Paul Weller '22 Dreams' album

One year in the making. Seventy Minutes in length. Twenty-one songs. '22 Dreams.' After a three year recording hiatus - during which he played historic concert series in NYC and LA devoting one evening each to his Jam, Style Council, and solo catalogs, and earned Lifetime Achievement honors at the 2007 Brit Awards, among other highlights - Paul Weller returns on July 22 with '22 Dreams,' (Yep Roc), his ninth solo album and the most ambitious of his career.

'22 Dreams' is not a return to form. It is not "Weller's best record since [fill in your favorite album here.]" It is a complete flowering of every musical impulse this artistic polymath has previously hinted at, and then some: rock, funk, soul, freak folk, free jazz, krautrock, classical, spoken word, electronica, and beyond.

"I've never understood the need to put music into boxes" says Weller. "I could listen to Debussy one minute, then some avant-garde jazz album, then Curtis Mayfield the next. To me, it all comes from the same source."

'22 Dreams' was co-produced by Weller and Simon Dine (Adventures in Stereo, Noonday Underground) and recorded at Weller's own Black Barn Studios in Surrey. Weller co-wrote the album's first single, "Echoes Round The Sun," with Oasis' Noel Gallagher. A shimmering blast of pure energy, the song is destined to join The Verve's "Bittersweet Symphony" and The Chemical Brothers' "Setting Sun" as an instant anthem of British rock. Other guests on the album include Blur guitarist Graham Coxon on the hazy soft shoe of "Black River," and modern day mod Little Barrie, who contributes frantic guitar work to the album's title track.

'22 Dreams' concludes with a four-song suite, which flows seamlessly from stark spoken word of "God" - co-written with ex-Stone Rose Aziz Ibrahim - to the mellotron and moog experiment "111" ("I've never done anything as full tilt as this," says Weller), to the wistful acoustic stomp of "Sea Spray," before concluding with the six minute instrumental "Night Lights," another experimental track which deploys everything from tabla and tape loops to the sounds of an electrical storm which rained down, serendipitously, during the final sessions for the album.

song by song
God
"I remember [guitarist] Steve Cradock saying halfway through the recording 'what we need now is a spoken word track. I had the lyrics in an old notebook. I'd written them seven or eight years ago. Then Aziz came down to the studio and we just did it. The fact that he's Muslim obviously gives it another dimension."

111
"This is an experimental track. I've never done anything as full tilt as this. Me and Steve Cradock were playing two different mellotrons and Simon Dine was on the mini-moog. It was really liberating not to have a standard chord sequence. We really got off on that. It's influenced by a great '60's avant-garde group called AMM."

Sea Spray
"It's an optimistic tune. A bit of light at the end of the tunnel."

Night Lights
"There are a lot of mentions of the seasons in my songs, and this is another one. We recorded it with the studio door open. You get some beautiful sunsets down at the Barn. When we finished the final track, there was a huge electrical storm, and we took the microphones outside to capture the sound of the rain falling. It symbolises the year coming full circle'."

biography
“After As Is Now I thought the time was right to make the sort of record I wanted to make” says Paul Weller of the creative process which led to his extraordinary ninth solo album 22 Dreams.
“Instead of worrying about anyone else, I wanted to really push the boat out. I think the result is going to surprise a few people.”

Recorded over the course of a year at Black Barn Studio’s in Woking, 22 Dreams will do more than that. A kaleidoscopic tour de force incorporating rock, funk, soul, free jazz, krautrock, classical, spoken word, electronica and all stops in between, it’s a seventy minute (m)odysssey delivered with a verve and ambition to shame musicians half his age.

“I’ve never understood the need to put music into boxes” says Paul.
“To me, it all comes from the same source. I could listen to Debussy one minute, then some avant-garde jazz album, then Curtis Mayfield the next. It all comes from the same source.”

For those who’ve followed Paul’s unparalleled thirty year journey through British pop, 22 Dreams should come as no surprise. Having split up The Jam at the height of their powers in 1982, he spent the rest of the eighties challenging pop convention with The Style Council (including an attempt to turn a reluctant audience on to Acid House in 1989).

In the nineties, he pioneered a new form of psychedelic folk-rock -accurately described by Robert Wyatt as “new furniture seasoned from old wood” -which reinstalled him as the pre-eminent songwriter of his generation. Nonetheless, following the top five success of As Is Now and a Lifetime Achievement Award at the Brits in 2007, he could have been forgiven for resting on his laurels. But then, that’s never been Paul’s way.

“I felt I’d gone as far as I could with the band with As Is Now, so I decided to freshen things up. In the studio it was mostly just me, Steve Cradock and (producer) Simon Dine. We recorded very quickly. People would come down to the Barn, and if they had an idea, they’d go straight in and record. It was all about catching the feeling rather than scrutinising every last detail.”
Featuring an illustrious roll-call of guest musicians including Noel Gallagher and Gem from Oasis (on the staggering Weller/Gallagher composition ‘Echoes Around The Sun’ ), Graham Coxon (‘Black River’), Little Barrie (“22 Dreams”) and folk guitarist John McCrusker (‘Light Nights’), 22 Dreams also reflects a personal milestone in Paul’s life.

“I’m fifty this year, and I think that contributed to the sense of urgency (laughs). But it also made me want to make something really special. I wanted to make an album with a beginning, a middle and an end. That’s why the two songs ‘Light Nights’ and ‘Night Light’s’ are at the first and last tracks. It’s designed to be listened to in one sitting, in the same way that Pet Sounds or Sgt Pepper were.”

Indeed. In a climate where download culture seems to have relegated the album to a marketing ploy, 22 Dreams stands as a reminder of days when LPs were designed to challenge as well as thrill the audience.
From the glorious blue-eyed soul of ‘Have You Made Up Your Mind?’ to the staggering psych-pop of Weller/Gallagher collaboration ‘Echoes Around the Sun’ it is crammed full of classic tunes, yet as raw and visceral as anything he’s produced.
Experimental outings such as ‘111’ –inspired by German avant-rockers AMM- and ‘God’ -a spoken word piece by former Ian Brown guitarist Aziz Ibrahim- are also a reminder that Paul’s cultural antennae remain as finely tuned as ever.

“’I’ve had the lyrics for ‘God’ for about seven or eight years. Obviously in the current climate people are focusing on issues like race and religion, but the fact that Aziz is Muslim just gave it an extra dimension.”

If the musical range is staggering, the themes- love, exile, nostalgia, the passage of time – are as universal as music itself.
In career terms, 22 Dreams is as bold, brave and exhilarating as those other classic albums released when Paul was at a creative crossroads -All Mod Cons, Confessions Of A Pop Group and Wildwood. Not that the ever-modest Paul would talk it up.

“The best way I can describe it is as a year in my life” he says of these sublime inner visions.
“We started recording last Spring, and the mood of the album evolved as time went on. Recording at the Barn played a big part in it. You get some beautiful sunsets down there. When we finished the final track, ‘Night Light’s’ there was a huge electrical storm, and we took the microphones outside to capture the sound of the rain falling. It symbolises the year coming full circle.”

Do you also would like to share your opinion? If so, please register or login here.

Tags

Details

Paul Weller - 22 Dreams