PlanetMosh Keeping it Metal
It’s not very often that an album comes along with such an interesting story as 100%. Back in August 2011, The Wildhearts‘ lead singer Ginger set up a PledgeMusic campaign in which fans could fund the recording and production of the new album. In just under 6 hours the campaign had already reached its target and by the time it came to recording the tracks, the total was up to an astounding 555%.
Fast forward to March of this year and every Friday for three weeks, ten songs were released to download. Collectively these three albums were known as 555% and once all three were released pledgers were given the chance to vote for the songs that would eventually make up this very album.
For those people who have been living under a rock or perhaps have been in a coma, Ginger Wildheart is the main singer/songwriter from The Wildhearts. He is without doubt one of the UK’s most underrated songwriters.
So on with the show, Opening with the ‘Forget About It’ and ‘Internal Radio’ you get all Ginger ‘s trademarks, heavy yet melodic riffs and choruses that will stay in your head for days . Yet after only one listen, what is already clear, is the total mixture of musical styles on offer here, ‘Taste Aversion’ for example throws in a melancholic piano led intro before taking several different directions, certainly something I wasn’t expecting, maybe neither was Ginger, who has been able, via this campaign, to write songs he wouldn’t normally be expected to write, to push the boundaries with his fans, and let them have the final say.
What we have here is a no bullshit rock n roll singer bearing his soul to his loyal fans, who repaid him in spades. It’s a testament to his character that he bounced back from lack of record funding to find another way of giving his fans what they wanted. I can see more groups and solo artists doing it this way, though not many may have the success Ginger has had with his cd, as it debuted at number 9 in this week’s album chart.
A unique and diverse collection of songs. 10/10
01. Forget About It 
02. Internal Radio
03. Lover It ll all Work Out
04. You re The One, You re The One, Yeah, I Know You re The One, You re The One (Yeah, I Know You re The One)
05. It Appears That The Party Is Over
06. Taste Aversion
07. Another Spinning Fucking Rainbow
08. Just Another Song About Someone
09. Westward Ho! (A New Reputation)
10. Beautifully, Blissfully Unsettled
11. We ve Been Expecting You
12. Time
www.gingerwildheart.net/
You can also read the interview Simon Bower from Planetmosh did with Ginger at last years HardRockHell festival HERE where he talks about the Pledgemusic campaign.
