Famed for his fiddly finger-plucking, guitar-patting, and intricate arrangements, ginger-haired dreadlocked surf-dude
Newton Faulkner became an unlikely fixture at the top of the charts in 2007 with his debut album,
Hand Built by Robots. With a title inspired by an operation on a wrist injury just prior to recording, his sophomore album,
Rebuilt by Humans, continues to revive the noble tradition of the one-man band, but also sporadically introduces a wider array of instrumentation to create a slightly more expansive and eclectic sound. There's nothing as radical as his
Green Day covers band beginnings, but the proper opening track "Badman," a
Peter Gabriel-esque ode to the beauty of nature, full of twanging blues riffs, fuzzy synths, and pounding rhythms and recalling the funk-rock output of his previous band, Half a Guy, and the
Levellers-meets-
Frankmusik leanings of "Won't Let Go," blending sharp Celtic folk strings with urgent '80s-inspired electro beats, show that
Faulkner is more than capable of stepping outside his comfort zone. It's a shame that
Rebuilt by Humans doesn't do that more often, as when he reverts back to his everyman troubadour inclinations there's not much to differentiate him from the plethora of acoustic singer/songwriters already out there. The lilting guitar hooks, country-style harmonica, and overall laid-back vibe of "Lipstick Jungle" evokes the breezy beachside folk-pop of
Jack Johnson; the driving anthemic chorus of lead single "If This Is It" echoes the epic melancholic rock of
Snow Patrol; and closing track "I'm Not Giving Up Yet" is the kind of stripped-down poetic ballad you'd expect to find on the first
Damien Rice album. While never short of a rousing chorus or emotive heartbreak-themed lyric, you do wish that producer Mike Spencer (
Jamiroquai,
Kylie Minogue) could have persevered with its occasional forays into more adventurous territory, while five largely instrumental interludes, which unnecessarily pad out the album, do little to dispel the sense of fatigue that wears in by the umpteenth "just me and my guitar" track.
Rebuilt by Humans will satisfy those expecting another fix of free-spirited acoustic stoner pop, but its flashes of genre-straddling invention indicate that
Faulkner's sophomore album could have been so much more. ~ Jon O'Brien