Ben Poole – Anytime you need me

Ben Poole’s new album “Anytime you need me” comes out this month, and will be followed by a UK tour in November and December.

There are two covers on the album. The first is the Eagles song, “Dirty Laundry”. It’s a great cover and his voice really suits the song – in fact he’d do well with pretty much any Eagles song. It’s the best track on the album in my opinion.

The second cover is “Start the car”, a song that was a hit for Jude Cole in the early 90s. It’s a great version – the production gives it so much more impact than the original which feels a bit dated and subdued in comparison. I prefer the vocals on the original as Ben Poole’s voice doesnt have the slightly rough edge that worked so well in the original, but I have to say he does a great job on the cover.

There are some lovely guitar solos scattered across the album, but the main focus is on Ben’s voice which is very good – it’s the sort of smooth vocals you associate more with pop or AOR than Blues though, but on tracks like the Eagle’s cover it really works well. The use of the Hammond organ always gets my approval – ever since Deep Purple it’s distinctive sound has been associated with some great rock music.

It’s a very radio-friendly kind of album. Yes it’s got blues and rock, but it’s also got plenty of funk and a very commercial sound, particularly with Ben Poole’s smooth vocals. It’s an album that deserves to be very successful. It is however a slightly awkward album that doesnt really fit any genre – it’s too poppy to be a real Blues album or a real Rock album, but it’s too Bluesy in places to be a pop album, so it might suffer from that as genre specific radio stations may feel it’s slightly outside their remit. Hopefully though that won’t happen as I’m sure if it gets airplay it’s going to sell well.

“Anytime you need me” will be released on 14th September 2018

Track listing:

1. Anytime you need me
2. Take it no more
3. You could say
4. Found out the hard way
5. Further on down the line
6. Dirty laundry
7. Start the car
8. Don’t cry for me
9. Let me be
10. Holding on