SUPERB! Rich DELIVERS Rich!!
author: Amrit Sond
..about time too, he's been on the scene for a while and I've been aching to finally get me hands on these songs and what a GREAT cd this is. The trademark soulful Rich vocals are all there, intact, his great classic driving guitaristic grooves are all there too and his songwriting shines in all glory. All tracks are truely memorable and this is a magical offering - get STFU now, I can say this CD has not left me CD player since I got it. SHINE on Rich.
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Listen carefully - you'll be rewarded
author: Americana UK
I think that there is a huge amount of talent of the type that you have to pay attention to in order to be rewarded. He is a little like a less intense Sophia or a far more credible James Blunt; he even has his own ‘Beautiful’ in ‘Amazing,’ only he wrote it himself and it doesn’t suck the life out of you. It is the type of thing that somehow transcends fad and fashion - sometimes it gets picked up for a while (think Turin Brakes) but mostly they are content in their own tributary as earnest young men. I’m inevitably thinking of Nick Drake. What Barnard does have in his armoury is diversity - he fills some tracks with a full band and when adding pedal steel to ‘Headlights' sounds very Dolly Varden like. He uses some welcome dissonance on ‘Interference’ and a string quartet is used to good effect on ‘Something about You’. His voice has an attractive nasal quality that is at home in all of these settings. I’ll hold onto this CD until he makes it huge. - David Cowling, www.americana-uk.com
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STFU is a smashingly clever pop-rock adventure...
author: Smother Magazine
If this was a bad album than this review would have considered of the following snarky remark “You took the words right out of my mouth”, but no, I don’t want Rich to shut the f**k up at all! Instead maybe I can ask if he could pass that on to some of the British Conservative folks in Parliament. His vocals are crisp and clear, saying a pleasant hello to both melody and harmony. Self-produced, “STFU” is a smashingly clever pop-rock adventure that is every bit as Brit-pop as his hometown of London offers. Mr. Barnard, thanks for being yet another reason to take that long journey across the pond!
- J-Sin (Smother.Net)
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Good Acoustic singer song writer stuff
author: JK
There shoulld be more of this stuff and is is probably on the up. This is a good solid CD; nice guitar work which occasionally haunts you. Perhaps the guitar needs to be a lttle stronger and he needs to lose the little facial hair thing but no weak songs, a bit less commercially oriented than Damien Rice maybe more Jack Johnson
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