Released 19 April 2010 on Kicking Ink/Bandstocks Label

Mr Fogg is a UK-born alternative pop artist, who made his name touring countries including Iceland - where he recorded his debut album - Lithuania and Latvia. He also played Reading Festival, Iceland Airwaves, Truck Festival, Secret Garden Party in the past and has some exciting UK shows coming up in 2010.

Mr Fogg has experimented with unusual methods of getting his music out. He uses Bandstocks, where members of the public can buy shares in the production of artists’ albums, and in December 2009 he opened a 4 day only pop-up shop, Fogg Shop, in Central London, to perform live and sell his music.

The ‘Moving Parts’ single single is out in early April 2010 and the album with the same title is to follow in late April. The album was recorded at Greenhouse Studios in Reykjavik, and co-produced by long-term Bjork-collaborator Valgeir Sigurdsson. Mr Fogg’s remixers include Rennie Pilgrem, Jakwob, Poirier, Ólafur Arnalds and Rudi Zylgadlo.

Mr Fogg had just returned from L.A, where, under the creative direction of legendary Tony Kaye (of American History X fame), he filmed a video for Moving Parts single.

Fogg is not just another new artist. He does things his own way and has done so ever since he started playing both the piano and organ aged 7. He’d mastered the guitar and four-track recorder by 12 and by 14 became an expert drummer and bassist. It’s his ability to follow his own path that makes him special, and where other young musicians would have opted to move to the big city, Fogg found greater personal affinity with the Nordic countries, where he eventually recorded this new album.

Now reading he above you may think that Mr Fogg’s music may be too leftfield for most peoples’ tastes. Well, you would be wrong, with a capital W. Look no further than the startling and very beautiful opener ‘A Second Look’ with its dark electronic intro, fabulous melody, solid lyrics and youthful, pleading vocal. It’s a moving, slam-dunk of a song and likely to be one of my favourite tracks of 2010. ‘Moving Parts’ adopts a much lighter instrumental backdrop to communicate another emotional and introspective message. Dripping keyboard notes, electronic clicks, subtle drum strokes, powerful melody and another sensitive, expressive vocal combine to deliver another quite stunning song. ‘Bloodrush’ offers up another sonic but different sonic feast with a relentless, deep Hammond drone below another fragile vocal performance. A sharp clatter of drums concludes another cracking good pop song. ‘Stung’ offers up yet another sonic treatment, this time a bass strum, swooning harmonies and guitars provide an indie rock ambience. It’s another winner.

Now what’s interesting here is that when I first listened to the album I picked three later songs for airplay on our radio show. However, during this review process those three songs has expanded to include just about every track on the record. And I reckon another listen will make it a full-house, that’s how good this is. ‘I Will Let You Down’ is a glacially paced emotional thunderbolt with a formidable backdrop of clattering drums under one of the most expressive vocal on the record. Glorious! ‘Keep Your Teeth Sharp’ delivers nightmarish darkness with its ocean deep bass rhythm, and desperation with a vocal as expressive as you’ll ever hear. Orchestral strings introduce an intensely contemplative sonic dreamscape in ‘My Bones Creak’, while final track, ‘Answerphone’ is a bittersweet love song where a desperate vocal pleads forlornly, “Give me a call, you will not get the answerphone.”

This is adult pop music drenched in adventure, sonic diversity, beauty and emotion, the like of which I doubt I’ll hear again in 2010. It’s a gorgeous record; beautifully written, performed and produced; and I just hope that Mr Fogg secures some airplay for it - he deserves to. 2010 is shaping up to be another very strong album release year, and thus far Mr Fogg is up there with the very best of them.

4.5/5

http://mrfogg.co.uk/

http://www.myspace.com/mrfoggisapopstar