September Roundup

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It’s been a bumper time at Blabber ‘n’ Smoke for albums tumbling through the letterbox. So much for the “silly season” so beloved of the press who complain that nothing much happens in August (that is, the world goes on, disasters happen but they don’t have their politicians to knock about with). Anyway, here’s a round up of what’s been rattling the walls around here.

First off some Scottish folk in the guise of Iain Thomson and Field of Dreams. Thomson is a shepherd in Mull who has now released two albums where he proves himself to be a very talented writer and a strong performer. Although the album is self released it comes beautifully packaged with a booklet where Thomson explains the origins of the songs. With a wide variety of instruments including accordion, fiddle, tin whistles and bodhran adding a traditional air and with several songs referring to local characters or history this is a great listen. Tostary, named after a ruined village on Mull is a haunting lament for the lost generations of the Highlands that evokes the beauty of the glens. Press Gang/Shouting Numbers relates an historical tale from Napoleanic times and is as fine a modern folk song as I have heard in a long time. One minor quibble is that the song, Southern Line, relating Thomson’s time as a truck driver, although fine in itself, sounds slight compared to the rest of the album.
Website
Tostary

Roy Schneider is a Florida based singer and songwriter whose album Erleichda is available to coincide with his appearance next week in the UK. A multi instrumentalist whose songs hark back to seventies country rock he is a fine purveyor of classic Americana best exemplified on Angels Along The Road. With banjo rippling away on a tale that references several touchstones including the highway and the devil this is a great song. Throughout the album very nifty finger picking, sweet violin, banjo and mandolin are all played by the man himself (who also appears to be quite an accomplished cartoonist, a veritable renaissance man indeed) and although in the long run not all of the songs stand out from the herd the overall vibe is good. Ending the album with a cover of The Grateful Dead’s Brokedown Palace just about sums it up. And finally anyone who names their album after a fictitious word dreamed up by novelist Tom Robbins is pretty cool.
Website
Angels Along the Road

Celilo hail from Portland, Oregon and their album Bending Mirrors has been around for some time but is now given a push on the back of upcoming tour dates over here. A five piece they have a sound that is often dreamy and lush. Washes of guitar and mellotron sweep over the songs but there is a skeleton of guitar and banjo underpinning this. This works best on Wy-am where the result is sublime but Sloan martin, who wrote all of the album delivers several others that are almost as good.
While there are comparisons to be made with Richmond Fontaine, Granfaloon Bus and Clem Snide Celilo manage to create their own limpid world. They are in the UK in November if any of this whets your appetite.
Website
Wy-am

From the moment the brash acoustic strumming that opens Roman Candle’s Oh tall Tree in the Ear tumbles out of the speakers you know you are in for a treat. This three piece North Carolina band offer eleven great songs with an intensity that is infectious. Oozing with melody, at times shambolic, at others rocking with a vengeance they embrace artists such as Dylan, The Drive By Truckers, Glossary and The Replacements on what is a thumping great listen. The stand out song here is, without a doubt Why Modern Radio is A-OK which has the makings of a modern classic.
Website
Why modern Radio is A-OK

J Shogren. Bird Bones and Muscle.

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From the opening bars of this album it’s clear that Shogren has a unique take on traditional American styles. “Burnt Fields” squirms and squiggles with scratchy guitar riffs and banjo on a song that sounds like a cross between David Lindley and Loudon Wainwright. The Wainwright comparison continues on the next song. “Charlie Poole, Charlie Poole” which has lashings of banjo and a great driving rhythm. “Salvation” which follows maintains this glorious banjo driven take on country blues, imagine vintage Taj Mahal souped up with a glucose jag and you’re halfway there. Mention must be given to Jalan Crossland who carries banjo duties and who flails away like a man possessed on many of the songs here.
Shogren calms things down on “ Big Blue Bird of Happiness” which is a ballad in the manner of Guy Clark while “Paper Barn” and “Wandering Foot” are couched in the singer songwriter idiom and sound as if they were forged in the Texas of the seventies.
While there is a touch of the magpie here with Shogren visiting other genres (including polka and swamp blues) he has a sure hand on the tiller throughout. The title song is a pumped up voodoo blues with some great gutbucket guitar while “Younger” is a tremendous country rock song where the banjo takes on the lead guitar part. A highlight is “Southern Isle a Pearl” which has Shogren crooning over a dreamlike backing with swooning guitar, a miniature gem.
Overall this is a fine example of someone grabbing tradition by the collar and bringing it bang up to date.
You can buy the album here

