Reviewed by Ian Phillips.
By Shane Nicholson, Island Records 2021.
Shane Nicholson is a three-time ARIA and eleven-time Golden Guitar winner and Living in Colour is his latest album.
It was written and recorded at his Central Coast studio as pretty much a solo effort due to COVID-19 restrictions with Shane playing most of the instruments and drummer Josh Schuberth recording his drums in his own studio in the Blue Mountains.
For Shane Nicholson stepping into the breach and taking on most of the recording roles is not new, he’s a go-to producer and multi-instrumentalist of some note.
In fact, he was busy producing albums for several other artists while working on his own project.
Shane is a remarkably good songwriter and Living in Colour really highlights his skill.
Songs like Simple Man, The High Price Of Surviving and Ain’t Been Loved stand amongst his best work to date.
It’s been a hard few years for Sane Nicholson, as well as the pandemic, he’s had to deal with a string of personal tragedies from the death of his grandparents and his partner’s dad to the suicide of one of his closest friends and much of this turmoil has found its way into his songs.
The pandemic has really hit the music industry hard and unfortunately too many people have given in to extreme depression and unfortunate actions as a result of the loss of their life’s work.
I suppose songwriting for Shane has become a form of therapy to help him cope with the loss of so many friends
Songwriting is a theme that he explores in two songs on the album. I Can’t Write a Love Song and the self-help track How To Write A Song.
Despite his claim that he can’t write a love song the track itself proves that he can because it’s a beautifully understated expression of the hurt of lost love.
The lead single from the album And You Will Have Your Way has already reach number 15 on the Country Singles charts and there’s a video of it on YouTube.
There are plenty of other potential singles on the album and I expect that Shane will be up for another Golden Guitar nomination come award season.
