PETER BRUNTNELL

Rolling Stone once declared Peter Bruntnell to be, “one of England's best kept musical secrets”. England has successfully managed to keep Peter Bruntnell a secret for all this time, even from itself. “Maybe this will be the album to finally give him the worldwide superstar recognition he deserves!”, enthused every other Peter Bruntnell album review from the last 20+ years, with an admirably unwavering optimism. “If we lived in a just world, Peter Bruntnell would by now be in the middle of his third or fourth global arena tour, his biggest worry working out how to courier his latest armful of Grammy awards back to the UK so his butler could have them installed in the west wing of mansion by the time he got home,” said a feature in The Guardian in 2016, intent on letting the cat out of the bag, but failing miserably. Needless to say, we don’t live in a just world and Peter Bruntnell is still having to get by without a butler. Although perhaps the curriculum is to blame for this failure to ignite mass awareness, with not one teacher in the past two decades known to have heeded the call from NME to teach Peter’s songs in schools.

So here we are again and another album into Peter’s 13 or 14 album career and shouldering the burden of even more sublime reviews, with every possible positive adjective having been called into play. Not even 2021’s primarily solo, slightly synthy lockdown album Journey To The Sun succeeded in putting an end to Peter’s non-success, despite Mojo echoing the plea that, “Somehow, some way, this cult and infinitely class songwriter must get his due wider recognition”. A brief, almost secretive, foray into dance music, in collaboration with mega pop-hit songwriter Rob Davis followed shortly after.

New record Houdini And The Sucker Punch marks a return to more familiar musical territory for Peter, with less solo and synth than his previous album, more Johnny Marr style guitar, Stephen Malkmus fuzz, Neil Young grunge, Richard Thompson, a bit of The Byrds and some slightly Everly Brothers style harmonies. It features Peter’s long-term bandmates alongside pedal steel virtuoso Eric Heywood, Jay Farrar (Son Volt / Uncle Tupelo), Mark Spencer (Son Volt), James Walbourne (The Pretenders / His Lordship) & cellist Laura Anstee.

The album has garnered all the predictably pleasing praise of previous albums, with a handful of writers suggesting that it’s on a par with, or perhaps even surpasses, Peter’s 1999 alt-country classic Normal For Bridgwater, originally released back in 1999. It also found itself featuring in a number of End of Year lists, including Mojo Magazine’s Top 5 Americana Albums of 2024. Further plaudits include top reviews from KLOF Magazine: “flawless… gorgeous songs and melodies” and the Daily Express: “This could well be his best yet in a career that has long deserved greater accolades.”