My Music in 2016 - Albums - Part 2

Seconds away; round 2.
The rules are exactly the same as before and in no way should you think that this list is 'second fiddle'. One of the featured acts would soon disabuse you of that notion simply because of its four members three play fiddle, almost always concurrently!
In addition, this list includes an entry for which the primary language is not English.

Anian - 9 Bach
Applewood Road - Applewood Road
The Black Feathers - Soaked To The Bone
Cale Tyson - Careless Soul
Fara - Cross The Line
The Honeycutters - On The Ropes
Joanne Shaw Taylor - Wild
Kelsey Waldon - I've Got A Way
Margo Price - Midwest Farmer's Daughter
On Dead Waves - On Dead Waves

This post is entirely me fighting my own corner as concerns the kind of music that I like. The links above might have indicated that. It includes one of the two US artists that I most wanted to see live in 2016 and I did so.

Margo Price and Jeremy Ivey, wife & husband, Woods stage, End Of The Road Festival, 2 September 2016.

The other US artist I really wanted to see live in 2016  was Jason Isbell and I did that too, at Green Man Festival 2016. The above list also includes two of the US artists that I would most like to see live at a UK festival in 2017 - The Honeycutters and Kelsey Waldon. It's looking promising.

This is from the Saloon Bar stage at Truck Festival in slightly challenging circumstances.

Applewood Road, a capella. 15 July 2016.

The few invading troublemakers - they were not merely drunk and disorderly - were soon removed without any further fuss by Security. This is the first time in ten years of festival-going that I have ever been in a situation like this and it was reassuring in the way that everyone reacted to it. Such things happen in many towns each weekend, more is the pity. Ten minutes later everything had returned to normal, but with even more camaraderie.

This is the 'Saloon Bar Stage' after all, so perhaps it isn't such a surprise?

Should you wish to attempt to prefigure 2017 then there is this. Its title is 'Powerplant'. I'm not saying much about it because crystal-ball-gazing is not my thing and look where professional pollsters led us in 2016! I would be lying if I were to deny that there are a couple of items that are interesting prospects indeed. The second album from this duo is one of them.

Girlpool, Big Top stage, End Of The Road Festival, 5 September 2015.

My Music in 2015 - Albums - Part 2

Here we are again, just over a week after my first foray on this subject. The rules are the same as in Part 1. I hope you find something to like or to argue about.
Critical comments are quite as welcome as positive ones just so long they are not offensive or defamatory. A fact is that a credited post always has more gravitas than an anonymous one and that applies even if the content of both were to be exactly the same. I reserve the right to publish comments on this post and will credit them accordingly.

• Ange Hardy - Esteesee
• Chantel McGregor - Lose Control
• Courtney Barnett - Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit
• Fara - Fara
• Girlpool - Before The World Was Big
• Heather Crosse - Groovin' At The Crosse Roads
• Mad Dog McRea - Almost Home
• Phillip Henry and Hannah Martin - Watershed
• The Rosellys - The Barn Sessions
• Stick In The Wheel - From Here

Part 1 was equally divided between acts from the UK and from North America and that only occurred to me after I posted it. This selection is much more UK biased, featuring just two acts from North America and an Australian. Specifically this one...

Courtney Barnett, Far Out Stage, Green Man Festival - Sunday evening, 23 August 2015.

Girlpool, Big Top stage, End Of The Road Festival - Saturday 5 September 2015.

Phillip Henry and Hannah Martin, Marnhull Acoustic Sessions - Sunday 23 February 2014.

The Rosellys, Saloon Stage, Truck Festival - Friday 18 July 2015.

Fara, Stage 2, Cambridge Folk Festival - Thursday 30 July 2015.

You may be wondering why I often use links to my earlier comments in these lists; this is because they often contain more back-links to the artist, as well as to other related topics. It saves listing multiple links all over again.

End of The Road 2015 - The Big Top

After a rather soggy, but quite wonderful, Green Man 2015 I am happy to report that apart from a short shower at an unimportant time on Saturday morning End Of The Road 2015 was blessed with dry and, as time went on, increasingly sunny weather.
By Saturday afternoon it was pretty much sunny so, having visited it hardly at all in 2014, I decided to spend much of the afternoon inside the tented Big Top stage! The first act that I saw there was actually one that had impressed me a fortnight earlier at Green Man - The Drink. This was just the start of what turned out to be a run of female-led acts on this stage.

Dearbhla Minogue of The Drink, Big Top Stage, End Of The Road Festival, early Saturday afternoon.

This next is Beth Jeans Houghton and an artist I have seen live a number of times before, not least several times at EOTR. This was the first time I have seen her with her new band project Du Blonde.

I could write a full post about this. Had it been the the culmination of an afternoon in the Big Top I would not have been disappointed. It turned out to be the end of the start. The backing bands for both the above are all male.

When I first heard the song 'Jane' last year it made me take note of its perpetrators - female duo Girlpool from Los Angeles. I can honestly say that at that time what it might sound like live never even crossed my mind. In fact I still don't know for, following the prudent idea of not playing live the song(s) that first garnered attention, they didn't play it.

Without the slightest pretence Harmony Tividad (bass and vocals) and Cleo Tucker (guitar and vocals) set about dismantling a whole raft of preconceptions about modern music in the space of forty minutes. I'm not at all convinced that I have seen a more affecting live set this year.

New Music 2015 - Part 19 - Girlpool - Before The World Was Big

Just when you thought all-female garage rock couldn't get any better and with Girlpool confirmed as booked for End Of The Road Festival 2015 it is now a real challenge; can Cleo Tucker (guitar and vocals) and Harmony Tividad (bass and vocals) better the set that Deap Vally produced on the Thursday evening in 2013 at EOTR, only to then better it themselves with an astonishing one at Truck Festival 2014 when playing on the main stage?
Here is the reason that I mention this. The stakes are suddenly raised for the début Girlpool LP has come to be known...

Girlpool - 'before the world was big' (Wichita Recordings) 1 June 2015 in the UK. (2 June in USA & Canada.)

Maybe I should have shared this, the first single lifted from the LP, yesterday.

New Music 2014 - Part 30 - Girlpool

I thought it time that some new music appeared here after a welter of festival related posts. This turned out to be too good to waste any time in sharing. It is the short but not entirely sweet 'Jane' by Los Angeles based duo Girlpool, comprising Cleo Tucker (guitar), Harmony Tividad (bass) and both of them on vocals. Girlpool is now signed to UK label Wichita.

The EP Girlpool is released in November.