Blabber’n’Smoke had a very pleasant afternoon at the official launch for this years Scottish Mental Health Arts & Film Festival (SMHAFF) which takes place from 10th until the 31st October. It’s the tenth anniversary of this ground breaking festival which uses various artistic platforms (including theatre, film, spoken word, dance and music) to promote the importance of mental health issues for all in the community while drawing attention to the struggles and successes of people living with mental ill heath. With over 300 events across Scotland this year’s festival is the biggest yet with submissions for the International Film Competition reaching over 1,600 entries with the winners to be announced at the awards ceremony on 11th October at Glasgow’s CCA.
In terms of music the big news from this years festival is actually a play, the first commissioned by the festival, written by award winning playwright Alan Bissett. One Thinks Of It All Is A Dream is an account of Syd Barrett’s brief tenure in Pink Floyd before he was ousted due to his erratic behaviour. A brief preview I attended some month’s back had a scene with Barrett being taken by his band chums for a consultation with RD Laing, a plan scuppered by Syd refusing to leave their car. The play looks at the then attitudes to mental health and Barrett’s reputation thereafter. Was he a “casualty,” a victim of drug use, a sane man in an insane world? The play will be performed in Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen throughout the festival while there is a 70th birthday tribute to Barrett hosted by music journalist Nicola Meighan which will feature the writer Alan Bisset, broadcaster and Barrett historian John Cavanagh and Barrett’s nephew Ian Barrett. A multimedia event it will feature discussion and insight into Barrett’s work along with video and artwork from Barrett.
One Thinks Of It All As A Dream
Elsewhere Rick Redbeard and Admiral Fallow are appearing while there are various events across the country featuring local music groups and a showcase at Glasgow’s Barrowland in conjunction with Music On Prescription and Nordoff Robbins Scotland for unsigned bands.
As for the launch itself, aside from introductions to various strands of the festival, the attendees were entertained with a couple of songs from Rick Redbeard and were greatly amused by the excellent performance poet Harry Giles.
Back in June Blabber’n’Smoke reviewed an EP, Got Me Singing The Blues, from a band called Starship Nicola and we were able to catch them live at the release show a few weeks later. Information about the band was fairly limited, a collaborative effort between Glasgow band Harry & The Hendersons and a chap called AJ Meadows, an American apparently. We were impressed enough to pursue the enigmatic Meadows in order to find out some more about the man who wrote the startling Ella, a song we likened to Dave Crosby singing with The Incredible String Band. Turns out he’s a polymath; an artist, sculptor, musician and writer and he is from The States and is a bit of a globetrotter. Back in Glasgow for a few weeks Meadows took some time out to talk to Blabber’n’Smoke about his work, the band and his future plans. We started off by asking him to tell us about his background, his art training and how he got involved in making music.
I was born in Michigan, USA but grew up in the south, travelling back and forth between Mississippi and North Carolina completing a course of study at Mississippi State University, graduating with a BFA in sculpture in 2009. I first came to Glasgow in 2011 after just finishing a year of study at the University of North Carolina in order to study on the Masters of Fine Art course at the Glasgow School of Art. Since completing the Masters course at GSA I have been quite lucky to be able to continue making my work. I’ve recently been in several exhibitions across Italy and currently have a large-scale sculpture on display at Franconia Sculpture Park back in the States. When did I first get involved with music? I remember I was 12 years old, and I was getting ready for school and just heading out the door to catch the bus, when my father stopped me….told me I wasn’t going to school that day. In a mixed state of confusion and sheer pleasure, we hopped in his red Chevy pick-up and drove an hour into the nearest town. We pulled into the parking lot of an old pawnshop, and before we went in he said that I could pick any guitar I wanted. We came home that day with an old Yamaha 6 string.
Can I ask where or why you got the name Starship Nicola for the band?
