Name: "Lonely Are The Brave" Track By Track by Maverick Sabre
Brand: Maverick Sabre
SKU: 602527960173
Price: 9.9 USD
Availability: OnlineOnly
Rating: 3 (203 reviews)

ALBUM

Blessed with a distinctive soulful voice which combines a faux-Jamaican accent with the Cockney twang of his Hackney birthplace and the Irish lilt of his County Wexford upbringing, 21-year-old Michael Stafford, aka Maverick Sabre, first came to attention fronting abrasive slabs of dubstep by Chase & Status and Professor Green. However, there's very little in the way of massive bass wobbles on his debut album, Lonely Are the Brave, which neatly fills the retro-hip-hop soul gap left by Plan B's recent ventures into other fields. Indeed, the melancholic dissection of "Broken Britain" on understated opener "I Need" could well have been the first chapter of a Strickland Banks follow-up, as could the stripped-back acoustic blues of "Shooting the Stars," a stinging attack on police brutality, and the doo wop-tinged "No One," a heartfelt riposte to an ex-girlfriend which appears to borrow the melody from Ms. Dynamite's "It Takes More." As authentic as the vintage Ronson-esque brass arrangements and socially conscious intentions are, Sabre only really begins to make his mark when he ventures into more uptempo territory, and nowhere more so than on the three sample-reliant tracks: "Let Me Go," a triumphant slice of brassy trip-hop which uses the same eerie Isaac Hayes string section as Portishead's "Glory Box"; the laid-back mid-'90s neo-soul of "Memories" (the Roots' "What They Do"), and the orchestral hip-hop of "These Days" (the Turtles' cover of the Byrds' "You Showed Me"). Elsewhere, the ghostly reggae of "Cold Game" recalls Finley Quaye at his Brit Award-winning peak, the baggy beats of "Open My Eyes" and the summery East Coast vibes of "Sometimes" allow Sabre to showcase his impressive MC skills, while the falsetto-led chorus of the toe-tapping "Running Away" provides the album's most infectious hook. An impassioned cover of Sam Cooke's revolutionary classic, "A Change Is Gonna Come" (chosen as a response to the 2011 London riots), proves Sabre is the real deal. But the more compelling contemporary fare on Lonely Are the Brave suggests he should ditch the classic soul man routine and continue to embrace a sound as intriguing as his voice.
© Jon O'Brien /TiVo

"Lonely Are The Brave" Track By Track

Product information

Release options

1. Track By Track: Intro

2. Track By Track: I Need

3. I Need

4. Track By Track: Let Me Go

5. Let Me Go

6. Track By Track: Open My Eyes

7. Open My Eyes

8. Track By Track: Memories

9. Memories

10. Track By Track: Cold Game

11. Cold Game

12. Track By Track: No One

13. No One

14. Track By Track: These Days

15. These Days

16. Track By Track: Sometimes

17. Sometimes

18. Track By Track: I Used To Have It All

19. I Used To Have It All

20. Track By Track: Shooting The Stars

21. Shooting The Stars

22. Track By Track: I Can Never Be

23. I Can Never Be

24. Track By Track: Running Away

25. Running Away

26. Track By Track: A Change Is Gonna Come

27. A Change Is Gonna Come

28. Track By Track: I Don't See The Sun

29. I Don't See The Sun

Technical Specifications