Posted on 04/14/2008
There's a Dutch proverb that says when you're looking for ideas, it's better to steal something good than come up with something bad yourself. It could have been invented for Duffy. Rockferry's ten tracks wear their influences from the ‘Soul for Dummies' book proudly, while offering little of Duffy herself beyond her much acclaimed voice. This doesn't make Rockferry a bad album, but after all the hype, you're left a little deflated.

I don't really need to tell you what Rockferry sounds like, as you've heard it all before. Take "Mercy," the big single. Bassline borrowed from "Stand By Me." "Hanging On Too Long" 's silky strings and guitar licks? "I Heard It Through the Grapevine." Both Duffy's takes on these two classics are fine, as any song which leans on them would be. As is the production, which draws heavily on Burt Bacharach's deft pop touch and Phil Spector's wall of sound. But nothing on Rockferry astonishes or leaves anything more memorable behind than its influences, and that's the problem at the heart of the album. While we should applaud Duffy for her taste and choosing to mine a richer seam of music than most of her competitors, that doesn't mean we should necessarily buy her record, pleasant as Rockferry is. 

 

If Duffy has a problem, it's the burden of greatness that has been thrust upon her by the media and her marketing department before she's got a record that can even begin to justify that claim. What she does have is a voice strong enough to command your attention for the span of the record, and that might get you up to dance (at your girl's instigation) to a couple of tracks. And isn't that what pop music is all about? For that's what Rockferry, just like its noble forebears, undoubtedly is, and it shouldn't be criticized for that. We'll just have to leave judging her claim to greatness to posterity, and that's exactly as it should be.

 

- Will Georgi