Trailer Star “Black River”

Posted on by

As the world goes wonky with financial instability and summer temperatures in October (apart from Scotland where the heavens opened) Blabber’n’Smoke hunkered down in the bunker and set to listening to an album that’s been sitting on the hard drive for some time. Black River is purportedly the final album from Trailer Star, the last in a line of intriguing releases swathed in a mythology summoned from the mind of the man behind it all, Shaun Belcher, Originally Trailer Star was meant to be a legendary Berkshire bluesman who met an untimely end. As his executor Belcher was able to release a series of cassettes and CDs of his music. This culminated in a well received tribute album Moon Over the Downs where Belcher was able to corral a bunch of artists to cover his songs. Now he’s decided to draw to a close this episode with Black River stating

“This is Trailer Star’s final and exhaustive round up. All tracks recorded between 2005-2010. These are all the late great Trailer’s recorded tracks and signals the final volume in the three CD Trailer Archive series from Tstar records.”

Mythology apart the album sounds primitive, home made and home grown. The sound recalls the ambience Neil Young created with Campaigner, stripped down but chockfull of emotion. It’s intimate and ultimately very personal with songs relating to the death of Belcher’s father dominating the latter part. Much is said about the redemptive power of music and one hopes that these stark and dark tales ultimately did some good for the author.
For the listener it’s hard going at times but glory can come from misery. The canon is stuffed full of songs from disenfranchised black bluesmen, poor sharecroppers, troubled minds. Trailer Star mines the same seam as the late Skip Spence on some of the songs here. The fragility and the feeling of being on the edge of toppling over is balanced by the skeletal beauty of the songs.
The album is available in several ways, in fact the whole story of Trailer star can be read on the website where the various albums can be listened to and even on occasion downloaded. Head over there to look at the whole impressive saga.

website

Black River

Sarah MacDougall The Greatest One Alive

Posted on by

One of the finest Canadian exports of the last few years Sarah MacDougall is playing the Glasgow Americana Festival (Brel on 9th October) and luckily enough she has a brand new album that those fortunate enough to attend should be able to get their hands on. The Greatest One Alive is a tremendous little album. Small but perfectly formed its ten songs are all delightfully crafted with MacDougall’s excellent vocals well to the fore. She has a great voice, husky and tender with a slight sense of vulnerability. She also evokes, both in her writing and singing a sense of the great cold outdoors, perhaps due to her Swedish background. Despite this the album also embraces a warm and celebratory experience with a spring in the step of a piece such as Song #43. Chillier climes and notions do inhabit the less adorned songs. Permafrost with its chilling pedal steel is hypnotic while Cold Night illustrates perfectly those moments, late at night and alone when rumination and recrimination deny sleep.
There are some fine and tender musical moments throughout the album with We’re All Gonna Blow Away and The Greatest Ones Alive swelling with pride from the speakers. The opening song Sometimes You Lose, Sometimes You Win grabs you from the start with its windswept sweep where acoustic guitars and piano pile into each other achieving a degree of perfection. This ensemble playing reaches its peak on It’s a Storm! (What’s Going On?) where MacDougall and her vocal partners are assisted by some fine rumbling percussion to create some musical onomatopoeia. However the most arresting song is the one that she delivers all by herself, MMM, a terrific and tender love song.

Website

We’re All Gonna Blow Away

September Songs

Posted on by

Gwendolyn. Bright Light

A child of California, Gwendolyn first came to Blabber’n’Smoke’s attention when she released Lower Mill Road, a 2007 album recorded in Scotland with players such as Chris Drever and John McCusker. With this, her fourth album she’s left the Incredible String Band influences evident on Lower Mill Road behind and welcomed country music with open arms. With a voice that is a cross between Melanie Safka and Dolly Parton she’s joined by her regular band who play an idiosyncratic selection of instruments including found percussion and glass harmonica. Despite this the overall sound is fairly traditional and throughout the album there is an impish and infectious sense of joy. The songs range from the Bakersfield country pop sound of Tater Tots and Whiskey Shots to the Nanci Griffith like Discover Me. Ably assisted by a clutch of guests including Tony Gilkyson, Josh Grange and some of I See Hawks in LA there are snatches of fiddle and guitars, both steel and twang, popping up when one least expects it. With all of the songs written by Gwendolyn she has produced an excellent set that harks back to tradition while stamping her own quirky personality all over. Listening to this I was reminded of Michelle Shocked’s Arkansas Traveller, another album that explored country roots. Gwendolyn’s effort is just as ambitious and overall is a tremendous listen with repeated hearings unveiling new delights. Well worth checking out.
website
Bright Light