Meanwhile Salvation awaits here

Doghouse Roses. This Broken Key. (Yellowroom Records)

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This Glasgow based duo generally get rave reviews for their updated mix of Pentangle styled acoustic folk with mentions given to guitarist Paul Tasker’s debt to Bert Jansch and Iona McDonald’s vocals compared to Jacqui McShee or Sandy Denny. Well, this second full length release doesn’t betray any of the above but compared to their first release, “How’ve You Been All This Time?” there is a looser, limber approach which forsakes the strings which adorned that album and offers a basic bass, drums and keyboard framework on which to hang their wares.
While a song such as “The Rain” has that cool Pentangle jazz swing it strikes me that the overall sound is more akin to that of John and Beverly Martyn’s albums, Stormbringer and Road to Ruin. The former was recorded in Woodstock and featured a song of that name. In the same fashion there is a song called Woodstock here, the second on the album that recalls the Martyn song especially in the repeated use of the word tumble. Anyway, this song is an indication that the Roses’ sights are shifting to the Americas and this is maintained in the song “Thunder of The Dawn” which actually swings and benefits immensely from some fine organ (played by Alan Scobie). The band cooks up a storm on “Any Kind of Love” which almost has a funk going on, again courtesy of the keyboards. A jauntier side is then evidenced on “Evermore” where a banjo is added to the mix.
Throughout the album McDonald’s vocals are excellent. While perhaps not best suited to songs that let their hair down she approaches them with gusto. The overall effect is reminiscent of sixties folk singers discovering rock music which led then to some fine examples of baroque folk styles. Toward the end of the album however she shows why she is regarded so highly on a pair of songs (The Devil In Me and The Highwayman) that are simpler in structure and which allow her cool, clear, icy delivery to shine.
Overall a very worthy second album that grows in stature on repeated plays and portrays a band evolving and growing in confidence
Website here
Thunder of the Dawn

Wade Lashley. Someone Take The Wheel.

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How nice to receive a package from Flagstaff, Arizona. Seems silly perhaps but some names are really evocative of the music that dives little blogs like this. Like 50’s teenagers in a fleapit cinema, the cinematic portrait of wide open American spaces tugging at their own grey reality, rain swept Americana fans stuck in dreary old Glasgow have a yearning for places like Flagstaff, Winslow and Barstow. Vicarious, I’m sure, but there’s a little bit inside all of us who dream of driving down that fabled highway and stopping off to hear that definitive band. Not one of the big name bands but a truly authentic American bar band who can thrill and delight with tales of the road and the fabled American dream.
Wade Ashley might not be in the going to win many awards for his writing, singing and playing but if you crank this up with a few beers by your side it’s difficult to imagine a better travelling companion when you’re on the road. Full blooded country rock with lashings of guitar and heart-warming organ, Lashley sings and writes with the attitude of country outlaws from the past, Waylon Jennings in particular comes to mind.
The opening song “Turn around Southbound” is a terrific start, cards on the table, muscular, take no prisoners. The jalop that is “Coffee, Tea or Whiskey” soars along while “Someone Take the Wheel” is like a movie, wide screen and deadly. The keyboard/guitar interplay here is exhilarating and at times achieves the hights reached by The Band all those years ago. Allowing you to catch your breath there are songs like “Waiting on the Rain” with majestic piano playing which evokes another blast from the past in the shape of the Allman Brothers. By this point Lashley is in full command, his singing in particular and he pounds this home with a spectacular song “I Won’t Let You Down” which sounds almost like an outtake from Derek and the Dominoes.
All in all it’s unlikely that this crew will appear at your local tavern but if you fancy a night imagining you’re tooling down route 66 then this might well be the perfect soundtrack.
Wade’s webite is here
and here’s a taste, I Won't Let You Down

Daniel Hertzov, Believing.

