More Celtic Connections………………

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There’s around 2100 acts appearing at this year’s Celtic Connections so we’re paying attention to the ones we expect to see and those lesser known folk who we except to be well worth seeing.

Canadian “powertrad trio” De Temps Antan are a cert to satisfy the traditional folk crowd with their robust and infectious sounds. Singing in French, Éric Beaudry (guitar), André Brunet (fiddle) and Pierre-Luc Dupuis (accordion/harmonica) need no translation as they switch from rambunctious drinking songs to beautiful traditional airs with each excelling on their respective instruments. Their latest album, Ce Monde Ici-Bas (The World Below) is a fine introduction to the stomping, wheezing and danceable storm they can whip up. They’re appearing at The Mitchell library on 31 January with support from Gria.

De Temps Antan website

Elephant Revival, a Colorado based five piece, open their first UK tour with an appearance at the Old Fruitmarket which is our favourite venue of the festival. Multi instrumentalists all the five band members conjure up a cornucopia of sounds weaving intricate and at times stately set pieces. While guitar, banjo, mandolin, fiddle and washboard are all employed the songs and vocal harmonies are tightly arranged with an almost chamber folk feel at times. With several vocalists on board it might be unfair to pick one out but washboard player Bonnie Paine has that Karen Dalton touch to her voice. Although they excel on their well mannered hymns to nature and spirituality they can turn out a good old fashioned earthy number such as Spinning from their forthcoming album, These Changing Skies, due for release in March. Grace Of A Woman, again from the new album has a sparkling Paul Simon snap to it as the band step up their pace and almost rock while they do whip up a fine gospel inspired frenzy on the closing song Rogue River. As stated they’re at the Old Fruitmarket on Friday 24th January supported by Salt House.

Elephant Revival website


And finally it’s time to land slap bang into the middle of good old fashioned American Honky tonking with the news that Sturgill Simpson is playing at the festival as part of his UK debut. Who? Well it’s just been announced that he’s been signed to Loose Records and that’s just about as good a recommendation as one can get. Loose will release his debut album, High Top Mountain in February. We’ve precious little information on him other than that he’s from Kentucky and evokes the likes of Waylon Jennings with his hard edged sound and listening to the album here we can only agree with that. Simpson is playing the Tron Theatre on Saturday 18th January supporting the highly recommended Lindi Ortega.

Sturgill Simpson website

Celtic Connections 2014 – Jenny Ritter

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Second artist we’re featuring is the Canadian Jenny Ritter. Blabber’n’Smoke reviewed her album Bright Mainland back in April. Here’s what we said then…

Ritter’s acoustic guitar and voice supported by a lonesome pedal steel introduce the first song They Can’t Tell where a separation crisis highlights the gulf between her island and the mainland. Pretty soon the band stomp in with a driving percussive beat and the songs builds a momentum that is pretty thrilling. Not for the last time the listener is reminded of fellow Canadian Kathleen Edwards as Ritter swoops and soars throughout. Five Nights captures some of her early experiences of life in the city with the band capturing a late night feel while Ritter has a sense of wonder and yearning in her voice. There’s an uplifting sense of joy and happiness in the following We Must Sing as banjos flutter, guitars soar and the lyrics celebrate the power of song. Resolute is another opportunity for the band to cut loose with a fiddle to the fore and while Ritter is singing of a lost love again the overall feel is optimistic. You Missed The Boat has an almost doo woppish 50′s rock’n’roll swing and according to Ritter is another “breakup” song written during that time when one is getting over the emotional upheaval of a failed romance. again Ritter transforms what could have been a lament into a redemptive song casting aside the ex lover and again celebrating the power of song, literally so in this case as a massed chorus swells up at the end. Throughout the album the playing is exemplary with producer Adrian Dolan playing several instruments while Lucas Goetz of The Deep Dark Woods delivers incendiary pedal steel and also drums. Ryan Boeur and Bear Erickson add electric guitar on some songs and Elise Boeur plays viola. In addition there is a host of backing singers most of whom are members of the Kingsgate Chorus, a “rock’n’roll” vocal collection of local Vancouver musical luminaries. The band shine brilliantly on the enigmatic Ghost, a song that is central to the album as it ponders the duality of the duplicitous male and realises that a girl’s best friend is ultimately her mum. The music churns and boils along with some fine guitar effects to create a fine musical conundrum. Scattered through the album are a few songs that reflect Ritter’s folkier roots as accompanied by guitar she delivers a childlike set of beliefs in It Is What It Is while Weathervane shows that even without her musicians she can deliver a rousing message.

