that Magpie has lost a little of that raw edge that made Fretwell so exciting and the absence of the wonderful Thank You creates a hole that none of the songs ever truly fills, but given that this contains his third version of Run, we can’t expect him to get it absolutely right first time. Magpie collects up a host of precious shining moments yet, like the bird it is named after, occasionally doesn’t know what to do with them once it has them. It’s a firm start but anyone who’s watched his progress up the ranks will know there’s better than this in him. | 
