Music Review: Hugh Coltman - Stories From The Safe House

Well here’s the news: Hugh Coltman is alive and well and recording in France. I thought he had disappeared into the ether, so when I saw his solo album, Stories From The Safe House, whilst strolling around a huge record store in Paris, it was a very welcome surprise.I am not sure where he has been these last few years, but he has clearly been working on some impressive music. Holed up in his safe house somewhere in France he has produced twelve acoustic based tracks that form this highly satisfying album. Further exploration of his Myspace page confirms that Hugh did, in fact, disappear. Having toured for five hectic years and releasing three albums with The Hoax, both the band and its award winning singer, Hugh, simply vanished.So where did he go? His site doesn’t actually reveal too many secrets. It says that maybe it was a “pre mid life crisis, or the love of a socially inept woman or that maybe he had just lost his front door keys”. Whatever he has been doing has inspired some wonderfully gentle acoustic tracks, with lyrics resonating reflection and observation, and crammed full of life experience. From the opening track, “Sixteen”, a song soaked in the additional atmosphere of ukulele, strings, and some very wise words, you know you are in for a special ride. “Voices” softly enters your psyche and refuses to move back out. Within these first two tracks he has set an atmosphere that is both melancholic and oddly optimistic.“On My Hands” has Hugh on characteristically effortless vocal form. It was this voice that helped propel The Hoax onward and upwards at their peak, a time that saw them opening for the likes of Buddy Guy, Robert Cray, and Walter Trout, among others. It is full of insecurities and regret, and lines so full of imagery they actual haunt you. “I’m afraid of the things my hands have done”, confesses Hugh amid a Parisian café atmosphere.“Could You Be Trusted” lifts the spirits with a song that paints an instantly visual scene. This is surely the sign of excellent song writing, coming at you like a brief encounter with totally believable people brought to life within a well-crafted verse or two. Hugh’s blues and soulful vocal pedigree, earned with The Hoax, takes hold as the track progresses.“Something Wicked This Way Comes” sets another powerful scene from a film, a play, or a well-written book. The gentle song of love, “Where Did The Day Go”, begs the question, where did you go Hugh? Again this demands attention with evocative lines such as, “your dress sighs against your skin”. “Greener Than Blue” is late night reflection for a friend. “All The Lovers Come And Go These Days” takes us out onto the streets of Paris, and elsewhere, watching the crazy world rush by. “Magpie” gives us a touch of reggae with a ukulele opening. Strange, but true.“As The Crow Flies” and “The Moon Caught In A Tree” keep the atmosphere rich with scenes from the observations of life. Stories From The Safe House comes to a close with the piano-accompanied “Ballad Of The Sad Young Man”. It is a song of total disillusionment, realised at the end of a bar.Hugh Coltman may have disappeared into a safe house overlooking the River Seine. He may have fallen in love or simply lost his keys. Whatever the reason, he is back with an album that announces his return with huge splashes of highly engaging poetry. He may have lost his way for a while, but in truth the music has remained within him. He has added an additional power to his songs by stepping back and watching life unfold on the streets and in the bars of wherever he was. As you sat on a stool at the end of a bar in some town, sadly alone studying the bottom of a glass, maybe the guy with the beard in the dark corner was Hugh Coltman. Maybe your story is on this album.

Article Author: Jeff Perkins

Jeff is a writer who lives in France. He writes CD/DVD box sets, music reviews and has had a book published about David Byron of Uriah Heep. He is 'busy' exploring the music of Europe with his wife Debbie and dog Dylan. It's Dylan that does the writing of course. …

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