Paul Goodwin - Scars [album]

BFF Records

December 29, 2008, 11:41 PM

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“He sounds like he’s having less fun than he really is”. This slightly depressing quote from his MySpace page sums up Paul Goodwin nicely actually. But don’t let that put you off…

Goodwin’s debut album, Scars, is entirely more soulful and raw than expected from the Cambridge resident. He’s been playing gigs around the UK for years now, with attendance surging after his 2006 EP Phosphorus Burn, and numbers will no doubt do so again once Scars is released on 2 February 2009.

Paul Goodwin keeps the unprocessed feel of his music true on Scars opening with a basic acoustic guitar and cello ballad, ‘Take it All’. This is an impossibly real track with so much honesty and disregard in the lyrics that it really puts the bar high as an opener for the rest of the album.

Deceivingly powerful track ‘Borderline’ is about a turbulent night out with a couple, with lyrics “Let’s go out tonight/god I hate your laziness/let’s get drunk you said”. Here, Goodwin’s accent only heightens the bitterly frank lyrics and with the aid of drums, bass and violin, ‘Borderline’ becomes one of the least folk sounding tracks on this supposed folk album.

The rock star spiked ‘Losing out to Bullethead’ is a thoughtful throwback to the more retro folk that we all know and love. The mandolin, drums and accordion on this track are festive and powerful culminating to the damning lines “You just say “I don’t love you”/and there’s no answer to that”.

The prominent ‘So Finally a Love Song’ shows the confidence of Goodwin with lyrics like “I tried not to say I love you/because I know I say it too much/and I know it loses meaning/but I can’t help myself”. This could be unbelievably tacky if it was coming from almost any other singer/songwriter, but Goodwin makes it sound sincere and valiant.

Slow burning ‘In Sure and Certain Hope’ begins slow and sombre with smooth guitar and then builds to a tempered beat alongside lines “We may as well have never met/because they really are your last respects/you throw your fist of dirt/you turn and go”, describing a funeral, and like a desperate surrender, Goodwin comes down to an acoustic finish which is emotional and unpretentious.

The final third of a debut album is always a possible sore point, but Scars has no troubles with tracks ‘60 miles with a Slow Puncture’, ‘Edinburgh’ and ‘Soaked to the Skin’, which are just as solid and sobering as the preceding tunes.
The final farewell comes in the form of short and sweet ‘One Off’, giving one last look into Paul Goodwin’s weather-beaten personal story.

This is one album I wish more people would go out and acquire than actually will and I can definitely see this album appealing to a wider range of audience than he is currently attracting. In a tactical ploy to downplay how good he really is, you can pick up an ‘At least I’m not Paul Goodwin’ shirt from his website. This alone makes me want to assure him that he is better than even he gives himself credit for.

I’m always a fan of more day-in-the-life-of lyrics, rather than some unnecessarily cryptic stanza about the meaning of life, and Goodwin is a master of the simple pleasures. Some artists are awkward and disabled with a debut album, but Scars is a complete contradiction to many things, this being one of them, and I think even apparent pessimist Goodwin himself will look back on Scars fondly.

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