Waldner
Image: link
Found & Lost - Waldner Album Review
Album Review
Elvis, Madonna, Bono, Prince, Beyoncé, Björk, Sting. To that list can we now add Waldner? Well, like Morrissey before him Waldner has gone down the surname only route but unlike the former Smiths singer and all of the aforementioned he has not yet achieved such an iconic status that you feel he will forever be known by just the one name. In fact, this particular dude has only just released his debut album (give or take a fledgling effort some sixteen years ago which went by the name of "FLICKER") and it is one which given his mug shot on the cover appears to have come relatively late in a musical life.
But let's not begrudge this David-come-lately his first real tilt at stardom. He has, after all, travelled thousands of miles from his native Canada to his adoptive London home and one listen to his words would suggest he has faced many physical and emotional obstacles in between. And, to give him greater credit, he has harnessed these personal experiences to ten well crafted songs that bob along quietly and efficiently on a rolling wave of pop and folk-tinged rock. It is all very pleasant and once or twice, on the more deeply resonant "Wilderness" and the beautifully trumpet-inflected closer "This Wonderful Pain", the songs do stretch out over and above this sea of tranquillity. But these brief moments apart it is all rather ordinary, albeit in a gently reassuring manner, yet with two more albums reportedly in the can and the promise of their being markedly different there may still be time for Waldner to fully justify his single name status.