Usually I write reviews after a couple of days (fairly) intensive listening and to be honest most of the time they get filed away as new stuff comes in. Today Ms. Ritter was retrieved and spun again and if anything the album sounded better given that the old memory cells were kicked into action with the result that I was almost anticipating the highlights. Anyway, Jenny Ritter plays The Mitchell Library on January 18th supporting Joy Kills Sorrow, a band I’ve reviewed on americanaUK. Fine as they are it’s Ritter we’re rooting for here.
http://www.jennyrittermusic.ca/

Celtic Connections 2014 – the Stray Birds

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It’s that time of year again when we shake off the post festive blues with some energetic gig going. Blabber’n’Smoke will be attending several shows for a feature on americanaUK, if you’re interested you can read last year’s write ups here and here.
Celtic Connections has a habit of imprinting some artists onto the public’s collective consciousness especially if they get the chance to appear on the extensive television and press coverage that accompanies the festival offering these choice acts a fine opportunity to build their audiences up when they return under their own steam. So over the next few days we’ll look at a few bands and acts and here’s hoping that some of that Celtic Connection luck rubs off on them.

First up are the very fine Pennsylvania based The Stray Birds, a trio whose debut album has been gathering praise since its release at the tail end of 2012. An acoustic trio featuring primarily banjo, guitar, fiddle and double bass they convey a relaxed sound that harks back to traditional country and folk although on the album they wrote all of the songs. All three sing and harmonise excellently with the song Wildflower Honey (which does feature some stinging telecaster work) being the highlight of the album. It’s a song that stands up well against the likes of Sandy Denny and the Fairports. My Brother’s Hill meanwhile features their harmony singing and listening to it you could be mistaken for thinking that the Eagles had got their Mojo back and delivered on the promise of their first two albums. All well polished and good but the band conjure up older and darker spirits with the instrumental Give that Wildman A Knife/Bellows Falls where the twin fiddles of Maya de Vitry and Oliver Craven are chilling and sinister. Capping it all is de Vitry’s song Wind & Rain which ventures into Gillian Welch territory and comes out a winner. If these are any indication of their live show then we’re in for a treat. With a new covers E.P just out (featuring songs by Townes van Zandt, Susanna Clark, Ira and Charlie Louvin, Jimmie Rodgers and Nanci Griffith) they are appearing at St. Andrews In The Square on 25th January.

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Blabber’n’Smoke’s Top Ten for 2013

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I succumbed to the idea of a top ten for the first time last year and if nothing else it’s been useful looking back at it over the past few days and comparing it to the list below. Was it a good year for music? I don’t know. Has there ever been a bad year? All I can say is that I’ve enjoyed listening to music this year as much as the last one and the year before that and so on. Many of last year’s list still get regular plays here so at least I liked them and the number one, John Murry’s Graceless Age has had a second wind with its eventual release Stateside. It may seem odd to have an artist with two entries in the list but both albums by Michael Rank & Stag are simply superb examples of what Blabber’n’Smoke would define as Americana; rooted in the country with a frontier outlook and a fierce regard for the common folk. And a happy coincidence to have two works from Howe Gelb mentioned also as he continues to plow his singular field. Both albums have striking images of Gelb threatening to turn him into an Americana icon, part Mt. Rushmore, part Dorothea Lange, for Blabber’n’Smoke, he’s a hero. Anyway, here’s what rocked our boat over the past twelve months.

1. Doc Feldman & the LD50. Sundowning At The Station. This Is American Music

Soiled songs and dusty ballads sounding like a wounded Crazy Horse. A triumph for label of the year, This Is American Music.

And here’s the man himself

2. Michael Rank and Stag. Mermaids. Louds Hymn

Wracked and raw country folk and rock from North Carolina’s Michael Rank. In the space of two years he’s delivered three albums (one a double disc set) that in a fit of hyperbole we said it sounded as if Keef had left the Stones in ’69, joined The Band and recorded with Neil Young frying honeyslides in the kitchen. At the very least it comes close.

3. Israel Nash Gripka. Israel Nash’s Rain Plains. Loose Music

Guitars weave and wander with a ferocity and lyricism that defies description and he repeats this throughout the album and there’s a moment in the title song where the guitars fizz and burn just like the best firework you’ve ever seen.

4. Cam Penner. To Build A Fire. Independent

“Ukuleles, guitars, banjos were strummed. Floors were stomped. Kick drums were kicked. Feet stumbled. Thighs, knees, hands, slapped, clapped. Voices strained and bent. Fingers gripped, grabbed, picked. Arms and hands flung. Skin wrapped tight strained and stretched. Body and sound thrown against wood and metal.”