Rum Drum Ramblers. Mean Scene

At the last Pokey LaFarge and the South City Three gig in Glasgow, washboard and harmonica player, Ryan Koenig pressed into my hand this fine album. Recorded by him and fellow South City Three member, Joey Glynn (upright bass) with Mat Wilson on guitar and vocals this will delight anyone who enjoys Pokey’s blend of old time swing and blues. The vibe is essentially the same and the third member of the South City Three, Adam Hoskins appears on slide guitar. The addition of the Funky Butt Brass Band on several songs offers a more pronounced jellyroll type jazz sound while Wilson’s vocals are mellower than Pokey’s. Comparisons aside the Ramblers are indeed a mean machine with some magnificent interplay between the instruments, a sly jive talking style and an obvious love of their influences. All 12 songs are gems with the standouts being Jack and Tom, a rattling introduction to the album, If It Have To Be with its vintage sounding blues guitar licks and Do You which has a decided Michael Hurley feel to it.
Well below the radar you’ll need to go to CD baby or Amazon to buy or download this but it’s a guaranteed winner.
http://www.myspace.com/rumdrumramblers
Jack and Tom

Old Dollar Bill. Across The Tracks

When what appeared to be cash money came tumbling out of the envelope we thought that at last someone had figured out that payola should not be restricted to members of parliament. Unfortunately it was a fake dollar bill from our old friends in the east, Old Dollar Bill, the mighty Edinburgh duo of Ed Henry and Stephen Clark. Hot on the heels of their collaboration with the Wilders and Woody Pines comes this four song EP. Maintaining their expanded palette with guest musicians from the Edinburgh folk scene (Martin McQuade on double bass, Owen McAlpine, harmonica, Mairi Orr, harmony vocals and Tom McAweaney, an old, old friend of Blabber’n’Smoke on fiddle) Old Dollar Bill deliver a great little bundle of tunes that sound as if they could have been played by bunch of genuine hillbillies. Clark excels on mandolin, Dobro and banjo while Henry’s percussion and especially his use of the Cajon adds an extra layer of enjoyment to what are already fine songs.
The EP opens with Move On, a driving romp that warns of the perils of gold digging women. Bright Light is drawn from the tradition of Appalachian dirges such as Oh Death and has some spine tingling vocals and fiddle playing. Hats Off to Begg (dedicated to the late Bryan Begg, a musical compadre of the Bill) is a heartfelt tribute that has a soulful southern blues slink to it. The EP closes with The Cold Gin Waltz, an instrumental that highlights the Celtic influence on Americana and could easily have featured in a movie such as Cold Mountain.
Old Dollar Bill seem to grow in stature with each release and this one is well recommended. .
Myspace page
The offending Old Dollar Bill

Move On

Anna Coogan. The Wasted Ocean.

Posted on by

A marine biologist who grew up in New England listening to sea shanties, Anna Coogan is no stranger to the second element. The Wasted Sea, follow up to her acclaimed debut The Nocturnal Among Us is in the main a set of songs about the sea and the folk who live and die on, near or under it. A delicate album, there are no rollicking bawdy ballads here, rather forlorn tales of women awaiting the return to shore of their men or mourning those who do not return. Coogan sings beautifully and is ably supported throughout by a superb group of musicians who cosset the songs with some fine Dobro, mandolin, violin and banjo, the soft mallet drumming on the opening song, The Sons Will Join Their Fathers could almost be the waves lapping the shore.
Despite the delicacy of the playing there is plenty of emotion on show here. Coogan can sound steely, hurt, lost at times. On her fine cover of Phil Och’s epic The Crucifixion (dedicated to her father and perhaps an odd inclusion but it does feature a verse about a mariner) she builds up a righteous anger. The highlights however are Come Ashore Love, a haunting song that features Colby Sander’s Dobro and Come The Wind, Come the Rain where Coogan sings accompanied only by Eyvind Kang’s violin on a song that is the closest the album gets to a traditional folk sound.
A fine successor to her debut album, The wasted Ocean is well recommended to anyone who likes Kris Delmhhorst, Alela Diane or Rachel Harrington. She is well acquainted with Glasgow having appeared at Celtic Connections and indeed mentions this fine city in her liner notes (noting that the spark for the album was lit on a “soggy Glasgow morning). She’s appearing at Glasgow Americana on October 6th.
website
Come Ashore, Love

