Andy White - Good Luck I Hope You Make It (2024)

Although Northern Irish singer-songwriter, poet and author Andy White has lived in Melbourne, Australia for over twenty years he`s quite rightly, still news in the land of his birth. The Irish Times had a music quiz this last week where they asked Andy White once went looking for which Irish writer`s burial place?? If you don`t know and I haven`t checked , but I’ll give you my guess later on.

This troubadour releases his first spoken word, political and personal album this month inspired by Hip Hop and went back to where he first came in, listening to John Cooper Clarke and reading Jack Kerouac novels. He started writing the new album with breakbeats and a bass guitar and took it from there. Prior to ‘Rave on Andy White,’ his first album, Andy was a performance poet, not a folk singer. He read poems and gigged with a Roland drum machine. When writing ‘Good Luck I Hope You Make It,’ he returned to his roots, filtering it all through his songwriting and recording experience. Raging about the news, laughing maniacally through lockdown, and enjoying how the spoken word is now a ‘given.’

We are introduced to the album via `The Revolution` a funky discourse on current issues that we all are encompassing such as unreasonable oil prices, social media, and AI. It kind of hints that the answer is in our hands. For me it had that vibe of Gil Scott-Heron`s 1971 satirical poem and song `The Revolution Will Not Be Televised` but less antagonistic. A driving bassline leads us through `Password Of The Beast` which refers to the number 5155 which I read somewhere signifies change, growth, and new beginnings. It is a powerful message from the divine realm possibly, encouraging you to stay positive and trust that you are on the right path. Listen and decide for yourself.

`Ghost Writer` appears to be a view of societies difficulties, a sort of captivating valediction rap. There`s a pointer towards the singer songwriter`s troubled hometown of Belfast with `The Day You Were Bomb` and as usual it`s a fairly balanced view of the problems religiously and politically.

`Bass Priority` is a delightfully edgy outlook on the singer`s adopted country which was released during the campaign for recognition of an indigenous voice to parliament in Australia. There`s some scratching or scrubbing and an intricately rapped viewpoint on the dangers of money as your goal on `Cake Yo Me`.

`Self Isolation` begins with what sounds like dual vocals with soundscapes cut in and vocals that maybe question what`s to come, a reflection on where we are heading possibly written during the global lockdown. We have a further introspective insightful assessment of financial injustice with `Best Of Times` which was shared over a slacker like beat.

`Book Of Poems` has an appealing rhythmic under beat which allows lyrics that sound as if they are a stream of consciousness a platform. A kind of ode to somebody close for when the narrator isn`t around anymore. I found `Light Comes In` delightfully absorbing and descriptive nigh on picturesque with a pulsating drum beat and complementing bass line. A poetic number that evolves literally and nearly physically and touches on the breaking of the coming day, the winter solstice and romance.

Title track `Good Luck I Hope You Make It` is a further continuous flow of uninterrupted thought or a monologue which does break into song on route and also halts before re-emerging with a baby`s cries and distant vocal harmonies. The album closes out with `Talk Don`t Touch` a pretty hypnotic offering with the phrase “all you gotta do is talk” repeated throughout and a further introspective address sprinkled atop. A simple but effective mantra for world peace.

I read that Andy was listening to Kae Tempest, Jack Kerouac, and Hip Hop and the playing bass and funky electric prior to and during the creation of `Good Luck I Hope You Make It` and yeah it may have some slight influences of one and all but it`s very much an Andy White conception. In that I mean as with most of Andy White`s albums there`s more to them than meets the eye. I found this latest offering totally enthralling and i`m sure you will too. Andy is touring the UK until the end of this month and i`m sure a fair slice of this album may be shared so even more of a reason to head along.