Charlotte Hatherley - 'Summer' (Double Dragon)
4/5
By: Thomas Hannan
There are many reasons one might want to embark on a solo career, be they frustration, curiosity or just a lot of spare time. With Miss Hatherley, this slight detour from the good ship Ash doesn't seem to have any malicious side to it at all (gosh, aren't they a nice bunch?), just a sense of wide-eyed adventure. So, can she do it? Resoundingly, on this evidence, yes she can.
Give it a while. What starts off as sounding like a few too many tunes all struggling for breath against one another soon blossoms into a quirky little pop song that skips and jumps all over the place before properly revealing its true melodious intellect. It's actually far more interesting than anything Ash have released in a long time, and while Tim Wheeler might have deliberately been focusing more closely on the tuneful side of things rather than all that's weird and wonderful recently, 'Summer' also packs a brilliant melodic punch too.
We're not for one moment suggesting he should be worried about the competition; if anything, he should embrace it as we are. Ash could now contain quite something of a songwriting partnership - the fruits of which, if they sound anything at all like this, we can't wait to hear.
Artists in this article: Charlotte Hatherley
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