Hemifran Hymns From Home

Posted on by

Hemifran is a music label and distribution company based in Sweden and is responsible for marketing and shipping many of the Americana releases you read about here and on other publications. The artists they push and promote range from household names (well, in my household) to independent spirits who’ve managed to conjure up a disc’s worth of music and offered it to the world.
Like most labels Hemifran occasionally gather up a handful of tunes and paste them into what one used to call a sampler. Their two previous offerings, “I Like It Better Here – Music From Home” and “I Like It Better Here – Some More Music From Home” have featured artists such as Jackson Browne and Graham Nash along with some lesser known but at times tremendous artists. Despite their releases being chock full of contemporary acts these two discs did display an engaging love for the singer songwriter feel of the seventies and this carries on with their third in the series.
“That Thing That’s a Whole Lot Bigger Than This – Hymns From Home” is a lovingly crafted artefact based on a suggestion by Greg Copeland that the third compilation consist of “secular hymns,” or songs that “have to do with “That Thing That’s a Whole Lot Bigger Than This.” To this end we have a selection of songs that in the main delve back to the likes of Townes Van Zandt, Steve Young, Steve Goodman and others of that ilk. Copeland himself appears twice while Steve Noonan, Jack Tempchkin, JD Souther and Judy Collins all get a piece apiece. Finger picking story songs predominate with several styles on show but with the likes of I See Hawks in LA and the power pop presence of Anthony Crawford’s On The Hill this is not a simple folk album. JD Souther’s On The Day Nobody Likes You glides from a Bo Diddley beat to glossy Boz Scaggs like soul shuffle while Judy Collins offers a hymn like paean to the power of song that evokes celestial choirs.
As to the theme of secular hymns all is revealed in the liner notes where each performer explains their choice. You can read these on the Hemifran website. Better still they have very kindly offered five copies of the album to give away here. If you want a copy all you have to do is let me know via the comments below with a promise to come back and tell us what your favourite song on the album was and why. First five to respond with a cast iron promise get the album.

Hemifram
I See Hawks In LA – If You Lead I Will Follow

Mare Wakefield. Meant To Be.

Posted on by

Mare Wakefield is yet another of those talented writers and performers whose albums tumble into Blabber HQ with increasing regularity. Whether its something in the water or just plain old talent a good percentage of them have a firm grasp on what makes a good album, a good song and the chops to deliver the goods. In the pantheon of female (and this goes for the guys also) performers in the Americana field there are the stars (you know who they are), the hardy perennials who will always get a mention and then the workers at the coalface. Time and again I’m astounded and impressed by the quality of the music produced by people I’ve never heard of, who plough their own field and come up with the goods. Wakefield is yet another one of these.
Based in Nashville this is her fifth release. A vibrant and impassioned singer she can deliver straightforward confessional songs then delve into a big band arrangement with sassy horns and a great sense of swing. Wicked is one such song, deliciously salacious it conjures up rain swept neon lit passions while Red Dress has a New Orleans shuffle with stride piano. The central song on the album is About the War where Wakefield sings about her dreams of tending to wounded soldiers and of watching generals, safe behind the lines, drinking fine wines. In a brave move she allows a “long haired hippie from Galilee” to enter her dream to tell her to forgive them but the dream and the wars go on. Reading this one might think of the hippie tendency to regard Jesus as “one of them” but Wakefield avoids any such seventies mawkishness in what is really a very good song.
The album ends with the eight minutes long “bonus” of Dear J where Wakefield ditches her fine back up musicians (who include Will Kimbrough and Fats Kaplin, two musicians who seem to be appearing with increasing regularity recently). An open letter in the style of L. Cohen’s Famous Blue Raincoat it’s a wordy recollection of times spent with an old flame, some regretted, an acknowledgement that time moves on and that what was meant to be doesn’t always happen. A great end to what is really quite a fine album.

