Prior to 2024, you’d always find the words ‘Peter Perrett’ appended with the apparently obligatory description ‘from The Only Ones’, the band he originally split from in ’81. You’d also find his name bandied about in circles debating the subject of unfulfilled potential. But not now.
Perrett’s latest, deeply personal (double) album, The Cleansing, realises every iota of Perrett brilliance, addressing decades lost to drug addiction, and the inevitable approach to life’s conclusion. The finest record yet to address the ever-more/nevermore-pertinent issue of septuagenarian angst, it’s a late-career masterpiece.
