Nerina Pallot – 'Fires' (Idaho) Released 04/04/2005

Nerina Pallot is BACK.  You better believe it.  The most eagerly anticipated comeback since… Ok.  Maybe not that eagerly anticipated as her name will be vastly met with a resounding ‘Who?’  But she’s back anyway.

She delivers some news.  Apparently – now, you may need to sit down to prepare yourself for a surprise – but apparently ‘Everybody’s Gone To War’. Phew! What a shocker, eh?  Didn’t notice that one did you? So after this astute observation follows a song of the same name.  It’s all about how awful war is, how it’s generally just really bad.

But hang on.  Haven’t we had our fair share of anti-war songs? We’ve had our ‘Oxygen’s' and our ‘L.S.F.’s we’ve even had a funny looking group jump about manically and ask us WHERE IS THE LOVE???

Obviously not.  Because what these songs have been missing is an “I don’t want to die” refrain, a lyric about God’s wacky sense of humour and handclaps! All sung to a tune that’d be a nice addition to Sheryl Crow’s back catalogue. Oh Nerina, it’s so good your back.

‘Everybody’s Gone To War’ is a nice little tune.  It really is.

Which, sadly, is more than can be said of the following songs.  Niceness inevitably turns to blandness, and good Sheryl Crow turns in to bad Natalie Imbruglia.  Songs like ‘Damascus’ and ‘Mr King’ drag by with a mediocrity that could make a Dido fan scream with insane sense of boredom.  NO MORE BALLADS! PLEASE!

Anyway, welcome back, Nerina.