This is Benjamin Clementine’s “long-awaited third album,” says the record company blurb accompanying And I Have Been. “Indeed this is not an album or my third album because that’s already recorded and will be released possibly early next year,” said the enigmatic Edmonton pianist on Instagram in June.
So who’s right? It certainly looks like an album, with Clementine and his cheekbones gazing seriously out of a thick blue frame on the cover and 12 songs within. And those compositions are certainly songs as we tend to define them, with verses and choruses and multiple memorable tunes. Maybe that’s why he’s hesitant.
After winning the Mercury Prize with the sparse piano balladry of his debut album, At Least for Now, in 2015, he went much weirder for the follow-up, I Tell a Fly, experimenting with structure and adopting all manner of vocal affectations.
That 2017 release made it painfully clear that the musician, who had been discovered as a homeless busker in Paris, was not planning to use his Mercury victory as a springboard to mainstream success. He has less in common with any contemporaries than he does with older uncompromising artists such as Tom Waits, Scott Walker and Nina Simone.
Nor does he even seem sure he wants to be a musician. Last year he was spotted acting in the sci-fi film Dune, and he has also said that a second set of songs following this one – which perhaps comprise the real third album – will be his last release.
Another reason to treasure these recordings, which manage to maintain Clementine’s angular intensity while also finding a warmth and charm that has been missing from some past work. Songs such as Delighted, which finds him pushing his voice to a vulnerable high point, and the lightly skipping Auxiliary, should appeal to fans of the string-laden torch songs of last week’s Arctic Monkeys album.
Gypsy, BC begins with gentle piano chords, adds more dramatic strings and sees his strident tones giving way to a soothing female voice (which sounds like his wife, the singer-songwriter Flo Morrissey) in the beautiful chorus.
There are some stranger touches, such as the waltzing organ sound on Genesis, the buzzing electronic bass and digital beats that appear beneath the violins in Atonement, and the far off funk guitar on Lovelustreman. None of them dent the appeal of his finest album – or collection of songs closely resembling an album – so far.
