US

This album is what we can say PG's best work; Us has something totally different from all the other albums. In this album, Peter doesn't use his favorite toy, the vocoder, in order to give a sense of reality to his lyrics; the results are the best words and the clearest images that he's ever created in his whole solo career (of course, I'm not including Supper's ready, Firth of fifth and The Lamia). All the songs have a "plateau" inside, a critical point in the middle of the song that allows the achievement of a solution for all psycological problems; it is important because I've heard someone saying that Us is an introspective album, a sad and egocentric album. I really think the right word to define this album is "hope"; Come talk to me is a cry from a lonely man who's lost his woman, but there is no hate in it, and the verse "...just like it used to be" is the furthest thing from hate. Love to be loved is nothing more than what the title suggests, and it has a critical point in the middle too, the line "...I recognise how much I've lost, but I cannot face the cost...and I let go"; Blood of Eden has a wonderful middle-eight, from the words "..at my request" to the G note that symbolizes for me a resurrection; Steam is not important, it seems having no kind of link with the rest of the album, it's something sticky for airplay or MTV, even if Quiet Steam, included in the SWL DVD's bonus tracks, is really good; Only us is maybe the clearest exposure of Peter's problems, he knows that he'd better shut up and listen but at the same time he hears his woman calling him back home from the great escape; Washing of the water is the natural folowing of Love to be loved, in which Peter understands that letting go is not the best thing to do, because it's hurting now; Digging in the dirt is the result of a psychoanalisis session, with the different feelings hate ("don't talk back...this time you've gone too far...shut your mouth...don't say nothing") and fear ("stay with me, I need support"). I think that this song exactly explains us what is PG's real problems and feelings: there is a woman, who doesn't understand him and doesn't hear his problem, putting him in the dirt (in which Peter finds the places he got hurt). But Peter knows that the only person able to take him out this situation is the same one who left him there, his wife (he needs her to stay close, to give him support). Fourteen black paintings is something really near Zaar or Across the river atmospheres, then we have Kiss that frog, useless just as Steam or In your eyes, and the perfect final, Secret World, a real pop/world music, something always beautiful in all PG gigs. I give the album a 9 out of 10.