Robert Forster
The Evangelist
Release Date: Apr 29, 2008
Genre(s): Indie, Rock
Record label: Yep Roc
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Album Review: The Evangelist by Robert Forster
Very Good, Based on 2 Critics
Based on rating 8/10
If anything, The Evangelist reveals Forster's conviction to just go on and make music, even if it's just this one recording (though given its quality and the empathic presence of the remaining Go Betweens, you hope not). If it's an album of closure, then it is a way to wrap the package with a beautiful bow rather than letting it sit there like an open wound and be wasted away by the weight of time. Yet somehow, there is little finality here, and just an abundance of brilliant, emotionally communicable and translatable, adult pop music that does its best to practice acceptance and find beauty as one goes on living and creating even in the face of life -- altering tragedy.
Based on rating 3/5
Robert Forster's first solo album in 12 years, his first after the untimely death of his fellow Go-Between Grant McLennan, begins with If It Rains, a song that shimmers with the same kind of exquisite sadness their much-loved band captured in their nine albums together. And when the soft guitars of Forster and McLennan's last joint composition, Demon Days, quickly follow it, the prospect of The Evangelist being a mournful masterpiece is all too gloriously likely. Sadly, that song's refrain, "Something's gone wrong, something's not right", reflects the album from thereon in.
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