CHRISTOPHER REES released his long- awaited album last week and next Wednesday his tour comes to Newport.

Rees and his brand of angst-folk have been wowing crowds from South Wales to Parliament for years.

Earlier this month he played the House's bar, The Portcullis, the first artist to do so, all in the name of a better political profile and, of course, charity. But bar a few low-key releases, including FF Vinyl's Kiss Me Kill Me EP, he had yet to put his music firmly into the public domain until last Monday with, The Sweetest Ache.

It's been released on his own Red Eye label which began earlier this year releasing an acclaimed collection of Welsh jazz bands.

An culmination of more than two years work, Rees recorded the whole lot in his own studio, further tightening his grip on his own affair.

It's got all the ingredients fans have come to enjoy at gigs from sliding strings and wailing mouth organs to mournful ivories and Rees funeral vocals.

Rut starts it with a piano-like tinkle, the riff from Dario Argento's master-horror flick Suspira before the depression kicks in with Rees perhaps overly extended lyrics.

Kiss Me, Kill Me will be familiar to fans and it's a good track, more upbeat than most on Sweetest Ache.

Curtain Call is the slowest dirge on the record, which is saying something for Christopher Rees, and it's also a cracker.

But it's with the title track that Rees really excels himself equalling the eeriness of Bauhaus before rising to a Gothic punk climax like The Waterboys crossed with Christian Death.

On Swandive he skirts around David Gray territory with a more Radio 2 friendly vocal and slide guitar. It's also very good.

Mid album things start to cook, rockin' out with Getaway Blues and Rees proves Bleedin' Gums Murphy's old adage, 'the blues ain't about making you feel better, it's about making other people feel worse'!

Next up is The Things You Do which has some sweeping guitar work like Angelo Badalamenti at the start and some slide like Ry Cooder at the end. Fire Eye Land and Inevitable Truth lead a funeral procession of jaded youth towards the end which meet them in the form of Lobotomy which with its quiet moments and loud crescendos is post-rock like from the school of Godspeed You Black Emperor!

As good as Sweetest Ache is, you still won't get the full picture until you've seen the band perform live.

So good is he and band that once upon a time he earned one of the most prestigious support slot on earth bar one.

Apart from Pink Floyd there was no band or artist on earth who'd spurned support acts other than John Cale.

But two years ago Chris got to do that in St David's Hall before the assembled mass of Cale-ites and Velvet Underground devotees.

Next week's show in Newport is his first in the city since a solo spot supporting the fledgling Frommars band, of ex-Janiero fame. It's well worth the trip to see a Welsh artist at work.

Christopher Rees plays the Meze Lounge, Newport on Wednesday, October 27. The Sweetest Ache is out now on Red Eye Music.