The Proclaimers

January 31st. 1987
SOUNDS

It's well nigh impossible to do justice to Scotland's other Reid brothers' outstanding repertoire in the space of a small review, but they can't hang you for trying. If you start off wity the songs, you inevitably end up with the performance, and an evening with The Proclaimers is probably quite unlike anything you've experienced before.

Craig takes the lead vocals, singing in an irresistibly broad Scottish accent, while brother Charlie plays guitar and fills out the sound with an amazing line in backing vocals.

And the sound? Well, sometimes it's a bit like a good-natured argument set to music; frenzied, with something for all ears. Yet it can also be restrained to the point of fragility.

While there's humour by the mile on a song like "The Joyful Kilmarnock Blues" - a freewheeling football epic with a difference - ther's also a quieter, more reflective side to this dynmaic duo that surfaces in the tender tones of "Beautiful Truth" and the show stopping "Letter From America".

Call it what you will, The Proclaimers have a rare emotional honesty about them and a uncanny knack of making the most off-beat pronouncements sound as familiar as the oldest cliches in the book. And it's both of these, along with their sheer naked inventiveness and a total lack of pretence, that make them very special.

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 The Proclaimers 
Sounds - Jan 1987