''Borrell 1'' is the debut

studio album An album is a collection of audio recordings (e.g., music) issued on a medium such as compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl (record), audio tape (like 8-track cartridge, 8-track or Cassette tape, cassette), or digital distribution, dig ...

by English musician and

Razorlight Razorlight are an English indie rock band, formed in 2002 in London by lead singer and guitarist Johnny Borrell. Along with Borrell, the current line-up of the band is composed of founding members Björn Ågren on guitar and bassist Carl Dalem ...

frontman

Johnny Borrell Jonathan Edward Borrell (born 4 April 1980) is an English guitarist and singer, currently the frontman of the rock band Razorlight, of which he is the only consistent original member. Early life and career Borrell was born in Sutton, London. H ...

. It was released in July 2013 under

Universal Music Universal Music Group N.V. (often abbreviated as UMG and referred to as Universal Music Group or Universal Music) is a Dutch– American multinational music corporation under Dutch law. UMG's corporate headquarters are located in Hilversum ...

Reception

Critical response

''Borrell 1'' has received mixed reviews from critics. At

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

, which assigns a

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rating out of 100 reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an

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score of 49, based on 10 reviews. Kitty Empire, writing for ''

The Observer ''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. First published in 1791, it is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper. In 1993 it was acquired by Guardian Media Group Limited, and operated as a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' ...

'' gave the album three out of five stars and commented that it was "a catchy little record". She added "While ''Borrell 1'' has many faults – too many sax solos, insufficient sackcloth and ashes – the jauntiness with which

Zazou The zazous were a subculture in France during World War II. They were young people expressing their individuality by wearing big or garish clothing (similar to the zoot suit fashion in America a few years before) and dancing wildly to swing jaz ...

disport themselves often makes up for it." Barry Nicolson from the ''

NME ''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming and culture website, bimonthly magazine, and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a "Rock music, rock inkie", the ''NME'' would be ...

'' gave the album five out of ten and stated "Ultimately, it's sketchy and uneven, ridiculous in as many of the wrong ways as the right, but not quite the disaster its tracklisting would suggest."

Commercial performance

''Borrell 1'' only sold 594 copies during its first week on sale and it failed to secure a place on the UK Top 100 album chart. Speaking to '' Drowned in Sound'' about its poor sales, Borrell said "It is being heard and appreciated by as many people as possible! It is! If that’s 500 people, that’s 500 people. If those are the 500 people that are open enough at this point in time to hear this record, fucking fantastic man."

Track listing

References

{{Authority control 2013 debut albums Albums produced by Trevor Horn Mercury Records albums