New Music 2016 - Part 29 - Kitty Macfarlane - Tide & Time

Whilst I was thinking about that next "road-trip post" --- it's nearly complete, at least conceptually --- I am amazed by how often I get diverted by things that are  local and sometimes actually more immediate.  This is one of them and I chose to say diverted, rather than distracted, for a reason.
Songs about shipping, weather and the possibility of a new Hinkley nuclear power station are all to be found amongst the lyrics on offer here. It has helped me considerably in assigning a better focus to the aforementioned project because it made me think rather more about not just what songs are written about but the possible reason why the subject was chosen for analysis.

Tide & Time EP - Kitty Macfarlane (self-released, 2016).

• Wrecking Days
• Bus Song
• Lamb
• Tide and Time
• Song To The Siren

Four are original songs on which she accompanies her singing with finger-picked guitar. Song To The Siren is a Tim Buckley cover and a song with a history all its own. It is therefore a brave choice to cover and while quite notable it doesn't subsume the other tracks in any way.
His original recorded version appeared on the 1970 album 'Starsailor' but the first artist to release a recording of it was Pat Boone on his 1969 album 'Departure', which was released by Tetragrammaton Records in the US. Tetragrammaton was wound up as a result of insolvency in 1971. Pat Boone has, indeed continues to have, wide appeal in the US but hardly any such in Europe.
The best known version of the song, at least in the UK and as of now, is that by This Mortal Coil and that has a very different treatment to the one on this EP. Tim Buckley did however perform it with The Monkees on TV and in its original folk-like incarnation, on 25 March 1968. This appears on the 2CD 'Morning Glory: The Tim Buckley Anthology' (2001). 

Kitty Macfarlane has recently toured as support for BBC Folk Awards 2016 'Best Duo' winners Sean Lakeman and Kathryn Roberts and she will do so again soon. She is currently supporting Blair Dunlop on many of the dates of his ongoing UK tour including 'The Plough', Torrington, Devon (30 April 2016) and Marnhull Acoustic Sessions, North Dorset (1 May 2016).

New Music 2016 - Part 28 - I Am Snow Angel - Fever

I haven't written much about electronic music for a while. This is in part because warm weather seems to prompt me to listen to it and at the moment winter is digging-in its heels for a final show of strength. Spring, and all thoughts of Summer, are therefore on hold. This kind of situation might change dramatically in a matter of days however - I believe in this - and that brings me to this artist whose moniker might ordinarily suggest a winter-time appeal.

I Am Snow Angel is a New York-based electronic pop performer, producer and visual artist and this is the latest release.

Fever - I Am Snow Angel (self-released, 2016).

There is plenty more by I Am Snow Angel out there to find, including the 2014 digital LP 'Crocodile', and there is more to come quite soon. I think that the thing that really caught my ear is that this is not strident electronica; it is pastoral rather than urban, wistful but still restive, and I'm keen to find more that is somewhat like it.
If I want or need to find urban or revolutionary music then I know that there is plenty of that available too.

New Music 2016 - Part 27 - Tim Heidecker - In Glendale

I've been thinking about putting up another post that is a road-trip or rail-trip through music. It's an idea that I like and I enjoyed figuring-out the first one but then again it was pretty spontaneous. Ideas and the music to go with them I am not short of. There is no doubt at all about that. There are only three significant matters remaining undetermined; the starting point, the destination and the itinerary. I guess I need a little more time working on that project. It isn't something that I can't conjure up on demand and trying only makes the problem worse.

That neatly brings me to this. A project complete, except for its release to an expectant world, and a project more-or-less about a single place. Tim Heidecker is a comedian by trade and this is his first foray into "serious" music. That might sound alarm bells for many but in this case it shouldn't.
This is his semi-serious take on life, family and anything else (not all of it pleasant) in and around their home in California.

In Glendale - Tim Heidecker (Rado Records, 20 May 2016).

• In Glendale
• Cleaning Up The Dog Shit
• Work From Home
• Ghost In My Bed
• Good Looking Babies
• When The Cash Runs Out
• I Dare You To Watch Me Sleep
• Central Air
• I Saw Nicolas Cage
• Ocean's Too Cold

Rado Records is an imprint, under the Jagjaguwar label, curated by Jonathan Rado of Foxygen. Whatever the sound, and it is mostly indie rock here, music doesn't get much more independent-minded than this.
In a sense Tim Heidecker has a parallel in Courtney Barnett: they are contemplating similar conundrums and the resulting decisions but starting from quite different points of view.