Website
Always Valentine

Mat Gibson. Forest Fire.

Posted on by

Five years ago English songwriter Mat Gibson cut a very impressive album in Philadelphia with his band The Broken Hearts. Packed full with fine guitar slinging Gibson came across as a UK equivalent of Ryan Adams at times. Since then he seemed to disappear from view until this re-emergence as a solo artist on Clubhouse Records. In the interim it appears that he spent several years in Quebec and something of the Canadian landscape (or mindscape) appears to have returned with him as Forest Fire is a set of stark, minimalist songs which sound as if they were conjured up on freezing plains with the writer isolated, miles from anywhere. The sound of the North Country (think of The Jayhawks here) also appears to have had some influence. This is most evident on Yonder Burning Tree where Gibson’s harmonica and guitar could have come straight from Hollywood Town Hall. Gibson plays all of the instruments sticking in the main to acoustic guitar with sparse accompaniment from his harp and occasional keyboards. There are some other embellishments, the slide guitar on the opening song Lord Only Knows, played by Jonathan Berry lends a plaintive air to what is an excellent song. Forest Fire drips like an icicle, a pale fire indeed as Gibson sings of seeing forest fires sending plumes of smoke into the air as he flew back from Quebec. On this elegiac song with heartrending vocals and a perfect marriage of guitar and strings Gibson’s lyrics cast a perfect light on the stress and strain and regret left behind when a relationship ends. The aeroplane metaphor is revisited in Icebergs where Gibson sings of having nowhere to land, buffeted by the forces of nature conspiring against him. An airborne version of Titanic, Gibson sings of “the band playing silently on” as the ‘plane circles endlessly.
After the glacial outpourings of the previous songs the final cut, Where Demons Go, adds some muscle with some electric guitar thrashing. Almost an exorcism after the confessional nature of what came before it Gibson asks “won’t you give me one more chance to make things right with us.” Whatever the answer there’s no doubt that that this album marks the return of a major talent to our shores and it’s to be hoped that we don’t have to wait five years for the follow-up.
Website
Lord Only Knows

Latest Blabberings

Posted on by

Here’s a few of the albums which have been rocking this joint over the past week.

Betty Soo and Doug Cox Across the Borderline: Lie to Me.

Blabber’n’Smoke first encountered Betty Soo a few months ago. Now she’s teamed up with ace guitarist Doug Cox to produce a fine, simple and superb album of covers. Soo is of Korean stock and hails from Texas while Cox is Canadian. Meeting at a guitar camp (indeed, do such things exist?) they appear to have shared a mutual admiration for Doug Sahm (whom Cox worked with) and soon Cox was touring with Soo. Together they cooked up the idea for this album wanting to share their favourite songwriters with the listener. Hence an album of songs by the likes of Loudon Wainwright, Butch Hancock, Sahm and Guy Clark along with lesser known talents such as Jeff Talmadge and Betty Elders.
Stripped back, the album features the pair on vocals with Cox’s fine resophonic guitar playing shining throughout. It’s an intimate affair, perfect for late night listening and the song selection is spot on. While the goofy country of Big Cheeseburgers (by Blaze Foley) and the bluesy Boxcars (Butch Hancock) are superb readings they excel on a pair of ballads. Betty Elders’ Light in Your Window showcases Soo’s fine clear voice while Guy Clark’s Dublin Blues ends the album on a high note.
Soo and Cox will be touring the UK in September and appear in Scotland for three dates.

