The Verve Urban Hymns - An Inspired 90's Classic

I was about to begin by labelling this album a modern classic. That was before realising it is over thirteen years since it was released! How time gets away. Regardless, this is a record that will forever stand the test of time. It is one of the last albums to revolve around four big single releases, and has been met with unanimous critical praise ever since. It was awarded the Brit Award for Best Album Of The Year in 1998, was the first ever inductee into the Q Classic Album Hall Of Fame, and was voted the 16th Greatest Album Of All Time by Q Magazine. It is a career defining moment for songwriter Richard Ashcroft, who reunited the band in 2008 to headline Glastonbury. When you're short of a record that you know everybody will like, Urban Hymns is always a great choice - triumphant and upstanding in any company. A landmark in 90's Popular Culture that, in my opinion, shits all over Oasis. A genuine British masterpiece.

Bitter Sweet Symphony - to this day The Verve's most successful single - is an instant classic if ever I've heard one. Performed by the Andrew Loog Oldham Orchestra, and written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, the score to this track stood alone untouched for years before Richard Ashcroft got his creative mitts on it and wrote a lyric. The finished product is definitely a contender for single of the 90's. If that wasn't enough of a ass-kicking opening, the album rolls into Sonnet, another of the four big singles, and one of the outstanding examples of Ashcroft's songwriting on Urban Hymns. The Rolling People is Zeppy in many ways, perhaps with an element of U2 ala the Achtung Baby era. If that isn't enough of a comparison to wet the lips, I suggest you take up crown green bowls. The Drugs Don't Work is a somewhat melancholy, moralistic rant from former junkie Ashcroft, but an endearing message cannot fail to creep through. Four songs in and you know you've definitely got some record on your hands.

Catching The Butterfly is, again, reminiscent of the industrial sounds used on U2's Achtung Baby, Neon Wilderness an immersing, spacial jam written by guitarist Nick McCabe, and Space And Time an atmospheric, wistful ballad centered on Ashcroft's superb vocal. Weeping Willow is a deep and emotive, Radiohead-esque groove that leads brilliantly into the album highlight, Lucky Man. I was fifteen years old when I became obsessed with this amazing single - I vividly remember being immersed in some History Coursework on Native Indians when I first heard it, and it opened up another dimension in my mind. A magical achievement, both from a songwriting and recording perspective. I have performed this song hundreds, if not thousands of times for live audiences, and it never fails to be one of the best received of all live tracks - simply because of its stature. A song that, long after The Verve are forgotten, will still be an enduring part of the woodwork.

Just when you're wondering where this record can possibly go after a stormer like Lucky Man, this band pull out another piece of musical treasure. One Day, a sublime, experimental ballad shows the delicacy and poetics involved in Ashcroft's songwriting: "One day baby we will dance again under fiery skies/One day maybe you will love again, love that never dies." Immense depth of feeling from such a young musician. This Time is a bare but intriguing funk, Velvet Morning an acoustic/slide guitar led lament, and Come On a crashing, Led Zep inspired thumper to close one of Popular Music's most important and ground-breaking albums.

I'm not a admirer of Richard Ashcroft and his 'Liam Gallagher attitude'. He is an extremely arrogant and egotistical, self-celebrating idiot a lot of the time. However, his contribution to this record in particular (since his solo career came nowhere near reaching these dizzy heights) is memorable and everlasting. It is also worth mentioning that the rest of the band were equally as essential to this creation: Simon Jones (bass), Peter Salisbury (drums), Nick McCabe (lead guitar), and Simon Tong (guitar/keyboards). I hope that Urban Hymns sits snugly on every music lovers' shelf, and is dusted off occasionally as a reminder that there was something worth caring about in the 1990's. It was, of course, Liam that snarled: "Is it my imagination or have we finally found something worth living for?" The answer, back in 1997, was yes: Urban Hymns.