The Coral 2013 on the Moon

Not really The Coral but various members were involved in the recording of the featured albums and the same four members have been part of the live band for Cut from a Star by Ian Skelly and Lover Undercover by James Skelly and the Intenders. Cut from a Star was released last December and all the tracks are on the playlist below.

Ian Skelly has apparently said that many of the tracks are ones that were considered too strange for a Coral album. This is a shame because any of them would improve any of the Coral albums and tracks such as Caterpillar would surely be considered one of their best. There has always been much more to The Coral than the songs you may have heard on the radio and they were a big inspiration to Mr Alex Turner of Arctic Monkeys  fame.  It may be that they have never been allowed to make the classic album they could easily have made after the promise of their debut. Their recent LPs have been great, but a little safe and not very diverse which is also the only real problem with Cut From A Star. This is where James Skelly and the Intenders comes in as it is an album of Motown-influenced Merseybeat and might contain a few tracks considered just too "Pop" for The Coral. I have though included the four that I think are Coral standard plus one B-side, and they do lighten things up a bit and break up the scouse psychedelia of Cut From A Star and James Kelly's voice is better than ever. What you then have is a great Coral album.

I could have also included songs from the recent  A Bad Wind Blows in My Heart by ex-guitarist Bill Ryder-Jones, which is a mostly great album, but sounds quite different from the Coral. You could though imagine some tracks being recorded by The Coral and a best of all three records, with James Skelly on lead vocals, really would be a classic. All three albums can also be found to stream in the usual places.