★★★★★
It's difficult to appreciate now the shock around the music biz, and gleeful titters among students, when Al Stewart laid claim to be first to use the word "fucking" in popular song, in the 18-minute title track of his second album, Love Chronicles...
- www.recordcollectormag.com
2011-05-23
★★★★★
Al Stewart actually described Past Present and Future as his "thesis," and in a way, it's true- the whole album is an excuse for "Nostradamus," one of his most ambitious tracks and definitely his proudest. On original vinyl pressings, he dedicates the song a blurb of its own, scrawling excerpts from the life of its subject matter, a rather successful seer who gains foresight of Hitler's rise, amongst other things. In another way, he's lying: where's the academia...
- www.sputnikmusic.com
2011-02-21
★★★★★
Two men with acoustic guitars take a trip through singer-songwriter Stewart's back catalogue - but the route they choose is by no means the straightest and most obvious. First off, there's no Year Of The Cat, Nostradamus or Roads To Moscow, which should be enough to put off the casual fan. But the lack of trademark tracks is deliberate, as they've already featured on the 1992 live album Rhymes In Rooms, to which this is a sequel...
- www.recordcollectormag.com
2010-12-21
★★★★★
Summary: I'm beginning to think you should have listened to Al. Al Stewart has written some classics and some howlers, and through it the only constant has been that tender, Tony Blair accent, swooping between Glaswegian swagger and public school dreaminess...
- www.sputnikmusic.com
2010-10-18
★★★★★
Al Stewart actually described Past Present and Future as his "thesis," and in a way, it's true- the whole album is an excuse for "Nostradamus," one of his most ambitious tracks and definitely his proudest. On original vinyl pressings, he dedicates the song a blurb of its own, scrawling excerpts from the life of its subject matter, a rather successful seer who gains foresight of Hitler's rise, amongst other things. In another way, he's lying: where's the academia...
- www.sputnikmusic.com
2010-10-18
★★★★★
Stewart's sixth record is the sort of in between of his commercially tragic career. He was going nowhere fast before this album - everything up to and including Past, Present and Future was, generally speaking, either a folk tale from the days of yore that played like a glorified lesson in history, or some psychedelic offshoot of love, usually about that quirky girl from the quirky 60s-70s era with some surrealist imagery to boot...
- www.sputnikmusic.com
2010-03-04
★★★★★
A landmark: the first rock record to use the word "fuck" ("fucking," actually) at the end of a line, an achievement typical of its occasional flaws--the rhyming word, "plucking," is forced--and unrepresentative of its success. The eighteen-minute title cut is a decent, serious, and touching reminiscence of sexual growth that for all its male bias is recommended to songwriters reluctant to shed their adolescence...
- www.robertchristgau.com
2009-07-10
★★★★★
Rather than gothics or sci-fi, Stewart goes for historical novels, and as long as he shuts up about Nostradamus--who inspired last year's Past, Present and Future, you'll remember--I say good for him. Well, actually the historical note is limited this time out to one song about Lord Grenville and references to Leonardo, phantom harlequins, etc. The prevailing tone is more spy-novel. I ask you, did Eric Ambler have an ear for melody?
- www.robertchristgau.com
2009-07-10
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