There is a bit of a back-story to its origin. I forget offhand the events that led up to that day, but on the 19th of November 2014 I flew into Dublin to meet an amazing woman who had a 50 ft long wooden vessel that was in need of repair. The boat was docked in West Cork and in exchange for lodging on board and several hot meals a day it was agreed that I would utilise what carpentry skills I had and provide four hours maintenance every day. She and her partner also had a house in Dublin that I agreed to paint. So I would visit on the weekends and the train into town would announce the stops in Irish, one of them sounding like “Starship Nicola”. I couldn’t shake it. Anyway, Anne, the woman with the boat, had a sister who was romantically involved with a producer, by the name of Billy who had a little recording studio above his garage up in Donegal. Anne mentioned Billy in passing, and her willingness to put me in contact with him to say thank you for the work I was doing. I didn’t hesitate, something felt very right. I phoned him and he agreed to have me in the studio for 3 days.
And is that where the EP was recorded?
Yes. I think it’s important to say that at this point I was already planning to record some material that I had been sitting on. The Starship Nicola EP itself wasn’t entirely pre-meditated, my original plan was to visit Billy on my own and record a very simple album with a similar to feel to Nebraska. One song I knew I wanted to record was Ella, but I was listening back to recorded versions and something was missing and that’s when I contacted Harry (of the Hendersons). I asked him if he and the guys would be interested in coming over to Donegal in 2 weeks time to perform on the album. I had first met Harry &The Hendersons at Stereo sometime back in 2013. I was in a three piece folk outfit and we were their support act. I actually met Vincent, one the singers for H&TH’s, at the Art School just weeks before that gig. I was just finishing the Masters course and he was just coming in as an undergraduate and I was assisting a course that was intended to help prepare the student portfolios for review. We talked about all kinds of whatnots, music came up, he mentioned the gig and not having support and I cheekily said I would do it. Anyway, they were onboard for coming to Donegal and then I phoned my friend Mark Gilbert who I had busked and played several shows with in the previous year, and he also agreed. I then phoned Billy to tell him that seven more members were coming to his studio garage. He laughed and said ok.
It all seems like a fortunate example of happenstance. The line up really gels on the EP and at the live show there was a great sense of camaraderie but I get the sense that this is but one phase of the Starship’s evolution, that you and The Hendersons are not the only incarnation you envisage.
Whether or not the line up is finalised? I think the answer lies somewhere in the unknown, tucked somewhere between a no and a resounding yes. I don’t think we ever really meant to become a band. It was something very special and spontaneous, and perhaps it is best to continue to approach it as such.
On the EP you do a version of Wildwood Flower, do you listen to much old time Americana? What artists/music do you listen to and what have been your influences?
I go through exclusive stages with music. What I mean by that…when I come across an album that affects me in some way I tend to give it my full attention, almost obsessively. Take for instance my iTunes library, Paul Simons’ album “Graceland” has 120 listens, The Bad Seeds “Abattoir Blues” and Radiohead’s “Hail to the Thief” are both in their 53rd rotation, and “24 Postcards in Full Colour” by Max Richter is on its 86th play. There is a wonderful compilation of Ethiopian music called “The Very Best of Ethiopiques” that I am listening to at the moment. As a child I was of course introduced to the rock classics, but more importantly the likes of Willie Nelson, Emmylou Harris, and the more playful Ricky Skaggs, Cajun Moon to this day is one of my favourite songs. But it wasn’t until after high school that I began to appreciate and understand the importance of earlier Americana. When I was 19 I was gifted the Anthology of American Folk Music, a compilation of 80 or so folk and blues tracks from the 1920’s and 30’s. It was an easy introduction to the roots of a genre of music I loved but my knowledge of which at the time didn’t expand past The Carter Family.
Influences for writing music go far beyond the actual music I listen to though it is an integral part of the songwriting process. I tend to document in detailed writing the happenings and goings-on of my immediate surroundings and encounters with real people. These writings are almost always the source for the lyrical composition of my songs. When the time is right to compose a song I don’t sit down with a pen and paper. I sit down with the dozens of journals I have kept over the years and I read them using lines taken directly from the pages and allowing the song to develop in an intuitive manner. I don’t try to force a meaning. The meaning behind the song is secondary. The colour is important. Colour is feeling.
Can you talk us through Ella? It’s a captivating song with some tremendous harmonies but it twists and turns quite a bit before the choral ending.