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Denizens of Glasgow’s acoustic music scene will probably know of Daniel Hertzov, a Russian born, USA raised citizen of this fair city. Now there’s an opportunity to take him home after a gig with the release of this, his debut album. Fairly divided between acoustic songs and band based rockers, the former are the more successful with some of the latter approaching typical bar band boogie status (Savior, for example). However there are moments when Hertzov, backed with full band and a most impressive Hammond organ does capture a fairly glorious sound such as in “Mosaic.”
The acoustic based songs are a different matter with Hertzov capturing elements of early seventies singer songwriters. Cat Stevens comes to mind on the opening, title track while on “6 years,” a simple acoustic guitar and vocal delivery is similar to the style of Andy Roberts of the late lamented Liverpool Scene and Plainsong. Romantic, melodic and well delivered it is one of the highlights here. “Shelter “skelps along with mandolin predominating adding a folksy swing to the album. Finally “Trust the River” bridges the two styles, a piano ballad which flows like the titular waterway, this is a fine song which could be on any number of accomplished albums from the mid seventies, again with some fine Hammond organ there is a touch of classic Traffic here.
A trip to his excellent website is highly recommended, not only to buy the album but to see his whimsical musings.
6 Years

Kacey Cubero. “Fill Your Cup”

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A welcome addition to that select group of female performers who fuse sultry vocals with bluesey country rock, Kasey Cubero is indeed, on the strength of this album, almost up there with Kathleen Edwards, Lucinda Williams and Sarah Borges. The twelve self penned songs are all impressive and while one or two of them may sound like Sheryl Crow circa “All I Wanna Do” (impressive enough I think) there are several here which are superb both in the writing and in the delivery. With a brace of immediately attractive radio friendly songs such as “It’s Alright” and “I Want More” (a tremendous song which conjures up the freewheeling wide open vistas that drive all great American rock songs) Cubero scores high. Add to that the slow burning sensual delight that is “Under my Skin” and the sweet pedal steel of “Fill Your Cup” and this record does indeed burrow under your skin.
While there are some detours into acoustic blues with “Two Trains” and “Old Cadillac” overall the sound is a burnished, streamlined classic Americana with guitarist Josh Davis excelling throughout with some fine spine tingling moments.
For a relatively unknown artist this is an exceptionally assured album. Ms. Cubero is coming to the UK shores later this year, check the website for details in the meantime here is Under My Skin

The Fox Hunt, Classic Grand, 17th July.

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Well, as threatened, this West Virginia band whipped up a storm on this, the last night of their tour. And yes, they played Plastic Jesus. The audience, some of whom had followed them over from their dates in Ireland lapped it up.
I’ve written a full review which will come up elsewhere but here are some pics of the gig.
The band going home

Sean Taylor “Walk With Me “

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It’s a bit like looking for crabs in rock pools, you find tiny little ones scuttling for cover and after a while you don’t bother to put them in your bucket. If you’re lucky however a large rock, pulled back, uncovers a magnificent specimen, large, fierce, a trophy to show to others. And so it is with this gig, lots of albums, often self released, nice, fair to middling, and then occasionally a trophy, something to shout about, this is one such specimen.
Sean Taylor resides in Kilburn but you wouldn’t guess that from his music. His voice is a strained, astringent murmur that is seductive and at times approaches the cool burr of J. J. Cale. His previous albums have been in the main singular affairs with Taylor playing all the instruments, here he handles the guitars and keyboards and is assisted by a stellar cast of musicians including B. J. Cole on pedal steel and Trevor Hutchinson on bass. Together they produce an album that is as comforting as a cup of Horlicks, warm, soporific, something to wallow in. There are love songs, ranging from the hushed “For You” with its tender saxophone evoking lonely rainy nights to the opening spare ballad “Perfect Candlelight” where voice and piano create an almost perfect tenderness.
Elsewhere Taylor evokes the lasciviousness of latter day Tim Buckley on “So High” and takes on a Shakespearean sonnet, “Love Hate On” which he turns into a lazy stroll with a beautiful string accompaniment. Likewise he takes the traditional “She Moves Through the Fair” and turns it into a sinister, doom-laden lament.
Best of all is “Hold On,” a sultry, sweaty and sexy longing that bundles all of Taylor’s influences into one of the best songs I’ve heard in a while. Worth buying for this alone.
Here’s Hold On
Website here

