Warrington-Runcorn New Town Development Plan – ‘Your Community Hub’ album review: a social history lesson taught through music
THE SKINNY: Sometimes, the greatest artistic inspiration can come from the most unlikely of places. Austerity-battered Northern towns like Runcorn or Warrington have often not been deemed as noteworthy, but if you scratch beneath the surface, there is a wealth of cultural history and inspiration there for the taking. Somebody who has never taken these places for granted is Gordon Chapman-Fox, whose musical project Warrington-Runcorn New Town Development Plan uses synthesizers and electronica to explore the history and impact of these ‘new towns’.
Your Community Hub, the latest effort from New Town Development Plan is part electronica-based concept album and part lesson in the cultural history of Northern England. It explores the sense of community that was supposed to be fostered by Britain’s ‘new towns’ – meant to improve living conditions and alleviate city overcrowding in the wake of the Second World War. The concept has been tackled in music before, most notably by punk icons The Slits, but never in as great detail as the new record by Warrington-Runcorn New Town Development Plan. The album is awash with the kind of optimism and euphoria that emanate from the retro-futurism originally associated with these communities but also hints at something darker.
A child of the 1970s, Chapman-Fox had a front-row seat to watch the deterioration and destruction of these manufactured communities after countless successive governments have ignored, undermined and destroyed them. This is perhaps why Your Community Hub also features a certain darkness, an inexplicable melancholy orchestrated by Chapman-Fox’s diverse synthesiser sounds. Nobody within the modern age has created synth-led tracks in quite the same way as Warrington-Runcorn New Town Development Plan, perhaps they never will.
Concept albums are difficult to master, but Chapman-Fox has seemingly established a whole act spanning multiple albums. His latest effort is undoubtedly one of his most appealing, suiting itself equally to soundtracking quiet contemplation about the state of modern society, as well as a day spent working from home – which, in itself, is an interesting comment on life in the 21st century. Your Community Hub is an innately political record and a stunning indictment of the damage caused by successive right-wing governments and a widening North-South divide.
For fans of: Spending your weekends taking photographs of brutalist multi-storey car parks on an overpriced film camera.
A concluding comment from William Beveridge: “If I had known, at the time, that our great efforts to create a post-war socialist utopia in Britain would only lead to some bloke from Runcorn messing about on a synthesiser, I wouldn’t have bothered.”
Your Community Hub track by track:
Release Date: May 24th | Producer: Gordon Chapman-Fox | Label: Castles In Space
‘A Shared Sense of Purpose’: The opening track is imbued with the sense of hope and optimism for the future that first inspired the ‘new town’ projects. Its ethereal quality lulls you into the album without growing stale or boring. [3/5]
‘Rapid Transportation Links’: Evoking the atmosphere of late nights spent waiting at train stations and bus stops, there is a strange melancholy to this track. The industrial influences present, particularly in the second half, provide some much-needed edge to the album. [3.5/5]
‘Cul-de-Sac’: Upon listening, I found myself pondering ‘Who else could write a seven-and-a-half minute long song about a cul-de-sac and have it be so compelling?’, and I could not drum up a decent answer. [3.5/5]
‘Summer All Year Round’: An incredibly captivating effort that endlessly toys with the emotions of the listener; its rising intensity is dealt with skilfully by Chapman-Fox. [4/5]
‘Facilities For All Ages’: The retro-futurism of Warrington-Runcorn New Town Development Plan is most evident on the song, which sounds like the lovechild of Kraftwerk and the Stranger Things theme tune. [4/5]
‘Pedestrian Shopping Deck’: A dark, brooding exploration of high expectations and broken promises. Provides the perfect soundtrack for walking past rows and rows of boarded-up storefronts in your Northern hometown. [4/5]
‘A New Town With An Old Sense Of Community’: Encapsulating the broader message of the entire album in a succinct five-minute synth track, this track is perhaps the most accessible from across the record. The closer is unexpectedly catchy without compromising the incredible concept of the project. [4/5]
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