Baxter Dury – Return of the Sharp Heads Ft. J Grrey.

Baxter Dury emerges with ‘Return of the Sharp Heads’, featuring JGrrey’s vocals, as the second preview from his September 12th album ‘Allbarone’ via Heavenly Recordings. The track serves as what Dury describes as ‘an abstract subconscious rant, criticising anyone that is from Shoreditch or thereabouts, as I talk from my ivory tower in west London’.

The collaboration with JGrrey adds soulful texture to Dury’s characteristically sharp observations about London’s geography of pretension. His self-aware positioning from his west London perch creates a delicious contradiction – the critic elevated enough to survey the scene while simultaneously becoming part of it.

Dury’s approach to ‘Allbarone’ represents what he calls a ‘brand new’ musical era. It marks his first production collaboration with Paul Epworth, whose resume includes work with Adele and Florence and the Machine. This partnership brings polish to Dury’s naturally caustic wit, creating space for his metropolitan observations to breathe.

The album promises to maintain Dury’s tradition of metropolitan anthropology, examining various London tribes with forensic detail. His description reveals the scope: ‘It’s very critical of people, this album, whoever they are, maybe some bloke with a moustache and sockless loafers in Shoreditch or a fat old Chiswick gangster lording it up in a really comfortable middle-class part of London’.

The track is the seventh song on the nine-track collection, suggesting its role as a central pillar in Dury’s latest commentary on urban existence. His admission that ‘it doesn’t always make sense but it makes sense to me’ perfectly captures the subjective nature of his observational comedy.