Full Tonne Kidd

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While much of Scots Americana pays homage to the likes of The Byrds and Alex Chilton with twelve strings jangling and melodies oozing with power pop chords some newer bands are looking elsewhere for their inspiration. This is probably most evident with the latest “next big thing,” Kassidy, who namecheck the Laurel Canyon sound as a primary influence. In a similar vein Full Tonne Kid, hailing from that small piece of America that is Bellshill, have a freewheelin’ acoustic blues based sound that owes more to the likes of Steve Stills and Delaney and Bonnie than Big Star. Country blues and gospel influences are well to the fore on their forthcoming EP which showcases five songs that recall the halcyon days of blue eyed hippies getting back to the country and their country roots.
A four piece consisting of Gary Carmichael and Colin Fullerton on vocals and guitars, Bryan Ferrie, bass and David Stone on drums they have a wicked sense of humour if you read their bios on their website where they create some fantastical forebears. Proof of the pudding however is in the music and this is delivered with a confident swagger. With vocals that recall Sal Valentino from Stoneground, muscular and ingrained with a Southern soul feel, Carmichael and Fullerton sing with feeling, you would never imagine these guys don’t live in Louisiana or some such place. The guitars snarl and slide to great effect and from the countdown that introduces “A Stranger” to the final notes of “Tell My Woman” this is a nice slice of country rock. The standout song is “Catch Me if You Can” where some excellent harmonica and a swamp driven beat proves that you don’t have to come from the South to have the bayou blues.
Have a look at the band here, the EP will be available there soon. In the meantime here’s Catch Me if You Can
Full Tonne Kid are playing at The Belhaven, Wishaw, on August 7th and at Glasgow’s 13th Note on the 14th August.

Howe Gelb & A Band of Gypsies. Alegrias

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As the mainstay of Giant Sand Howe Gelb has slowly, over the past twenty years or so, built up a reputation as one of the stalwarts of what we call Americana. Whether with the shifting line up of Giant Sand or solo he has blistered, strummed, crooned and goofed around on over thirty albums. His star shone most brightly however with the release of ‘Sno Angel, an album recorded in Canada with a gospel choir that garnered rave reviews and exposed him, however briefly, to a wider audience. The album was a mixture of familiar old songs and some new ones but the relatively straightforward renditions (by Gelb standards) showed him to be a great writer and performer.
Five years on and he’s done it again, this time in Cordoba, Spain with a cast of gypsy (their description) musicians. The flashing guitars, flamenco stylings and sheer brio enhance another brace of songs from his back catalogue that is wildly exuberant and brimful with an effortless sense of cool. The overall feel is of an informal “juerga, where flamenco musicians jam together enjoying the music and each other’s company and according to the press this is what happened when Gelb stumbled across these musicians essentially flamenco star Raimundo Amador’s group. While many folks notion of flamenco is that of The Gypsy Kings’ flamboyant Bamboleo, this is a more measured, slower, sexier traditional sound, not too far removed from the Mexican influences which abound in Gelb’s home town of Tucson.
The reworkings of songs such as Uneven Light of day, Always Horses Coming and Where The Wind Turns The Skin Into Leather are recognisable as Giant Sand songs but the loose limbed renditions evoke lazy sunny siestas, mañana made musical. Gelb’s voice has never sounded better, weathered smooth into a sexy, sultry croon. Along with the remakes there are several new songs written in Cordoba, none better than Broken Bird & The Ghost River. This beauty floats and shimmers with a female chorus that evokes the best of sixties Euro pop.
All in all this should be the album of the summer, heard in pavement cafes and town squares and on a hi-fi near you.
Alegrias means “joy,” you can read a great interview with Gelb here where he describes the genesis of the album and you can buy it here
Broken Bird and the Ghost River