Tom's WEB Blog

David Gilmour had a new CD out and it's a great surprise. This one slipped in under the radar for me. I didn't hear about it till 4 days before it's release. "On An Island" features the type of music that Pink Floyd and David Gilmour fans have come to expect from the man. There's lots of moody atmospheric playing. The album does indeed sound very Floyd-ish, which Gilmour himself admits. Gilmour's memorable raspy vocals, sounding as though he's barely aged a day in the past 20 years, and some of the best material he's written are really excellent. Collaborating with guitarist/songwriter Phil Manzanera and veteran producer Chris Thomas, Gilmour has crafted an atmospheric album full of hazy instrumentals and songs that may not rock out the way fans are used to but are still filled with passion and emotion. How does this compare to his other solo albums? Well each one represented a different decade in Gilmour's life so they are all quite different and difficult to compare, but the quality of the songwriting is top notch here as on those. This effort is a little more focused than his first ("David Gilmour") and a little less commercial than his second ("About Face"). Written solo and in collaboration with Polly Samson, (his wife, who wrote some of the lyrics for "The Division Bell" ) providing words on most of the tracks "On An Island" features a wide variety of memorable guest players. Floyd's Richard Wright, David Crosby & Graham Nash on backing vocals, Jools Holland formerly of Squeeze, Robert Wyatt and guitarist Phil Manzanera playing keyboards non the less. The production by Gilmour, Manzanera and Thomas is atmospheric providing the perfect sonic backdrop for Gilmour to do what he does best, play guitar and sing. "On An Island" does allows Gilmour to experiment a bit as well with the material but what's most interesting is how emotionally direct the songs are. Gilmour works well with his collaborators on this solo album. The album does have some slight flaws (for lack of a better term), for example the pacing is a bit slow at times for myself, and truly it would have helped to have had a solid hard rock number here to break through the haze on the album, you won't find any driving rock songs like "RUN LIKE HELL" on this album, but there are plenty of tasty guitar licks to satisfy any fan of Gilmour's work. Overall it's a terrific effort and a worthy follow up to his work leading Pink Floyd. I figure 4 and 1/2 stars - this is great if you like Pink Floyd.