Workers Playtime

Perhaps this one should have been subtitled the difficult fourth album, since unlike its similarly subtitled predecessor, 1986's Talking With the Taxman About Poetry, 1988's Workers Playtime is the record on which Billy Bragg hits the awkward stage. Integrating a full band into his sound for the first time on a full album, and precariously balanced between the political songs that first made his name and the sweetly rueful love songs like Greetings to the New Brunette and A New England that threatened to bring him a larger audience, Bragg occasionally falls between two stools on this uneven album. The band sounds like an afterthought most of the time, as if they were dubbed onto the guitar and voice tracks after the fact, and, for the first time, there's an element of stridency to the few explicitly political tracks. That said, She's Got a New Spell is an outstanding addition to Bragg's love-song canon, and the closing track is one of his finest. Starting with his endearingly yobbish voice and simple guitar lines, Bragg sings the self-deprecating lyrics of Waiting for the Great Leap Forwards in the voice of a {singer/songwriter} addressing his audience directly and basically asking for their trust and companionship as he moves from one comfortable stage of his career to another, more potentially dangerous, one. It's a brave and good-natured song, and the way his band slowly enters behind him, one at a time until the whole thing turns into a raucous, bellowing knees-up, is perfect for Bragg's statement and his plans. It's a brilliant song, and a promising end to a halting album. ~ Stewart Mason, All Music Guide