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In his eclectic 40-year career Paul Weller has shown a growing willingness to experiment with different genres. His previous album Saturns Pattern (2015) was his most adventurous yet, but his new one takes him into completely new territory: Jawbone is Weller¢s first film score. (The Style Council¢s Have You Ever Had It Blue? written for the 1986 film musical Absolute Beginners was just a standalone song.)
The film itself (released on 12 May) is directed by Thomas Napper and written by Johnny Harris, who stars in the semi-autobiographical story of a former youth boxing champion Jimmy McCabe making a belated comeback: “a man searching for hope but looking in all the wrong places”. Several of the seven tracks on the album include snippets of the film¢s dialogue but Weller himself only sings on only three of them. This is the Modfather as you¢ve never heard him before.
The epic, fragmented 21-minute opener Jimmy/Blackout – which takes up more than half the album – is the most experimental track and the closest Weller has come to making ambient music. Its sombre, dissonant soundscape sets the tone for a desperate tale, featuring mournful strings, droning guitar, swirling synthesisers and choral harmonies. Weller¢s own vocal only arrives a few minutes from the end, sounding much more other-worldly than usual as he sings “It takes a strong mind to battle through”.
In complete contrast, The Ballad Of Jimmy McCabe is a recognisably Wellersque acoustic folk song full of melancholy yearning: “I¢ll beat my head ¢til dawn / Figure out what I¢m running from / Only then will I find peace in me.” The two-minute-long Bottle has a similarly mellow vibe, as he asks “Where is the man I was?” with tender regret.
The other tracks are basically instrumentals that follow the film¢s emotional journey. The title track is a psyched-up piece with fuzzy wah-wah guitar that plays with different sounds coming out of each speaker. Man On Fire is a very short mood-setter with dirge-like strings and minor-key piano.
Jawbone Training is a percussive, heart-pounding number that reflects the mounting tension building up to the big fight. And End Fight Sequence also has an insistent beat, as well as a static-like guitar sound and a few echoes of the opening track, as the fighter enters his final round.
Read more at https://www.musicomh.com/reviews/albums/https%3A%2F%2Fwww.musicomh.com%2Freviews%2Falbums%2Fpaul-weller-jawbone-ost#JWsQz4JS1sSfSE76.99
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