5. Michael Rank & Stag. In The Weeds. Louds Hymn
No apologies for the second appearance from this tall, stick thin North Carolina rock’n’roll ragamuffin. The sonic slurry he conjures up is nothing less than mesmerising.

6. Sam Baker. Say Grace. Independent

Baker’s wounded heart goes from strength to strength

7. Diana Jones. Museum of Appalachia Recordings. Proper Records.

She’s not well known but whenever we mention her there’s a flurry of activity from folk who recognise Jones’ ability to sound as old as the hills and bang up to date, the thinking man’s Gillian Welch?

8. Birds of Chicago. Birds of Chicago. Independent.

JT Nero makes an honest woman of Allison Russell as they formally pair up for a laid back celebration of harmony singing and some Tupelo honey.

9. Dead Flowers. Midnight at The Wheel Club Hee Haw Records

Dark and deep, vocally and lyrically, a trip through North America and the soul.

Dead Flowers – The Beach from deadflowers on Vimeo.

10. Wynntown Marshals. The Long Haul. Blue Rose.

Local heroes, The Wynntown Marshals survived some turbulent years with band members coming and going. With new crew on board they came up trumps with a bigger, more layered sound and another fine songwriter in the shape of bassist Murdoch McLeod who penned the amazing Tide. Topping off a great year for them the band were snapped up by the very discerning blue Rose label.

Honorable mentions

Howe Gelb. The Coincidentalist
Howe Gelb. Dust Bowl
Mark Collie & his Reckless Companions. Alive At Brushy Mountain State Penitentiary.
J. R. Shore. State Theatre.
The Coals A Happy Animal
Benjamin Folke Thomas. Too Close to Here
Slaid Cleaves. Still Fighting The War
Thriftstore Masterpiece presents Lee Hazlewood’s Trouble Is A Lonely Town.
The Quiet American. Wild Bill Jones
Amanda Pearcy. Royal street
Heidi Talbot. Angels Without Wings
Jim Dead I’m Not Lost
Rachel Brooke. A Killer’s dream
Great Peacock E. P.

Fox and The Bird

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A short note to recommend that you watch the video for Fox and the Bird’s video for their song Wreck of the Fallible from their upcoming album Darkest Hours. Far as we can see they’re a pretty good old fashioned crew using banjos, accordions, ukuleles & fiddles as they delve into that old Americana sound. Hopefully we’ll get a chance to hear the album when it arrives but in the meantime here’s that video.

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Simone Felice unveils first song from his forthcoming album

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Taken from the forthcoming new album Strangers, set for release through Team Love Records in the UK on March 24th, Simone Felice returns with the record’s opening single, Molly-O! Draped in the additional vocal talents of Wesley Schultz & Jeremiah Fraites of The Lumineers, the song is described by Felice as “a song where we get to go off the rails a bit”. Of the single and album he says;

“Isn’t it wild how, when it comes to matters of the heart, we can start out so fanatical, so certain, only to end up as strangers in the end? Remote even to ourselves over time, strangers in the mirror…
Molly-O! is a bit of a tongue-in-cheek salute/requiem to the itinerant panhandler I was as a kid, an exercise in not taking one’s early sins or one’s current self too seriously. In the studio we had the core band as well as my brother James on accordion and harmonies, and were lucky to have a friend Zach Alford (Bowie, Springsteen) on the kit (I play drums on most of the album but sometimes you just have to give up the seat), as well as a drunken horn section. I want it to be a song where we get to go off the rails a bit, as we all seem to posses the need to lose ourselves from time to time by whichever vehicle: Love, pills, technology, booze, lust, music… pick your poison.”

Listen to Molly-O! here:

Lou Reed. 1942-2013

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Blabber’n’Smoke hasn’t posted an obituary since its inception but tonight we make an exception to mark the passing of Lou Reed. There should be no need to recount his career here and some folk might wonder why an “Americana” themed blog would mention him (although he did write a song called Lonesome Cowboy Bill). Suffice to say that Reed and his comrades in the Velvet Underground have cast such a huge shadow over the most interesting music produced over the past four decades either musically or in attitude. Way back in the seventies when Zeppelin, The Who and the Stones were the top triumvirate in schoolboy rock cred some brave folk carried around VU albums and fortunately I eventually saw the light. Reed’s initial solo career however passed me by as I (in a snobbish way) associated him with glam and I was off pursuing the likes of Neil Young, Poco and catching up on the adventures of The Grateful Dead. Late seventies and into the eighties I gradually discovered his work (and enjoyed Lester Bang’s on off love affair with his music). The persistence of a friend ensured that I considered Reed’s music as each album came out and to this day his Blue Mask and New York albums get regular plays. As tribute here’s a song from Coney Island Baby which that friend hopefully will understand why Blabber’n’Smoke has chosen it to commemorate one of the most influential musicians of the past 50 years.

