''The Magic Position'' is the third studio album by English singer-songwriter

Patrick Wolf Patrick Wolf (born Patrick Denis Apps; 30 June 1983) is an English singer-songwriter from South London. Wolf uses a wide variety of instruments in his music, most commonly the ukulele, piano, and viola. He is known for combining electronic samp ...

. It was released on 26 February 2007. The album features collaborations with

Marianne Faithfull Marianne Evelyn Gabriel Faithfull (born 29 December 1946) is an English singer and actress. She achieved popularity in the 1960s with the release of her hit single " As Tears Go By" and became one of the lead female artists during the British I ...

and

Edward Larrikin Larrikin Love were an England, English four piece indie rock band from London. Consisting of singer-songwriter Edward Leeson, guitarist Micko Larkin, bassist Alfie Ambrose and drummer Coz Kerrigan, and also occasionally including violinist Rob ...

Larrikin Love Larrikin Love were an English four piece indie rock band from London. Consisting of singer-songwriter Edward Leeson, guitarist Micko Larkin, bassist Alfie Ambrose and drummer Coz Kerrigan, and also occasionally including violinist Rob Skippe ...

as well as backing vocals by Wolf's sister Jo Apps and also bass and alto clarinet instrumentation by Derek Apps. The album was preceded by the singles "Accident & Emergency" and " Bluebells". Music critics and Wolf himself have noted that this album marks a departure from the musical style of his previous two albums, with this one being more pop-oriented. He cites

Boney M Boney M. was a German-Caribbean vocal group that specialized in disco and funk created by German record producer Frank Farian, who was the group's primary songwriter. Originally based in West Germany, the four original members of the group's o ...

and Giorgio Moroder as influences. '' Slant Magazine'' named ''The Magic Position'' the best album of 2007. As of 2009 the album has sold 20,400 copies in United Kingdom.

Critical response

''The Magic Position'' received general acclaim from music critics. At

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 82, based on 27 reviews, which indicates "universal acclaim".

Track listing

# "Overture" – 4:40 # " The Magic Position" – 3:53 # "Accident & Emergency" (featuring

) – 3:17 # "The Bluebell" – 1:11 # " Bluebells" – 5:17 # "Magpie" (featuring

) – 3:57 # "X" – 1:05 # "Augustine" – 4:19 # "Secret Garden" – 1:49 # "Get Lost" – 3:17 # "Enchanted" – 2:07 # "The Stars" – 3:51 # "Finale" – 1:57 Digital download #

"The Marriage" – 2:46 UK enhanced edition #

"Bluebells" (music video) Japanese edition #

"Underworld" # "Adder" # "Ari's Song" (Misprinted as "Ali's Song") # "The Marriage" # "Accident & Emergency" (music video) # "The Magic Position" (music video) Canadian edition #

"The Childcatcher" (live) # "Luna & Libertine" (live)

Singles

* 23 October 2006: "Accident & Emergency" * 1 January 2007: " Bluebells" (download-only) * 26 March 2007: " The Magic Position" * 2 July 2007: "Get Lost" Billboard.com - Discography - Patrick Wolf - Get Lost/ref>

Personnel

* Patrick Wolf – lead vocals, Bosendorfer grand piano, Kawaii Modular synths, baritone & soprano

ukulele The ukulele ( ; from haw, ukulele , approximately ), also called Uke, is a member of the lute family of instruments of Portuguese origin and popularized in Hawaii. It generally employs four nylon strings. The tone and volume of the instrumen ...

s, mountain dulcimer, 5- and 15-string

kantele A kantele () or kannel () is a traditional Finnish and Karelian plucked string instrument (chordophone) belonging to the south east Baltic box zither family known as the Baltic psaltery along with Estonian kannel, Latvian kokles, Lithuania ...

clavichord The clavichord is a stringed rectangular keyboard instrument that was used largely in the Late Middle Ages, through the Renaissance, Baroque and Classical eras. Historically, it was mostly used as a practice instrument and as an aid to compositi ...

, clavinet, programming,

theremin The theremin (; originally known as the ætherphone/etherphone, thereminophone or termenvox/thereminvox) is an electronic musical instrument controlled without physical contact by the performer (who is known as a thereminist). It is named afte ...

harmonium The pump organ is a type of free-reed organ that generates sound as air flows past a vibrating piece of thin metal in a frame. The piece of metal is called a reed. Specific types of pump organ include the reed organ, harmonium, and melodeon. Th ...

, autoharp, bells, gongs, handclaps,

locks Lock(s) may refer to: Common meanings *Lock and key, a mechanical device used to secure items of importance *Lock (water navigation), a device for boats to transit between different levels of water, as in a canal Arts and entertainment * ''Lock ...

and keys * Victoria Sutherland – solo violin *

– vocals on "Magpie" * Jo Apps – backing and sister vocal * Derek Apps – bass and alto clarinets * Katy Wright – solo

cello The cello ( ; plural ''celli'' or ''cellos'') or violoncello ( ; ) is a bowed (sometimes plucked and occasionally hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually tuned in perfect fifths: from low to high, C2, G ...

* Mark Rudland – trombones * Flip Phillipp –

vibraphone The vibraphone is a percussion instrument in the metallophone family. It consists of tuned metal bars and is typically played by using mallets to strike the bars. A person who plays the vibraphone is called a ''vibraphonist,'' ''vibraharpist ...

and glockenspiel *

– vocals on "Accident & Emergency" * Richard Eigner – drums * Werner Dafeldecker –

double bass The double bass (), also known simply as the bass () (or by other names), is the largest and lowest-pitched bowed (or plucked) string instrument in the modern symphony orchestra (excluding unorthodox additions such as the octobass). Similar i ...

* Jeremy Shaw, Richard Eigner, Patrick Pulsinger and Anna at Eastcote – handclaps * Andreas Kaufmann – first violin * Alexej Barer – second violin * Raphael Handschuh –

viola ; german: Bratsche , alt=Viola shown from the front and the side , image=Bratsche.jpg , caption= , background=string , hornbostel_sachs=321.322-71 , hornbostel_sachs_desc=Composite chordophone sounded by a bow , range= , related= *Violin family ...

* Rozaliya Rashkova – cello

Charts

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Magic Position, The 2007 albums Patrick Wolf albums