Thank you Paul. Ella is actually the first track off the EP. Sometimes a song, an object, or even a smell can become fixed to a memory. I had Ella Fitzgerald’s “You Got Me Singing the Blues” on repeat for about a year. I would make dinner, put the record on, and it never failed. No matter what was happening around me and in my life, she was still singing the blues. My song Ella tells a story, with the first four verses speaking of loss, and the dangers of living life to someone else’s standards. The very end of the song, where we build the voices into a wall of sound is the manifestation of memory…a heartfelt version of Ella’s classic song. When I showed Ella to the guys for the first time it was the night before we were meant to be recording and though we had shared the same bill, we had never actually played music together. And I think this is why the song works so well, how it is able to maintain this sort of honesty and rawness.
Got Me Singing The Blues EP artwork
What about future plans for recording or playing live?
There are actually several recordings currently in the works. Alongside a handful of demos we’ve started as Starship Nicola, Mark and I are going forward with a short concept album. At its root are seven songs written during my stay in Glasgow all revolving around and questioning this idea of “home”. Mark is an incredibly talented musician and has supplemented the tracks with layered violin harmonies as well as gentle synthesizer. Various recorded sound samples can also be heard throughout. It’s currently 22 minutes in length, and has the potential to continue to grow. We are hoping to finish and release it in the next month or so.
At the moment I am working with Chris Blackmore of Holy Smokes Records to line up a small Scottish tour, a handful of shows that would potentially start here in Glasgow in October. Future live shows, for now, would logistically be few and far between simply because of visa regulations but I don’t think this is going to stop us. There is already talk of playing across Europe next summer and bringing Starship Nicola to America in 2018.
You’ve got a blog called Temporary lovers which is populated with fairly gnomic thoughts and memories. Have you any thoughts about publishing any writing, short stories or such?
The blog loosely chronicles the development of Starship Nicola and highlights each of the members. It takes its name from the idea I mentioned earlier about the accidental nature of the band and it being special and spontaneous, but goes beyond the scope of the music. It is stark social commentary. I’m actually waiting to release the final post for Temporary Lovers. I intend to publish the writings in small quantity just as a record of our time together.
Outwith Temporary Lovers, I am collaborating with a good friend of mine. His illustrations are amazing, quite unsettling. It’s my hope to put out a short illustrated novella, a playful mix of fiction and personal memoir. It is nearly complete, so I anticipate this coming to fruition quite soon.
So there we go, a sneak peek into the world of AJ Meadows and Blabber’n’Smoke will try to keep track of those future plans. In the meantime you can catch up on Starship Nicola goings on here and read Temporary Lovers here.
Harry & The Hendersons in the meanwhile are fundraising for their debut album and are playing a show this Sunday at Broadcast in Glasgow, details here
It’s been some time since Peter Bruntnell ventured north of the border with a band and news of this gig had veteran supporters salivating at the prospect. Bruntnell, hailed by The Guardian recently as an “alt country genius” in their cult heroes column is a superb performer solo, his songs, described in that same Guardian article as “classically constructed, melodically rich, lyrically ingenious and emotionally, intellectually affecting…,” delivered by his gentle voice and guitar playing always win over audiences. The prospect of a band show and in the sweaty and confined cellar of The 13th Note however was a dream come true for several of the audience as Bruntnell and his band line ups have been known to achieve heights that recall the best of the crunchier power pop rockers and even Neil Young’s psychedelic guitar work outs. Tonight he and his band did not disappoint. The four piece (Bruntnell on guitar, David Little, guitar, Peter Noone, bass and Mick Clews on drums) stormed through a set that showcased several songs from the excellent Nos Da Comrade and cherry picked several highlights from the back catalogue. The intimacy of the small venue (a shame really as Bruntnell truly deserves a larger audience) allowed the crowd an experience that was at times transcendental, a rock’n’roll nirvana.
With the guitars cranked up they launched into the chunky rhythm of Ghost Dog with Little already burning on his solos before a wall of sound was launched from the stage on the perfect power pop of Fishing The Floodplain, gears shifting smoothly leading up to a glorious chiming conclusion. London Clay, a song that was only briefly available via the ‘net continued in a similar vein, glorious harmonies and sun dappled pop with chiming guitars recalling the likes of The Lemonheads at their best but this was topped by the guitar refrains of Long Way Down From A Cloud which recalled The Byrds’ reappropriation of Bach. All glorious so far but the band were well able to swerve into darker territory with Where The Snakes Hang Out a powerful slow groove and the brooding epic of Yuri Gargarin a slow burning extravaganza of guitar workouts and pedal effects that was hypnotic in its burnished twists and turns, Bruntnells’ whispy vocals floating over the mesh of amplified strings and the propulsive rhythm section.