Doug C and The Blacklisted

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They say it pays to be friendly and after getting a friendly message from Calfornian Doug Carrion inviting Blabber’n’Smoke to have a listen to some of his songs we felt it was only right that we pass this on to our readers as they’re a mighty fine listen. Carrion lists Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Dwight Yoakum and The Blasters as influences and he’s laid down some songs with his band The Blacklisted that certainly have a Bakersfield sound to them although we would add Jason and The Scorchers to this list. There’s a swagger to some of the songs with Weekend Warrior packing a punch especially when a mighty guitar solo kicks in towards the end. The five songs are available to download and there’s mention of an album in the works which we look forward to hearing.
You can listen to and download Doug C and The Blacklisted here

Doug C’s Facebook page

Hi Tech Corner

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Blabber’n’Smoke is relatively dinosaur like when it comes to listening to music. There has to be a disc, a piece of plastic that has to be inserted or placed on a machine that will convert its contents into music. That machine has to be made for playing music, a CD player or turntable (and then there’s lots of old cassettes lying around here also). We rarely listen to music on via computer and reviews that are sent as downloads are burned to disc prior to full listening. As musical primitives we’ve never gotten around to SACD and DVD-Audio so we were intrigued then when offered a Blu-ray album that promises a better sound quality than ever before. Problem is the need to hook up some speakers to a bblu-ray player or get one of those super duper woofer cinema sound things. However if the disc arives and we can play it we’ll report back. In the meantime here’s some info on these discs which come from Universal music.

High Fidelity Pure Audio is the exciting new range of physical HD audio products from Universal Music Group which uses Blu-ray technology to deliver the ultimate listening experience to the user. High Fidelity Pure Audio discs are playable through all Blu-ray devices including Blu-ray Players and games consoles, allowing the consumer to experience the sound as it was intended by the artist. No compression, no compromise. A download voucher is also included in-pack which gives the consumer a digital download of the album in MP3 format at a standard resolution ensuring they can also access their music on the move, on devices which don’t support HD audio.
Because of the increased size and bandwidth available on a Blu-ray Disc, music can be offered in its purest quality without the compression that is required for 16bit CD releases and lower resolution digital formats. Consumers have a choice of several different sound formats including PCM, Dolby True HD and DTS HD Master Audio at 2.0 and 5.1 surround sound (where available).
Universal Music Group is committed to offering high quality audio to the discerning consumer and has selected a wide range of repertoire showcasing some of the most iconic talent the music world has ever seen. Artists with releases already on the format include Amy Winehouse, Bob Marley, Nirvana, Queen, The Rolling Stones and Stevie Wonder. There is also a vast selection of classical and jazz music including Jonas Kaufmann, Rolando Villazón, John Coltrane and Oscar Peterson.

Heidi Talbot at Celtic Connections

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Another Blabber’n’Smoke favourite who’s appearing at Celtic Connections is Heidi Talbot. Irish born she was a member of America’s Cherish The Ladies before returning to the UK and hooking up (professionally and personally) with John McCusker. With a new album, Angels Without Wings, set for release she plays the Old Fruitmarket on 27th January, sharing the bill with Paul Brady. We haven’t heard all of the album yet but the four songs on display below show that she’s building on her fine 2010 debut , The Last Star which found her finding her own songwriting skills.
Angels Without Wings was recorded in the Gorbals Sound Studios with her regular team of Ian Carr (guitars), Phil Cunningham (Accordion), Michael McGoldrick (flutes/whistles) James Mackintosh (percussion), Boo Hewerdine (acoustic guitar) and Ewan Vernal (bass). It features guest spots from Mark Knopfler, King Creosote and Karine Polwart.
When we reviewed The Last Star we thought that there was a similarity in the sound and feel to Richard and Linda Thompson’s early recordings and the title song of the new album confirms this as the accordion and brass would sit easily within Hokey Pokey. When The Roses Come Again meanwhile has that heartaching quality that Linda Thompson was so good at conveying.
Proper Records have autographed copies of the album for sale at http://www.propermusic.com/product-details/Heidi-Talbot-Angels-Without-Wings-Ltd-Autographed-Edition-146125

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