PAUL WELLER - SATURNS PATTERN
He may still be known as the Modfather in some quarters, but the 56-year-old can no longer be defined by one genre with his latest album seeing him hop between all kinds of musical styles.
As with 2012's Sonik Kicks, Weller plunders high and wide for inspiration. White Sky starts with the calming, new age sounds before breaking into crunching Black Key-like blues rock.
The title track channels some of the breezy psychedelia of Traffic with the immediately hummable chorus of a lost 1970s classic, while These City Streets is effortless, lilting soul in the vein of the Isley Brothers. In The Car is Weller's magpie mind in microcosm - his voice is distorted through a megaphone as he bemoans the commuters making endless circles around the M25, while the music jolts from sunny country strum to distorted blues stomp, plagued by sci-fi sound effects.
Occasionally, he is not afraid to tone down the sonic experiments and, on the piano-led ballad Going My Way, simplicity brings a sweetness he's rarely matched before. At the end of These City Streets, Weller sings: "I've still got a long way to go" - Saturns Pattern suggests there's going to be plenty more great music along this way. 8/10 Mark Edwards
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