Search - William Topley :: Feasting With Panthers

William Topley certainly isn't the first British boarding-school student to fall hard for American blues, rock, and soul listening to the BBC. Nor is he the best to have turned his early infatuation into a well-traveled career. On this, his fourth album, he lends his supple baritone to 12 songs that fall somewhere between John Hiatt at his most self-effacing and Mark Knopfler on a story-telling bender. The tracks that satisfy most are the ones that take deep, mostly American roots and add an interesting variation, such as the dancehall/hip-hop delivery that punctuates "Soul I Want," the Spanish-intro, low-key funk of "Los Largos," and the narrative specificity of "Drake's Drum." Where Topley falls short is on songs like "I Can't Wait" and "Closer to You," which are as prodding and predictable as their titles--as if Topley is singing someone else's clichés. Feasting with Panthers is solid and dependable as a plate of comfort food which, depending your appetite, is either its lure or its weakness. --Keith Moerer