Thomas J Marchant - I Sold My Heart (To Goldman Sachs)

Hear The Track Here

This month Thomas showed his decisive indecisiveness by giving me two track to choose from simply because he couldn't be arsed to pick one himself. Having said that, I've probably picked the one he didn't want reviewed but hey, that's the problem with indecisiveness. Maybe. Probably. In my own defence if you were given a choice between a track called blah blah blah and a track called I Sold My Heart (To Goldman Sachs), you would, wouldn't you? How could I resist having a tout at mankind's favourite financial octopus, along with the rest of the world. They may be masters of the universe but it isn't any universe you or I would recognise, so **** 'em eh?

After we stole the money back, of course.

For people who have latched onto Thomas since he went acoustic (as it were) will have gained a certain image of his work, so this track may come as a bit of a shock like the Bob Dylan 'electric' moment albeit in an unsigned context. There isn't (I'm sure) an acoustic within a thousand miles of this track so if you latched onto Thomas back in the Station For Imitation day (Ed: a previous bandname), then this track will bring that time back to life although - to be fair - it has a lot more structure than any of SFI's material. More to the point, Thomas has not forgotten to bring a song into the electronic proceedings, and a bloody fine one it is too.

I swear as time goes on, and he gains more and more confidence as a singer, his voice is getting deeper, more expressive. I want to say fruitier but he may take that in quite the wrong way, but certainly his voice is getting more interesting rather than less. I Sold My Heart is a deceptively simple track, like much of Thomas's output, and that is - for me anyway - one of his major attractions. It's seems hard for songwriters to be concise and succinct these days, where words overflow in a meaningless pile, but Thomas can always be counted on to being it back down to earth - even, it would appear, with some olde tyme electronica...

Highly Recommended (and topical) ditty.