While well able to channel the guitar carnage of Neil Young and Crazy Horse Bruntnell is a master of melodic rock displayed tonight on the brisk delivery of City Star and on two songs which are perhaps his best known, songs which probably are responsible for his inclusion in that alt country label mentioned by that Guardian article. Here Come The Swells and By The Time My Head Gets To Phoenix are superior examples of UK Americana and tonight this was amplified by the inclusion of Iain Sloan (from support band The Wynntown Marshals) on pedal steel adding another dimension to the band. Hearing Sloan step into the shoes of Eric Heywood was a bonus, his pedal steel woven into the golden tapestry of both songs as Bruntnell took the opportunity to offer some pithy comments on Swells while Phoenix was just majestic, the guitars racked up for an astonishing finish. Coming to a conclusion there was a fine display of sonic wizardry (replacing the studio sitar effects) in the run up to Cold Water Swimmer which metamorphed into a shimmering white noise barrage before the punk infused thrash of Peak Operational Condition saw the band exit on a high.
The conditions were right, the band was right and the audience were rightly rewarded for their recognition of one of our “unknown heroes.” Do spread the word.
There was a fine bonus tonight in the shape of the supporting act, a two man version of The Wynntown Marshals featuring that man Iain Sloan on pedal steel and acoustic guitar with singer Keith Benzie, also on guitar. While the full Marshals line up is a clamorous vision of high end rock and country tonight the pair stripped back some of their songs, sieving the nuggets from their usual melodic mayhem, allowing Benzie full accord as an excellent singer and lyricist. Moby Doll carried a sense of ennui heightened by the pedal steel stylings while Low Country Comedown was a creamy country laden ballad and The Submariner was given a fine country lope. Curtain Call saw Sloan switch to acoustic guitar for this poignant tale and its deadly denouement, deliciously delivered by the pair. Their rendition of Red Clay Hill really allowed the lyrics to shine as it came across like an earthbound version of Jimmy Dale Gilmore’s Did you ever see Dallas from a DC-9 at night? while their closing song The End Of The Golden Age was just sublime, Benzie in fine vocal form with Sloan harmonising excellently on a song that is on a par with the Jayhawks.
Husband and wife team Rob and Sarah Skinner have an enviable reputation to trade on, feted by country and blues audiences with awards for their albums and Sarah’s saxophone playing. Their bluesy side was to the fore on their last release, the warts and all Live At The Blue Lamp but on Behind The Wheel they seem to have settled on a more bucolic, almost folksy approach.
They kick off with the rousing title track which offers Sarah opportunity to display her Dixieland like soprano sax on a song which woozily wanders along at a fair clop as they sing about the joys of life on the road. A fine opener the one complaint here is that it fades out far too soon, just as Sarah is letting loose on the sax. It’s one of two up tempo numbers here, the remainder a collection of contemplative songs that are complemented by Rob’s guitar skills as ripples of strings float throughout, at times gilded by the floating sax solos, a style used to best effect on the dreamy Home Sweet Home. The Other Half is a boudoir piece, the couple swapping verses in an intimate fashion but Eleanor Joan is very much a showcase for Rob, his psychedelic guitar buzzing away behind his acoustic picking as he sings this render song, Sarah’s voice closely harmonising. The Inspiration is a stark piece, piercing harmonica and stinging guitar reflecting a hopelessness that’s contained within the lyrics despite the allowance that the experiences might become, as the title says, an inspiration.
A pity then that the mood that’s built up so far is somewhat spoiled by the horn driven Bad Apple, a song that probably works well live and is surely an opportunity for Sarah to wig out (as she does here) but in comparison to the other songs it doesn’t really carry any heft. Hurrah then for the almost medieval Thoughts Of the Past which is an ode to the past glories of a woman who’s life is now counted by the glasses of wine she can get hold of. Daybreak and a reprise of Eleanor Joan close the album, the former a lengthy narrative that switches courses as it twists and turns in its capture of various predawn happenstances before launching into an extended display of guitar dexterity and saxophony.
