albums and tracks

Editor's rating

A tortured soul though he is, Pete Doherty has always been blessed with the ability to turn his visions into outstanding songs. Lamentably, substance abuse, daydreaming and poor taste in company have long starved him of the temperance required to do so properly.

On his debut solo work Grace/Wastelands Peter (as he'd now like to be known) attempts to ferment the many recipes for melodic potions he has spent the last five years absent-mindedly scattering around his peculiar world.

Fortunately, producer Stephen Street - an alchemist of utmost skill - seems to have kept a trained eye on the best bits of Doherty's output, thinking highly enough of the unkempt raw material to want to expand it.

By drafting in Graham Coxon, Street has also found a colleague of palpable musical worth for Doherty to bounce off - their healthy dynamic magnifies each player's individual impact.

Peter does not wallow. Most of the material recalls an time when cataloguing and poetically describing an imagined world was higher up his agenda than self-pity.

It's pleasing to hear that his work, as well as his body, is successfully being rehabilitated. Gone is the ramshackle harshness and absent are the references to hard drugs, replaced instead with a measured self-awareness and an impetus on musicianship and production values.

Street's guidance, particularly with regard to the inclusion of elegant but ghostly string arrangements and the recruitment of Coxon, has forced the artist to smarten up his act in every sense.

Rupert Murphy