New Music 2016 - Part 4 - Clara Engel - Visitors Are Allowed One Kiss

It is the end of the first full working week of 2016 and for that I am thankful. I opened my mailbox on my return home and behind the weekly Domino Pizza flyer, that went straight into the recycling box as always, lurked a small padded envelope. Today had just taken another turn for the better!
Dispatched from the interesting independent label Paradigms Recordings, based in Kent, UK was this.

Clara Engel - Visitors Are Allowed One Kiss.

My first purchase from the above-label this may be but it is certainly not the first of music from Clara Engel, who hails from Toronto, Canada. Her releases, which might be (indeed often are) described as gothic folk, or possibly folk-noir from time to time, are always interesting and their supposed genre merely a distraction in many ways. They always demand attention - the vocal is sometimes almost spoken-word and the instrumentation apparently sparse yet, at the same time both deeply dimensioned.
I mentioned the Madagascar EP as long ago as May 2011 and the A Little Slander, A Little Lace EP (2015) as recently as last month as part of my reviews of 2015. There is plenty more to find, for she has released eleven albums (I think) but finding physical copies of much of the body of work is at best difficult.

That is indeed a potential issue with Visitors Are Allowed One Kiss - it is limited to just 200 copies on CD - but is still available here. The screen-printed fold-out packaging is a great complement to the recording and a lyric sheet is also included. The track listing is as follows (taken from the back cover of said CD):

There are only five tracks but each of them takes its time to unfold. Neither the individual songs nor the LP, which is a fraction over thirty minutes in duration, ever threaten to overstay their welcome. It is another triumph of the maxim that sometimes less is more.

My Music in 2015 - EPs and mini-albums - Part 1

Not wishing to get into a debate about what is or is not an EP this category is something of a cop-out. That does however leave an open question concerning quite when does a mini-album become a full-blown LP. In so far as is possible I use the distinction that the artist chooses and if that is indiscernible then I make the decision myself.
In the new order this is however one of the most interesting places in which to dwell: just ten years ago who could have foreseen that the then moribund concept of the EP would find a whole new meaning - whether that be digital only, on CD, vinyl or now increasingly so also cassette. The list is, as usual, alphabetical by artist:

• Aurora - Running With The Wolves
• Clara Engel - A Little Slander, A Little Lace
• Francis Pugh and The Whisky Drinkers - A Place Back West
• The Japanese House - Pools To Bathe In
• Joni Fuller - Letters From The West Coast
• Sound Of The Sirens - All We Have Is Love

It's a mix of things that have grabbed my attention. In this case I have only seen two of these acts live  - the first and the last. This is the first.

Aurora - Walled Garden stage - Green Man Festival -  23 August 2015.

This was long before the John Lewis Christmas advertisement in which Aurora Aksnes' cover of Oasis' 'Half The World Away' happened. That has certainly bought her a great deal of attention. Her own music deserves more than that.

Clara Engel is a Canadian that is criminally ignored by most. That is a great shame and not least for the would-be listeners. Her music maybe somewhat challenging but it repays the effort many times over and, while the above EP is short, there is a sizeable body of work to discover. Do it.

Francis Pugh and The Whiskey Singers I pretty much summed up in my post back in September. This, for the purists, is a true EP. Three tracks - the first and last are their own with a cover of Hank Williams' 'I Saw The Light' sandwiched between them. Another stalwart of the Oxford roots music scene is likely to feature in part 2 of this thread.

Sound Of The Sirens. a duo from Exeter, has had quite some year. Here they are playing The Lights, Andover back in March.

That was before Chris Evans, presenter of the BBC Radio2 Breakfast Show, was revealed as a fan. One thing led to another and ultimately the duo of Abbe Martin and Hannah Woods played live at the relaunch of his classic late 1990's Channel 4 show TFI Friday.

New Music 2015 - Part 10 - Clara Engel - A Little Slander, A Little Lace

I suppose that Saturday lunchtime is an odd time to write a post but never mind.  It is a cold, grey blustery day and I have done all the things I needed to do that involved being outdoors so now I'm at home and doing domestic things while listening to music, of course.
This, released digitally today by Canadian artist Clara Engel who I have mentioned several times before and most recently here, caught my attention immediately.

The download [from US $2] also includes track 'What's The Damage'. Pay 50% more than the minimum asking price and it is still no more than really good coffee. It is bottomless too - you can have another dose as often as you like, for as long as you like. You won't find a deal like that at any coffee shop that I've ever come across. 

My 2014 in Music - Albums - Part 1

With December, traditionally the start of the pre-Christmas hiatus in meaningful musical releases, just hours away it is time to start mentioning those releases of 2014 that have for whatever reason been highlights for me.
One change is that while the acts are grouped in alphabetical order the number of entries has been reduced to ten in this list. This is not due to a shortage of possibilities, far from it indeed, but rather to make compiling and writing each post more manageable.

• Angel Olsen - Burn Your Fire For No Witness
• Arc Iris - Arc Iris
• Clara Engel - Looking Glass Fire
• Jennifer Crook - Carnforth Station
• Joanne Shaw Taylor - The Dirty Truth
• The Moulettes - Constellations
• Ninebarrow - While The Blackthorn Burns
• The Rails - Fair Warning
• Sylvan Esso - Sylvan Esso
• Ward Thomas - From Where We Stand

One thing that changed not a jot is the influence that music I have seen live during 2014 has had on the outcome - eight of the ten above fall into that category and of those eight I have seen four live on at least two distinct occasions. Of the ten, five are LPs that I own on vinyl.