Sadly Blabber’n’Smoke is not familiar with Tim Easton’s previous output so we weren’t sure what to expect from this release. The title apparently is a nod to Easton’s wish to “prod a fork in the somewhat predictable Americana format,” whether he succeeds is essentially down to the listener but over the eight songs here he certainly offers a tasty selection of various dishes. What became clear from our research prior to writing this review is that Easton has a wealth of experience behind him. Aside from an impressive back catalogue on various labels he spent seven years way back in the nineties busking around Europe, taking advantage of the fall of the USSR to visit countries which were no longer blocked by the iron curtain. He recently completed a project to play 100 songs in 100 days, the fruits of which can be found on YouTube and he’s an entertaining (and engaging writer) with his blog well worth reading while he his account of watching the Rolling Stones’ gig in Cuba this year is excellent, his experience of present day Cuba given more space than the concert. All told he seems like a real nice guy.
Happily, American Fork does not dispel this notion. While Easton easily inhabits several skins here, the opening song Right Before Your Eyes a slinky rock’n’soul gumbo with Little Feat roots that eases one into the album, he lays out a manifesto of sorts on the excellent follow up, Killing Time. A cool country styled call to arms with Easton proclaiming, “I say Rock & Roll can still change the world, so don’t let your life be wasted on you. Don’t hang there like a broken door. Find out what you’re living for. There has to be something more than just killing time,” the song paves the way for what is to follow as he asks is there more to life than “Just to get up and go to work and eat your American Pie with your American Fork?” It’s a wonderful song, Easton vocally reminiscent of Nick Lowe while the female harmonies summon up Leonard Cohen’s oeuvre while the guitars are as creamy as a Nashville cat.
Having set out his manifesto Easton gleefully swings into blues territory on Elmore James, a rousing salute to old-fashioned “fun and games songs” and their seductive effect before Gatekeeper’s sinister flick knife slide guitar glissandos hover into view. Burning Star is a burnished night time revelry beautifully played and arranged with Easton’s voice acrobatic and intense. The bouncy power pop of Alaskan Bars Part 1 again recalls Nick Lowe when he was hefting bass with Cooder and Hiatt in the ill-fated Little Village although it’s more akin with that trio’s work on Hiatt’s Bring The Family album. Easton tones it down for the remaining songs. Now Vs. Now a slowly swelling capture of memories, dreams and wishes, the organ washes offering the song a Band like majesty while the closing On My Way is a pared back offering to his daughter, its gentle shuffle replete with keening pedal steel.
Last we heard from Betse Ellis, the firecracker fiddle player of The Wilders, was on her fine solo album High Moon Order (which we reviewed here ), an album that portrayed her very fine skills in the world of traditional American music while dipping its toes into more contemporary waters as on her cover of The Clash’s Straight To Hell. On River Still Rise she’s teamed up with banjo player Clarke Wyatt for an entertaining journey of sorts through traditional and old time songs and tunes, their band name and the album title deliberately recalling the exploring duo of Lewis & Clark as the duo carry out their own explorations.
With Ellis on fiddle, viola and vocals and Wyatt on banjos and cello they provide a conduit to the past, the music here (aside from three originals) plucked from a canon that includes the Child Ballads, Charlie Poole, Clarence Ashley and the still with us centenarian Violet Hensley. These old songs and tunes are rearranged by Ellis and Wyatt with brio, there’s a vitality and a sense of fun that prevents the album from becoming a history lesson although part of the enjoyment here is in actually reading the history of the songs and to this end there are extensive notes on the selections available here . While the pair can easily let loose on songs such as Diamond Joe, Take A Drink On Me and the rollicking Rolling River (with Betse’s vocals whoopin’ away) elsewhere there’s an elegiac grandeur, a reverential nod to those pioneers who created such great music in such hard times. This is probably most evident on the pair of tunes associated with Ms. Hensley, Jericho and Fill My Way With Love, the former almost a chamber piece, delicate and awe inspiring.
There are pieces which will be familiar to folk such as Fair and Tender Ladies, Requiem For Little Sadie and the John Hartford inspired The Quail Is A Pretty Bird, others much more obscure but each and all a delight. With occasional support on upright bass and guitar from the band Brushy Creek Betse & Clarke sail through the album with aplomb, keeping tradition alive. Overall the album is an essential purchase for anyone interested in old time mountain (and river) music.
