Richard's got the voice of a Lion. So much power in it, coupled with Nick McCabe's guitar sounds is a spiritual experience. Richard and his guitar is great as well, but in The Verve, it all just clicks properly. Same with the Stone Roses - Ian's solo career is okay, and he may not be the best singer, but with Squire's licks, Mani's bass and Reni's drumming - it's all sensational.

The difference is that the Ian is not that much "worse" now than he was at the beginning of the Roses...
With Liam it's like...a development from the best to one of the worst (live singers)
But Ian was never known for his great vocal abilities. It's just the sound of his voice and his persona in general that fit to the Stone Roses.
I'm just getting a bit sad writing this and looking up seeing the poster of Liam on my wall

Edit: I just realised this is VERY off-topic. I apologise for that. Let's be glad Richard is still one of the best singers with one of the best voices around!

Listened to Hold On a few more times, and I'll say, it ain't half bad, which is more than can be said about This Is How It Feels.

My main gripe with Hold On isn't the sappy strings, but the fucking dance beats. It's pointless to layer commercial-sounding electronic drums to an already painfully generic track to make it even more commercial.

Thanks a lot!

The comments section is terrible. Full of losers slagging him off for no other reason than his past failures. 

Glad to see Richard keeping it real about people like Chris Martin. 

he said in the bbc interview that he wants to be one of the biggest solo names out there and as much I as I like RA its not going to happen, his music is good but its not going to set the music world alight and even if it was, guitar music isnt where it was, people arnt interested like they were once, much like Noel, you will probably do alright but your not going to be center stage again, certainly nowhere near the success and general appeal the verve managed.

plus RA has marketed this album on a small scale, most people probably dont know about it.

Lads we need to cop on and stop making excuses for Richard Ashcroft. And end the Verve comparisons now!



It's time to compare Richard solo to Richard solo. He's been at it long enough!



'Hold On' is arguably the worst record he's ever sang on or wrote - if it wasn't Richard Ashcroft, you'd be making no excuses. I'm reading 'Ah it sounds good acoustic!' = you can make most pop sound good acoustic, ever heard of Live Lounge?!! No excuse.



Anyway, 16 years ago Richard Ashcroft wrote, composed and produced a beautiful, wonderful song that was nothing like Verve.



It actually has that baritone voice, old romanticism style of Richard Hawley, minus the strings. Yes, minus the strings. Richard didn't use strings on this song. That sounds fucking mad I know. But it was a beautiful song, absolutely beautiful.



16 years later, it still sounds gorgeous. Soulful, stripped down, wonderful guitar by BJ Cole, amazing use of multiple vocal tracks towards the end. No cliched lyrics, production spot on. The track was called 'Could Be a Country Thing' and was a b-side to 'Song for the Lovers'. So he doesn't bloody need to drench every track with strings. He certainly can produce good music without the Verve. That song was so good because it sounded like a collaboration with BJ Cole. Equal space for Ashcroft's vocals and Cole's guitar.



Dickie's problem is, was and always will be his flipping EGO. He has slagged off Coldplay twice in the last month in the press, which is fine, knicker wetters that they are. However, when Human Conditions came out and everyone facepalmed themselves, Chris Martin and his knicker wetters were there for Dickie when no one else cared. Chris Martin stood up for Human Conditions. Chris Martin gave him a massive stage to sing Bittersweet Symphony (calling RPA the best singer in the world too). At Live Aid or Live 8, remember that? Happy to get up and sing Bittersweet Symphony as long as he gets the stage (never mind who he shares it with though).



I'm sure there's more to this story but it looks like RPA is trying to distance himself from Coldplay, so barring anything personal that went on, it must be a dig to the general MOR rock/pop that Chris Martin and co have been responsible for.



Either way, it's baffling when you listen to 'Hold On'.



It's so Coldplay-lite and so middle of the road it's pretty much clipping oncoming traffic!! Coldplay's single 'Midnight' (produced by Jon Hopkins) is actually brilliant if you've heard it. I believe this is because Jon Hopkins is a really good electronic producer and Coldplay collaborated with him. It is my belief, based on nothing but Dickie's records, is he doesn't collaborate. Chris Potter needs to go, he's a yes man by the sounds of it. When Dickie works with others, the results are good usually: Verve, DJ Shadow and The Chemical Brothers for example. The UNOS album wasn't a collaboration, it was a monstrosity that HE was in charge of. Once Dickie is in full charge, things go downhill. His self-directed video for 'This is How it Feels' is an example of the man when left in full creative control.



Way too eager to please these days and has lost the art of songwriting for a desperate need to be adored again. Sad.

Apparently Richard is on Jools Holland next week.

Love your voice man! Great stuff.

Source?