Graham Coxon – What’ll It Take?
“Oh, so Damon’s got a bit of attention recently, has he?”
[Video][Website]
[3.89]
Alfred Soto: The co-writer of “Coffee & TV” is the last person to ask what it’ll take to make ME dance.
[2]
Anthony Easton: It will take a song less assured of its own cleverness than this.
[4]
Jonathan Bogart: How about dance music, for starters?
[3]
John Seroff: More than warmed-over James Murphy leftovers.
[5]
Michaela Drapes: Unlike Damon Albarn, who actually worked with James Murphy, Coxon decided to go it alone, unfortunately.
[2]
Brad Shoup: This would officially make him the Nilsson to Albarn’s Harrison, yes?
[0]
Sally O’Rourke: Perhaps spurred by the reunion of Blur, Graham Coxon returns to the sardonic disco of “Girls and Boys,” only with that song’s cheeky satire swapped for artless venting of frustrations external and internal. (“I don’t really know what’s wrong with me” is Coxon’s entire solo lyrical output in capsule form.) Like Sideshow Bob stepping on a yard full of rakes, though, the repetitiousness of “What’ll It Take” progresses from mildly amusing to sort of irritating to kind of brilliant by sheer commitment to its premise. By the end, I don’t care if I’m being made fun of; I’d dance to it.
[7]
Iain Mew: Graham uses electronics in pretty much the same way as he’s long used guitar in his solo stuff, cutting straight to a jumpy simplicity matched to his strained voice. The effect works for a while, boosted by the gawky brashness of “What’ll it take to make you people dance,” but by the time he’s gone into looped shouting it has long since paled.
[5]
Sabina Tang: Reach back in the Coxon bag of tricks, past the Brit-folk and the Happiness in Magazines-era punk pop candy; this is most like one of the lo-fi shouty bits off The Golden D, but with barely any guitar(!). Possibly it is intended as a Crystal Castles tribute. I can’t imagine a cohesive album of this having extensive replay value, but Coxon’s sense of melody remains intact, as do the adorable bespectacled-nerd-boy-gone-wild vocals. Graham is otaku Japan’s favourite Blur member, then as now, because he is the most manga-esque.
[7]
The nice thing about solo Graham Coxon is that if it doesn’t work (and this doesn’t, if you compare it to his last album), the next one is guaranteed to be bonkers in a totally different way. In that sense Damon and he are fully alike.