Without comment: The European Question.

When The Common Market Comes To Stanton Drew:

Folks say nowadays we've got to change our ways,
The papers say so, so I s'pose 'tis true,
We've got to take the chance, with Germany and France,
And live like all they foreign people do.
Now, I wonder if they'll build the Eiffel Tower on 'arptree 'ill,
Put gondolas down on the River Chew,
Shall us all drive on the right, and drink up all the night-
When the Common Market comes to Stanton Drew?

Some folks seem to think, we'll 'ave to change our drink,
There's rumours flyin', so I s'pose 'tis right,
They say they've seen a tank of Portuguese vin blanc,
Jammed up in t'High Street t'other night.
They say that port and brandy will sell for £1 a quart,
And the Druids Arms won't close till ver' nigh two,
And we'll all drink caviar from a girt big cider jar,
When the Common Market comes to Stanton Drew!

Now, as for what we eat, we must export more meat,
Send 'em all our best prime beef and ham,
While we does stuff our guts with Transylvanian nuts
And garlic-flavoured processed German spam!
When George comes home from milkin', he'll get a big surprise,
When 'e sits down expectin' Irish stew,
And 'is wife says "George, I'll get 'ee, a girt dollop of spaghetti,"
When the Common Market comes to Stanton Drew!

When the market-time comes round, down the pub we'll all be found
Jammin' up the public bar all day
And you won't get through the doors, for Messieurs and Senors
Arguin' about the price of summer hay.
With Timsbury full of Belgians, and Radstock full of Dutch,
The Paulton farmer won't know what to do,
And you might see Acker Bilk advertisin' Pensford milk,
When the Common Market comes to Stanton Drew!

In the evenin' times I s'pose, we'll sip of our vin rose,
Just like they do in the Argentine
And we'll watch they foreign blokes, with their girt big 'ats and cloaks,
Flamingo-in down on the village green.
We'll 'ave to watch our wenches when they dark-eyed lads gets here,
And the local boys'll 'ave to form a queue,
They'll say "Ooh la la, oui oui," instead of "How's bist thee?"
When the Common Market comes to Stanton Drew.
When the Common Market comes to Stanton Drew
When the Common Market comes to Stanton Drew!

Adge Cutler and The Wurzels (1973)

New Music 2016 - Part 26 - 9Bach - Anian

There is so much interesting music that is being released in the UK at the moment that I often find it hard where to start and what to choose. This one wasn't difficult to include. It's the third LP from North Wales' 9Bach and follows on from Tincian (2014). Once again, although sung entirely in Welsh, its musical influences go far beyond that - particularly in the direction of Greek, Balkan and near Middle Eastern traditions. In comparison with its predecessor it is also more outward looking in terms of time as well as place. That is not to say that what Lisa Jên articulates here is optimistic. It isn't and it is often rather challenging. Anian means nature and, because Welsh is economical and subtly nuanced in its use of words, also related concepts like natural order, morality and such.
If you find modern mainstream chart music rather bland, repetitive and commercial what's not to like?

Anian is released by Real World Records on 29 April 2016 in the UK.

It was recorded with the same musicians as Tincian, but the process and resultant mood is very different. This is the track list:

• Llyn Du
• Anian
• Yr Olaf
• Ifan
• Si Hwi Hwi
• Cyfaddefa
• Brain
• Heno
• Deryn

The first track to be released is Llyn Du (Black Lake) and the video is all shot in the Glyderau, North Wales.

New Music - Part 25 - Half Deaf Clatch - Simple Songs For These Complicated Times

Well what can I say?
It seems no time since I was writing about Half Deaf Clatch and the 2015 LP The Life and Death of A.J Rail. My memory isn't failing me here, I'm pleased to say, even though it was barely longer than a month back.
That was based on seeing Half Deaf Clatch live in Frome somewhat earlier when he also mentioned the possibility of a forthcoming EP, 'The Apocalypse Blues'. Well you can forget that idea. It has been has now taken on an entirely new dimension as a ten song LP.