River Still Rise is available now and Betse & Clarke are currently on tour in Ireland, dates here.
Blabber’n’Smoke is mighty pleased to report that My Darling Clementine (Michael Weston King and Lou Dalgleish) are returning to Scotland in September, their first dates here since their successful stint at last year’s Edinburgh Fringe where they performed their Americana mystery tale, The Other Half with crime writer Mark Billingham. An intriguing blend of Billingham’s narratives about characters whose lives revolve around a small time bar in a small time town and My Darling Clementine’s songs the show and accompanying album (review here) were acclaimed and the trio performed the show across the UK until the end of last year. While plans are afoot for their next album My Darling Clementine are playing six dates in Scotland starting in Edinburgh on 6th September and two of the shows (Glasgow and Stirling) will feature Billingham as they again perform The Other Half. You can read about the genesis of this multi media show in this interview from last year.
On the recording front My Darling Clementine confirm that they are recording their next album which will be one step removed from the classic country duet style that informed their debut How Do You Plead? and its follow up, The Reconciliation. There were hints of a more Memphis based sound on some of the songs on the latter and on the new album, provisionally entitled The 3rd and Final Testament, the pedal steel and fiddle give way to horns and funky guitar, more Delaney & Bonnie than George & Tammy apparently. With a due date of March 2017 we can only patiently await the release but in the meantime the tour offers the opportunity to see the pair who have, according to Country Music People, recorded the “greatest UK country record ever made”
Not a new release but one that was new to Blabber’n’Smoke when we encountered Les Johnson at a house gig a few weeks ago (which you can read about here). We were very impressed by Johnson on the night, his baritone vocals and seam of dark humour impressive and both are present and correct on the 12 songs contained on 15 Hands, his debut album. Equally impressive are the settings for his songs, in the main delivered by The Shiverin’ Sheiks, a glorious time capsule of reverbed rockabilly, Cash like boom chicka boom and shimmering Tin Pan Alley melodrama with a hint of Joe Meek weirdness. Johnson croons and slowly burns his way through his set of songs with an easy authority equally at ease with the unabashed romanticism of Break Your Heart, a real tear jerker that sits up there with the best of Richard Hawley, the soul stirring country gospel of Beckon Me To The Light and the Celtic lilt of Sweet Promises.
For a man who says he never wrote a song until he was 46 Johnson certainly has a way with words, his more straightforward lyrics packed with arresting couplets such as the chorus on the stumblebum lament Small Time Big where he sings “Oh My Lord you made me your son, I got a god but you’re not the one. No, money is the one I want, ‘cos I ain’t got none, yet.” The aching ballad Someone Who Cares rivals Kris Kristofferson with its descriptions of a troubled man as Johnson sings, “And you can walk wide and slipslide but you still ain’t able to move. With the evil and deeds done to you, you got nothin to lose.” This version of Kristofferson of course would be overweight in a soiled gold lame suit searching for the searchlight in a seedy Vegas nightclub. Elsewhere Johnson’s dark humour is evident as on the title song’s tale of a cowboy’s love of his horse which may go beyond the platonic, at the very least he advises, “Don’t fuck with my baby, she’s fifteen hands.” The Morning After (The Night It All Came Down) is a homoerotic vision of comradeship in the face of adversity while Silver Suit complete with cheesy organ trimmings is an over the top obituary, Elvis in his cups, that celebrates a fallen idol whose showbiz career goes to pot when a man catches fire at the front of his house.
At his best Johnson reminds one of the garish karaoke weirdness of Dean Stockwell channelling Roy Orbison in Blue Velvet but we need to mention the most Scottish song contained here, the wonderful duet with Katie McArthur that is Dear Marvin. Here Johnson and McArthur inhabit George Jones and Tammy Wynette as played by Rab C Nesbitt and his wife Mary Doll, she singing “I’m gonna brain you Marvin” as she lists his defects, he, a Govan Zen master, accepting his fate.
A grand album then and if you’re quick off the mark you can catch Les Johnson tonight as he is appearing at Glasgow’s Broadcast, information here.
