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Lustre takes on a kind of cinematic joy where Harcourt the long-suffering vampiric troubadour steps into the light and shines.
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Harcourt is a singer of uncommon charm, and Lustre is a welcome reminder that when he's on top of his game--which he is for roughly half the record--you'll want for little else.
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For those who have heretofore found Harcourt to be a little too melodramatic, this is likely the album that will have them reconsider his work. We all need a little romance, and so much the better when it's delivered with a bit of knowing quirk.
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Despite its promising start, the album sags in the middle with Harcourt indulging, not for the first time, his love of Tom Waits.
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When it isn't a high school poetry recital, Lustre often feels like a disappearing act-- an attempt to put on a few musical disguises to see if anyone likes them better than the musician beneath.
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Lustre is ultimately an album that greets life's up and downs, victories and defeats, calms and frenzies, with enthusiasm. Put another way: Ed Harcourt will light up your life.
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Q MagazineIt may be too late for the big breakthrough, but Harcourt has given himself a fighting chancce. [Jul 2010, p.133]
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The Sussex brooder's first studio album in four years is reflective and occasionally darkish, but he's apparently too entranced by fatherhood to be properly morose nowadays.
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UncutHaving branched out by working with everyone from Patti Smith to Mark Linkous, one of the UK's most gifted all-rounders returns rejuvenated with a fifth LP as positive and confident as 2006's "The Beautiful Lie" was moodily introspective. [Jul 2010, p.108]
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Under The RadarRather than take the leap of faith required to create art truly terrible or transcendent, Harcourt has aimed, and landed squarely in the middle of the road, where the world is busy passing him by. [Summer 2010, p.84]
User score distribution:
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Positive: 3 out of 4
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Mixed: 0 out of 4
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Negative: 1 out of 4
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matthewaJun 18, 2010