I just felt the need to get the ball rolling on this late autumn afternoon. It is easy to keep putting the start of such things off for another day for while it is certainly not a chore, a certain activation barrier has to be overcome nevertheless. Links - some might be my own and others to the artist or label - and probably some relevant photos will follow shortly.
I am happy if people would like to make comments and suggestions. I will be equally so if this leads anyone to find music of which they were previously either unaware of had forgotten about. If it tempts you to head out and see some live music then that is a real bonus. It is also, truth be told, quite simply the music that I really liked.

The alphabet is as it is; it starts this list with an artist that was a complete surprise, and a revelation, to me. I had heard it said that, as a performer, she is at best diffident and at worst obtuse. Be that as it may I can now go only with what I heard and observed myself. Those descriptions are quite harsh I believe; reserved and self-absorbed maybe, which means it admirably mirrors the album title 'Burn Your Fire For No Witness'. 

Angel Olsen - Green Man Festival 2014.

A bonus that accrued from starting a blog is that I really had to go out to see live music and soon armed with a camera. I often don't go far at all...

Ward Thomas, Cheese & Grain, Frome, 2 August 2014.  The opening date of their début headline tour.

The Moulettes are currently supporting Bellowhead on tour, but often playing as a four-piece and good though this is (dubbed the Moulllites by Hannah Miller) when I saw them thus live at Reading Hexagon just a couple of weeks ago you really do need to see them live as a six-piece playing a full set because that is in another league entirely. This was fresh on my mind as I had seen them thus just ten days previously at Marnhull Acoustic Sessions. You can do exactly that at Behind The Castle Festival on 13 June 2015.

One of the Reading absentees: Ruth Skipper, Marnhull Acoustic Session, 9 November 2014.

New Music 2014 - Part 19 - Clara Engel - Looking-Glass Fire

I seem to be in a writing mood at the moment so I guess that it is best just to roll with it. In any case I just keep finding out about stuff that interests me and, as it often does, this tends to result in a positive-feedback loop all of its own. For times when this pattern fails I keep a list of things that I really ought to investigate but simply haven't done anything about. It may seem a curious way to work but that is how it is.

This is the latest release from Canadian artist Clara Engel, whom I have written about before in respect of the Madagascar EP (2011). It is another EP/mini-album and I am currently unaware if a physical release is planned, but no matter.
You can stream below but if you like what you hear please buy it. Only this way can independent artists subsist, let alone continue to record and thus make our lives a much richer place.      

There is plenty more by Clara to explore and enjoy. If you like the above then try her most recent full LP 'Ashes and Tangerines' (2014).

2011 in Music - EPs and mini albums

Several people have mentioned that, along with vinyl, the EP is enjoying a welcome and long overdue return in all formats and for reasons that are entirely practical.  It provides a way for artists to release a connected piece of work whether that be on vinyl or download, rather than just odd tracks, and for whatever reason.  It can be a new artist with only a small collecton of completed material or an established artist with a collection of material that in some way does not sit well with the bulk of their output.  Whatever the reasons for this revival are it has been a good year and I'm going to start on a year-high. When I discovered this my 2011 in music changed. Very few people can do that.

 
The next one is equally different and difficult to classify but I'm going to continue with this, which comes from an artist that few had heard of at the start of 2011 and myself included. It is difficult to describe its genre - tenebrous, intellectual, indie-dance does it for me.

Its creator is Estonian writer-singer-DJ Maria Minerva. Were it not for this EP (vinyl & download) and my self-imposed rules concerning these lists (see previous post) her 2011 album 'Caberet Cixous' might just have been included. I chose this specifically because of its tight and distinct focus.

  

  
There will only be three items in this post - the connecting theme being they are neither depressing nor euphoric - and that is what sets them aside. 

What they mean to me, and what I feel about these songs, is like looking in a quite special mirror: one that changes like the sky and can reflect things that otherwise I cannot see.

New Music 2011 - Clara Engel - Madagascar EP

The chain of events that led to me purchasing this pretty much sums up everything that I like about music and writing a blog all rolled into one. Three days ago I knew nothing - not even the existence - of this artist.  By yesterday evening I was listening to physical music by the same... something that only the combination of the digital age, independent artists, labels and stores and snail-mail-on-speed could achieve.

Clara Engel is a singer-songwriter from Toronto, Canada and a very prolific one so my research since Wednesday attests.  The Madagascar EP is however her first physical release and it is, even for purists and I am not one of them, a 'proper' EP - three tracks on vinyl, in this case of the 12" 45 rpm variety and only in this format.  It is released by new label Vox Humana Records as VHR01. It is available from Rough Trade Records, always a dependable source for new music.
  
Now to the music.  I don't tend to write about music that I don't like and this is certainly no exception. Many of the UK-based comments on Clara Engel's music compare her to Anna Calvi, indeed the Rough Trade website and sticker on the cover did so. That is unfair, if a little understandable. Yes, they both write, sing and play guitar big time but actually Anna Calvi is the newcomer here if already better known in the UK; we can do parochial just as well as anyone else and I don't think lumping both artists together does either of them a favour.
Take a listen to this EP or indeed any of the other downloads available from www.claraengel.bandcamp.com and make up your own mind. There is plenty as her next album will be her eighth or ninth! The three tracks on the EP come from two albums; 'Blind Me' and 'Madagascar' from 'Secret Beasts' and 'Accompanied by Dreams' from 'The Bethlehem Tapes'.  There is a new album in the making, so long as she can get the funding together to make it happen. Another track from 'Secret Beasts' is 'Lick My Fins', which is available as a free, legal download.

You owe it to yourself to listen to new music. If it turns out that you don't like it then that is just fine but at least you will know and so it will influence your future forays in to the unknown.  What I want to do is take it out (on vinyl) and find people to play it to...