Glaswegian Martha L Healy recorded her fine debut album Better Days in Nashville and is soon heading back over there for an extended stay in anticipation of album No. 2. In the meantime she has brought a little bit of Nashville over to Glasgow in the form of this four song EP which was recorded “on a cold January weekend” at La Chunky Studios with producer Johnny Smillie. The EP, two original songs and two covers, features Healy in fine voice, gutsy and with just the right amount of high and lonesome yearning, accompanied by Rebecca Brown on fiddle, Sean Thompson, banjo and David O’Neill on double bass with backing vocals from Paul Healy.
The acoustic set up (and excellent playing) allows Healy’s voice to shine, tackling the Patsy Cline standard Walkin’ After Midnight excellently, her bluesy inflections mirrored well by Brown’s fine fiddle. Likewise on Hank Williams’ I Saw The Light where she and the band sound as if they’re veterans of The Grand Ole Opry, Healy in effervescent Gospel mode over the string band jubilations. Of her own songs, Too Much Time (co-written with Paul Healy) is a reflective piece that recalls the likes of Gretchen Peters or Mary Chapin Carpenter with the band creating a sumptuous and sweetly flowing backdrop. Speaking of Gretchen Peters we know that Healy was a participant in the recent song writing workshops held by the award-winning songstress recently in Edinburgh. Hearing a song like Too Much Time one wonders why as Ms. Healy here manages to encapsulate an artist’s dilemma wonderfully, melody and hooks and all. Joking aside the EP’s title song, To Be Free, does portray Healy as an excellent writer and performer with the song able to stand tall alongside creations from Dolly Parton and Loretta Lynn. Here the band head into Appalachian Carter Family territory as Healy rails devotional and defiant, her voice as vibrant as her Nashville heroines, a staggeringly good song.
As we said earlier Ms. Healy is heading back to Nashville for a while but there’s a chance to catch her in concert this Thursday at the EP launch at Glasgow’s Glad Cafe. On this form it’s sure to be a great night. Tickets here
Two years back Tildon Krautz came into my life via an intricate, delightful and slightly mysterious package that contained their second album (which I reviewed here ). Recently a similar package arrived, another homemade delight with drawings that recall Edwards Lear and Gorey and within, Tildon Krautz No. 3 AKA A Love (although a delicate scribble on the sleeve records that main man Greg Weiss wanted to call the album Nonszalancki, a Polish word that roughly translates as flippant or nonchalant). Flippant they may be (see the brief song they call Extracts which is basically singer Gabi Swiatkowska and Weiss singing karaoke style over an MOR arrangement of Dolly Parton’s I Will Always Love You which bizarrely pops up halfway through the album), but at heart they deliver yet again a wonderfully spare and left field take on old time roots music with hints of chanson and music hall thrown in.
While initially a listener might think that there’s a naiveté abound here, simple songs with catchy choruses, closer listening reveals a smart wit within the words while the playing is deceptively simple, a ramshackle tumble that takes talent to sound this good. This is evident from the opening Benny Song, a delightful ditty that tiptoes along with a mandolin carrying the main tune as Weiss and Swiatkowska squabble wonderfully like Sonny & Cher sitting on an Appalachian back porch. This back porch picking continues on the fine Life Apart and on Weiss’ excellent Fish, a song that brings to mind John Sebastian in a sunny mood while Disney Song plinks and plunks along as the pair sing surreally about a cat and a discombobulated mouse.
With Marco Hertz and Noel Migliasso on hand on various stringed instruments along with Jim Rowe adding drums on occasion there’s a bit more heft to several of the songs. Disco Song won’t be worrying the Bee Gees but its up tempo banjo beat drives yet another squabbling couples song, Weiss and Swiatkowska sounding quite impassioned here. La Chanson Grave adds a string section for a sombre showcase from Swiatkowska, her fluttering voice sounding vulnerable against the woody timbre of the cello and viola. Weiss delves into darker areas on Longer Than 29, a pensive song that recalls the work of poet Robert Frost and the mournful meanderings of Will Oldham, a trick he repeats and surpasses on the closing song Letter To Dango. A brooding missive that opens with a portentous swell of strings it’s an existentialist folk song that finally lands on the side of human kindness.
Not your everyday cup of tea perhaps but Tildon Krautz are simply sublime and deserve wider hearing.
