Pete Alderton – Living On Love (Songways).

Pete Alderton is the son of an American G.I., born in the UK and living in Germany so it is not so surprising that he has a diverse musical outlook. Living On Love begins with It Seems Strange, a short explanation of the blues, before Alderton launches into Evil Was Her Name which is a classy, jazzy blues. Song For David is a strange one. No, it’s not about me, it’s for David Blaine. It’s hard to categorise but anyone who gets Blaine into a song deserves a listen. Have The Roses Gone Dry and I’m Sad are sentimental ballads and little more and the title track is acoustic, like most of the others, but not very inspiring. Jesus In A Bottle is one of the best tracks on the album and could easily be a big end rock song or, as it is here, an acoustic burner. A Fool For Her Body (skit) is a short spoken interlude that leads into Witching Hour but it’s of no real purpose and the aforesaid Witching Hour has the welcoming introduction of harmonica but is standard fare nonetheless.

Pete turns the Whitesnake song, Give Me All Your Love into an acoustic effort but doesn’t really do the song any favours. He then launches off into another of his skits, this time I Still Remember. This is his ramblings on his love of the blues beat and gives us an insight into the man. A Taste Of The Blues is a tenuous link to the blues and, although it is well executed, is nothing to get too excited about. The album is taking a bit of a downturn by this time and the acoustic AOR of Baby I Love You and the tedious The Loved do little to halt the slide. Evil Was Her Name (Full Edit) shows itself to be one of the albums highlights and could have been further enhanced by a screaming guitar solo – it was just crying out for one but Pete played it safe and remained too laid back. It’s hard to get the balance between sentiment and over-sentiment and Passing Ships confirms that Pete Alderton hasn’t really managed to nail it on this album. He finishes with some more musings on The End Of The Day – we’re all living on love, apparently!

http://www.songways.de/
http://www.pete-anthony-alderton.com/

David Blue.