ALAN PRICE : METROPOLITAN MAN

1. Papers
2. Fool's Gold
3. Nobody Can
4. A Little Inch
5. Changin' Partners
6. Mama Divine
7. Too Many People
8. Keep On Rollin'
9. It's Not Easy
10. Sweet P.
11. Drinker's Curse

Label : Polydor

Length : 43:33

Release Year : 1975

Review (Amazon) : Tough to find (in the U.S.) even at its original release during the mid 70's, this gem, (along with the several other Alan Price albums of the same period), have been long overdue for CD issue. Cut for cut, "Metropolitan Man" is the most satisfying Price set, after the excellent (and much easier to find!) "O Lucky Man" movie soundtrack. Price shows a surprising amount of diversity on this collection, from the rousing power pop of "Papers", to the bouncing calypso of "Mama Divine" and the haunting balladry of "Fool's Gold" (which features a memorable organ intro reminiscent of Price's own classic keyboard stylings on the Animals' "House of The Rising Sun"). Also not to be overlooked are Price's clever and sometimes droll way with a lyric. He is sorely missed by many music fans...kudos to Edsel Records for making his legacy available again!

Review (Only Solitaire Blog) : The relative success of Between Today & Yesterday made Alan invest in an attempt to repeat the same approach, but on a slightly humbler scale - this, too, is largely a conceptual, and this time an even more personal album about the past and the present, but lacking the elements of grandeur that may have appealed to the «progressively trained» buyers in 1974. Actually, it is this low-key attitude that may explain why its predecessor sold reasonably well, whereas Metropoli­tan Man seems to have bombed, and even in retrospect remains totally obscure (not even a measly review at the All-Music Guide!) When in reality it is every bit as good as its predecessor and maybe even better - at least in terms of consistency. The fact that there are no grand, stately compositions here in the vein of ?Jarrow Song' or ?Be­tween Today And Yesterday' might even be positive, because Mr. Price, with his passion for homely pubs, quiet provincial life, and cozy vaudeville, is far from your poster boy for Grand Statements - he has neither the compositional nor the vocal talent for that. But he'd honed his compositional and vocal talents well enough to ensure that Metropolitan Man has not a single bad, or, more precisely, not a single unattractive song on it. It's a wonderful combination of diverse melodies, stretching across several distinct genres, tasteful arrangements, clever lyrics, and a rainbow of joyful sadness and optimistic melancholy that arches all the way from Tyneside to Randy Newman's Brooklyn. Song-by-song, it might easily be his single best set. Even if the man never succeeded in inventing his own sub-genre or anything, here he excels at practically every genre. On the dynamic side, ?Papers' is a brilliantly multi-layered power-pop piece, with an ecstatic slide guitar lead part ruling over a bedrock of pianos, synthesizers, and brass as the man himself launches into a biting condemnation of the yellow press; ?Nobody Can' is somewhat of a musical and lyrical answer to Elton's ?Crocodile Rock', every bit as catchy as the latter but not as superficially corny; and ?Changing Partners' is a hilariously loving parody on Fifties' rock'n'roll, with Alan going all Jerry Lee Lewis on the piano, mock-stadium applause mixed in for «authenticity», and the guitar man going expectedly batshit crazy on the solo. Things are subtler and much more moving on the ballad side - ?Fool's Gold', at the least, should have been a classic, with a really choking chord change introduced in the long solo organ intro and then reprised in the vocal melody; this is, once again, Price taking a lesson from the sad side of Paul McCartney and Badfinger, and matching it to his own memories and experiences accu­mulated during his musical career. For ?A Little Inch', his lead guitarist, whoever he is, borrows the «weeping slide» style of George Harrison and uses it admirably in combination with Alan's own weepy tale of an unsuccessful love affair. Even the orchestrated schmaltz-pop of ?It's Not Easy' creeps under your skin, by means of Price's weak, gently trembling voice. In addition to all that, you get a fun calypso romp with a supercatchy chorus (?Mama Divine'), a tight, slightly Exile On Main Street-ish R&B/gospel groove riding a cooler-than-hell bassline (?Too Many People'), a dark New Orleanian blues shuffle with swampy harmonica (?Keep On Rollin''), a 100% Randy Newman rip-off that should by all means be reserved for some future Pixar movie (?Sweet P'), and a plaintive «me and my piano» coda that should, of course, be played by the pianist late at night when the only clients left at the bar are those unable to leave the place on all fours (?The Drinker's Curse'). Lascivious, spiritual, ominous, empathetic, depressed but unyielding - there's your emotional variety contained in this little bunch alone, and there's more: the album brings a whole new dimension to the understanding of what it is to be a true «metropolitan man». Why this whole thing is not considered a timeless classic is understandable - a low-key perso­nality like Price, without a lot of brazenly original ideas, is not going to attract a lot of attention. Why the album is so completely neglected is a different question - even though it has been re­leased on CD, I don't exactly see lost treasure hunters flocking towards it in sufficient numbers. In such situations, even a measly, but strong thumbs up on a «maverick review blog» can be of a little help, and we here at Only Solitaire are happy to provide, particularly since most of us, I'm sure, will find an easy way to relate to at least parts of this record.