M People - Fresco (1997)@flac

From the opening strings of Just For You to the last broken beat of Avalon Fresco is another classic M People album, again delivering their timeless virtues of structure, performance and passion. It is also another musical advance for a band that will never be content with the status quo. As founder member of M People Mike Pickering declares "Everything we do, we feel, has to be better than what we've done before, and we certainly feel it here"
Recorded primarily at The Strongroom in East London [as were the previous two albums, Bizarre Fruit and Elegant Slumming] with trips to the leafy surrounds of Surrey's Ridge Farm Studios and the very urban Chun King Studios in New York's Lower West Side, Fresco. contains eleven original songs and one very startling adaptation.
Fans of M People's ability to stir the soul with songs such as Bizarre Fruit's Search For The Hero will luxuriate in the depths of songs such as Smile, Last Night 10,000 and the first single Just For You, with it's acoustic guitar, sweeping strings, insistent vocal refrain all building to a fantastic choral climax. There are few Bands as capable of lifting the spirit; Angel Street and Fantasy Island do just that, with their pace, drive and eternal messages of the need for both self-reliance and co-operation. The change of pace and rhythms carries on with bubbling reggae of Lonely and the ultra-contemporary drum + bass re-working of Roxy Music's Avalon, the stunning cover that closes out Fresco.
Fresco is M People's fourth album in their impressive career and like its predecessors was written, demoed and recorded in part at Paul Heard's North London house. Continuing another tradition the Band produced the album themselves assisted by a stellar list of old friends and new accomplices; engineering credits include Warren Riker [The Fugees], Neil McClennan [The Prodigy], Phil Bodger [The Lighthouse Family] and David Sussman [Mariah Carey].
Guest musicians include Pickering's long-time Manchester cohort Johnny Marr, who plays guitar on three tracks, Chris `Snake' Davis [familiar to anyone who has witnessed the M People live show] who plays sax and flute throughout and Terry Burrus, the legendary American keyboard player who's CV [including work with artists of the stature of Miles Davis] tells its own story. Backing vocals have been handled by the likes of Will Downing, Danny Madden, Carroll Thompson and Claudia Fontaine - singers all notable for their inidividual careers. (Customer from Amazon)