Half Deaf Clatch - Simple Songs For These Complicated Times (self-released, 11 May 2016).

No frippery is evident in the song titles:

• The Hush Blues
• The Blinkered Blues
• The Apocalypse Blues
• The River Blues
• The Undertow Blues
• The Exodus Blues
• The Lost Blues
• The Struggle Blues
• The Countdown Blues
• The Elysian Blues

Just acoustic blues.
Added 16 April 2016: Here is an archive-based video, to accompany 'Apocalypse Blues', that draws on footage of nuclear weapon tests. Added 16 May 2016: Now the recognition of this is spreading across the Atlantic, as this review demonstrates: http://www.musicnewsnashville.com/half-deaf-clatch-simple-songs-complicated-times/

Why Bristol matters and other thoughts...

I have issues with Bristol. I lived there from early 1990 until late 1995.
I shall try and explain that statement elliptically, in the context of two recent releases.
The first and most recent of these is the third full length from Bristol-based multi-instrumentalist Laura Kidd; it follows Disarm (2010) and Little Battles (2012).

Direction of Travel - She Makes War (The State 51 Conspiracy, 8 April 2016).

Attempt to place Direction of Travel in a pigeonhole at your own peril. It is dark-edged but often rather uplifting. The opening track 'Drown Me Out' starts with a portentious drum figure. The lyrics are uncompromising and unsettling too; that's just the opening salvo. Even a megaphone is not unknown. 

Elements of pop, grunge, folk and electronica, as well as vocal loops, slither in-and-out like Medusa's serpents and with a coterminous unpredictability. 

The one thing that this most certainly is not is comedy for, as she says herself:

She Makes War... because love is a battlefield.

The video to Paper Thin was shot in Boston and New York, February 2016.

To follow this might appear to be something of a problem. That it is not so is the result of a complete oversight on my part!

This next album should probably have been included in my selection of 'Albums of 2015'. Better late than never, I suppose, and again I will make no effort to put the content in any neat little box. Bristol, Brighton and Plymouth are involved here too.

On The Inside - Wildflowers (Caroline International, 28 August 2015).

A trio comprising sisters Siddy and Kit Bennett, and Joe Ashbury, On The Inside is their first full length release. One quote, regarding life on the south coast of England where Siddy Bennett lived between the ages of ten and sixteen, is really rather interesting.

I had a magical childhood, but Plymouth changes a person.

Taken from the album this is 100 Personalities recorded live at The Crypt Sessions, 4 April 2016.

New Music 2016 - Part 24 - Julianna Barwick - Will

I seem to have posted a large run of 'New Music' posts just recently. Here is yet another and a sneak preview. I've been listening to this on repeat this evening simply because I can and I wish to do so.

Will is released by Dead Oceans in North America and Europe on 6 May 2016.

It follows her 2013 LP Nepenthe, which I mentioned briefly, and is her third full length recording. I'm minded to think that is is also the one that I might come to like the best. I have seen her play live too, at End Of The Road Festival 2013, and that aspect certainly comes highly recommended. She is confirmed to play at Green Man Festival 2016 so that is an opportunity I intend to take. The other thing that I have been doing is listening to it some more, from start to finish and now several times. I'm not as a rule much inclined to pick a couple of stand-out tracks unless of course I feel them to be all that is of-note on offer and here that is not any concern of mine.
I suppose you might attribute this to my pre-digital roots when there were only two things available - the singles or the album purchased in its entirety.

Here is the track listing:

Julianna Barwick - Will:

• St. Apolonia
• Nebula
• Beached
• Same
• Wist
• Big Hollow
• Heading Home
• Someway
• See, Know

Beautiful, dreamy and led by keyboards, it's going to take a small and intimate stage setting to show this at its best live - unless of course she has a grand 'Plan B' to reveal, which is quite possible at least in principle.
At End of The Road 2013 she played the Tipi stage with just understated electric guitar, courtesy of Scott Powell, as accompaniment beyond her own keyboards.

Here she is back then at EOTR 2013. The Walled Garden stage at Green Man 2016 would work perfectly.

Whilst I have nothing live to offer from the new album here is an extended live set recorded at KEXP in Seattle a couple of months later:

Julianna Barwick live at KEXP, Seattle - November 22, 2013.