Barry Adamson - Stranger On The Sofa (2LP) - Red Vinyl

Some records feel like cities at night. Stranger On The Sofa is one of those, the kind of album that slips into your headphones and starts casting streetlight shadows across your room. Barry Adamson has been doing this sort of thing since his Magazine and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds days, turning basslines and brass into noir scenery, then building whole worlds out of them. By 2006, when this one landed on his Central Control International label, he had long since proven he could score the film in your head. Here, he leans into that gift with a sly grin and a sharpened set of tools.

Adamson came up in Manchester and kicked his solo career off with Moss Side Story, that audacious “soundtrack to an imaginary film.” He then racked up a Mercury Prize nomination for Soul Murder and kept moving, orbiting film culture proper along the way, including contributions to David Lynch’s Lost Highway. Stranger On The Sofa sits comfortably in that lineage. The songs hum with the grammar of cinema, yet they still work as late-night jams. Nothing feels like pastiche. It is his language, not borrowed atmosphere.

The record lives on contrasts. Drum machines tuck in next to brushed snares. Twanging guitar lines saunter through rooms filled with vibey organs and low brass. Then a voice drifts in, half-spoken, half-sung, pointing your attention at a figure in the doorway or a clue in the ashtray. The tempos roll and breathe, never rushing, always letting the detail do the heavy lifting. Adamson’s bass remains a guide rope, thick and tactile. You can almost feel the strings under his fingers. The production is his home turf, too. He is a notorious multi-instrumentalist and studio obsessive, and you hear the care in the edit points, the patience in the fade-outs, the little bits of foley and street noise that make the rooms feel lived in.

There is a great trick at the heart of Stranger On The Sofa. It flirts with menace, then turns tender. A cue will set up tension, a scraping guitar or a lonely trumpet, but before the scene curdles, a melody opens the blinds and lets a little sun warm the carpet. That push and pull keeps the record replayable. You start noticing how a single ride cymbal pattern holds an entire arrangement together, or how a backing vocal slides in for two bars and then vanishes, like a passer-by you only catch in profile. Adamson has always had a curator’s ear. The sequencing here feels like a night out that takes you from the pub to the cab to a bar you did not know existed, and somehow you still make the last train home.

For those who collect Barry Adamson vinyl, this album is a sweet spot. The low end has proper weight, which flatters the noir swing and the more electronic pulses. Pressed right, it blooms, and the quieter passages have a hushed charm that digital sometimes flattens. If you are crate-digging in a Melbourne record store, it is the sort of sleeve that jumps out at you, all mood and promise. And if you prefer to buy Barry Adamson records online, keep an eye out for tidy copies, because this one gets love spins. Stranger On The Sofa vinyl tends to circulate among fans who play it, not stash it, which tells you plenty about how it lands in real rooms.

Context matters with Adamson. People talk about his soundtrack instincts, but what keeps me coming back is how he writes characters. Even without a lyric sheet, you meet them. A bass figure becomes a detective with a frayed tie. A clipped guitar becomes a landlord who wants the rent yesterday. You do not need a plot when the performances draw faces in the smoke. That knack is why Adamson’s work has aged so well and why Barry Adamson albums on vinyl feel like small cinemas. Drop the needle, lights down, curtains part.

Stranger On The Sofa is a strong entry point if you are new, and a rewarding deep cut if you already know the big titles. It connects early milestones like Moss Side Story and the Mercury-nominated Soul Murder with the swagger he would refine later, and it does so with unshowy confidence. If you are sifting through vinyl records Australia wide, stick this on your list. It rewards attention, but it also makes a room feel cooler even if you are just doing the dishes. There are records that tell you what to feel, then there are records that give you a key and let you roam. This one hands you the key and fades into the crowd, which is exactly the point.