website

Brothers Reid. Top of the Old Road

Brothers Reid are a band from Aberdeen who take Americana by the scruff of the neck and give it a good shake. A busy bustling band this debut might be a little muddy in its production but they have a fine line in their mixture of West Coast influenced rock with some folk influences thrown in. Starting off with Done and Dusted the harmonies and sinewy guitars hint at evenings spent listening to old Steve Miller and Moby Grape albums. Flea Circus continues in this vein but it’s the third song, Farmboy Blues which catches the listener’s ear. While it has a hint of the Grateful Dead’s country leanings the band steer it away from homage with an extended coda that has some fine guitar and strings. The outright folk embellishments on the following song City Lights come as a bit of a shock at first but are a brave reminder that the band hails from Scotland and not California. Despite that California is never far from the mind as they deliver their epic Roll On, a guitar churning slow flowing piece that sounds like it might be a killer heard live. Similarly the closing title song, a blues boogie whose harmonica parts recollect Canned Heat could have an audience on its feet yelling for more. Promising.

website

JD Malone & the Experts. Avalon

For a debut album his is a bit of a behemoth. Based in Philadelphia Malone and crew have produced a package that one generally expects from established bands. Comprising of two discs, the actual album on CD (with 13 tracks and five bonus cuts) and a DVD of them rehearsing in the studio it looks mighty impressive. Best of all however is the fact that Malone et al pull this off with no sign of filler throughout this bar the repetition of one song, Just Like New which has a “radio edit” version tacked on. Fitting perhaps as this band are nothing other than radio friendly with their version of blue collar American rock. Ringing and stinging guitars, sweet pedal steel and a rocking rhythm section back up Malone’s impassioned vocals on a series of songs that sound as familiar as hell after a few listens. The jangling intro Silver From is straight out of Earle county while the spooky Emmit Meets a Demon recalls the Byrds’ forays into swamp rock. Leave Us Alone has hints of the Jayhawks as has the Ballad of Mr. Bardo.
Covers of Creedence’s Fortunate Son (a great version by the way) and Tom Petty’s I Should Have Known It (on the DVD) show where the band are coming from. While they won’t win many awards for originality they do deserve an award for delivering this fine slice of energetic and rocking Americana.

website

Peter Stampfel and The Worm All-Stars. A Sure Sign of Something

Posted on by

Blabber’n’Smoke makes no excuses for featuring Peter Stampfel again. This Greenwich Village veteran and peer of Dylan back in the early sixties continues to amaze us with his vitality and infectious enthusiasm. His Glasgow gig back in January with Jeffrey Lewis was a sheer delight and in person he is simply astounding, a pleasure to spend a few moments with. So much so that at that gig I stumbled away without picking up a copy of the album he’s recorded with Lewis. Nevertheless of late Stampfel has been on a roll both live and in the studio and this collaboration with Dutch avant garde musicians The Worm All-Stars is a fine addition to his canon.
Stampfel met these guys when he was in Amsterdam for a screening of the Holy Modal Rounders’ documentary, Bound to Lose. Invited to perform after the screening they offered to back him up. According to Stampfel’s delightful liner notes he was so enthralled by them he invited them over to New York to rehears some songs. He then followed them back to the Netherlands to record this album.
The Worm All-Stars consist of Lukas Simonis on guitar and bass, Nina Hitz on cello and keyboards and the astonishing Alan Purves on all manner of percussion and noseflutes with all three contributing to the vocals. Although described as an avant garde noise troupe they manage to carry off a very fine old country type sound allowing Stampfel to indulge in his love of traditional Americana. Several of the songs are old traditionals while others are more recent, written by Stampfel and his compadres with one contribution from Simonis.
Of course this being Peter Stampfel this album is far from a retread of old and new folk numbers. The band add a tremendous sense of adventure and at times plain old sonic wizardry while Stampfel stamps his authority all over the piece, vocally and musically. Recalling the wild adventure that was The Holy Modal Rounders in their earlier incarnations songs like Last Chance and Peg ‘N Awl disinter the old Harry Smith Anthology sound and revive it much as Victor Frankenstein did with his creature, awesome and dangerous yet with a simple sense of wonder.
Revisiting songs from his past there is a fine version of Midnight In Paris from Have Moicy while the infamous Rounders song Fucking Sailors in Chinatown which opens the album is as anthemic as ever. This should have been on the Rogues Gallery CD spawned by the Pirates of the Caribbean movies if there were any justice. Simonis’ song, Maximum Spare Ribs is a mutant Ghostriders In the Sky with the ghostriders replaced by insurance salesmen! Time and again one is struck by the playing on this album but special mention must be given to percussionist Purves who populates all of the songs with all sorts of clutter and clatter. Stomping bass drums and skittering sticks abound with perhaps the best example being the aforementioned Last Chance where the cacophony is added to by some excellent violin screeching and fine guitar from Simonis. Stampfel and Hitz work brilliantly together on the skeletal One Will Do For Now which creaks and groans like old timber.
The album is well packaged with liner notes on all of the songs by Stampfel. He pays special mention to Shambolar, a song originally by Sherriff and the Ravels from 1958 describing it as “the Rosetta stone connecting African music, Caribbean music and doo-wop. The version here offers full rein to Purves’ percussion on a chant that could as easily have come from Paul Simon’s Graceland or an old Fugs’ record. The connection, I’m sure is there.
An added bonus to this excellent album for Scottish listeners is a hidden song at the end. Percussionist Alan Purves originally hails from Edinburgh and he provides a spoken tale, A Wee Fortune, a scatological account of a night out in Edinburgh from his youth which is darkly humorous and brings to mind a meeting of Ivor Cutler and Irvine Welsh.
Buy it here
Drunken Banjo Waltz

http://lukas.home.xs4all.nl/english/lukas.html#discography

Roundup time again

Posted on by

Been a while since I looked at some of the albums gathering dust at Blabber’n’Smoke. Here’s a few that are about to hit the shops.

First up is a fine EP from the splendidly named Water Tower Bucket Boys. Based in Portland, Oregon this four-piece string band have a sound that’s slightly off kilter from traditional bluegrass and revivalist peers. While they are able to conjure up songs that sit well within the country canon such as Pilgrim Song they add a vibraphone on R Song and on Meet Me Where the Crow Don’t Fly a typewriter provides the percussion. Despite this the overall impression is of a band who know their roots and have the musical chops to deliver. The mandolin and banjo on Pilgrim Song are excellent and Meet Me Where The Crow Don’t Fly is a brilliant stroll through a dark Americana with some devilish fiddling. In fact all five songs are well worth hearing. The band start an extensive UK tour later this month.
Website
Pilgrim Song

Fearing and White are essentially a two man super group if such a thing can be said to exist. Canadian Stephen Fearing is probably best known over here as a member of the superb Blackie and the Rodeo Kings while Belfast born Andy White has carved a fine reputation for himself over the years. The two have been writing songs together for several years but only recently managed to record any of them. Anyone familiar with either of these guys won’t be surprised by what’s on offer here. More to the point they won’t be disappointed either. The 13 songs are all well crafted and well delivered with Fearing and White playing all of the instruments and sharing vocals while percussion is ably handled by Ray Farrugia. Fearing’s guitar is the predominant instrument on several of the songs tearing big bluesy chunks out of the likes of Under The Silver Sky, a fine Blackie type song and Say You Will, a slow rolling number that could have been crafted by J.J. Cale. The remainder consists of full bodied workouts such as Mothership, a bubbling pop stew with big chords breaking the surface and acoustic based ballads with Fearing and White harmonising like brothers heard best on the fantastic What we Know Now.
All in all a fine album and well recommended if you like literate honest to god songwriting and delivery. The duo are scheduled to play in Glasgow in October.
Website
What We Know Now

The Carrivick Sisters hail from Devon and From The Fields is their fourth release. Playing guitars, mandolin, banjo and fiddle between them they veer from English folk to old time Americana across this album. They harmonise well and when they are joined on two songs by the esteemed B.J. Cole on pedal steel they achieve a sound that is not too short of sublime. Both appear to be accomplished players with some fine guitar and fiddle playing in particular featuring. Writing in a traditional field they have a fine grasp of what makes the music tick with some of the songs seeming almost to be plot summaries from the pen of Thomas Hardy. This is most to the fore on Flowers With Jamie and the spinechilling Charlotte Dymond while the title song is an acappella telling of a lovers’ tryst that ends in tragedy. With an excellent instrumental The Mouse, The Bird & The Sausage (named after a Brothers Grimm tale) included this is an impressive album that belies the sisters’ relative youth. They come to Scotland in September appearing in Edinburgh.

Website
Charlotte Dymond