New Music 2018 - Part 1 - Stick In The Wheel - Follow Them True

Divining the future has to start somewhere. I have chosen this as my starting point for music in 2018, not least because Stick In The Wheel is exactly between the future and the past.
I have no idea what the songs on this, the second LP, will be but I'm happy to trust that I shall like them and so I have pre-ordered it on vinyl.

Follow Them True - Stick In The Wheel (self released, 26 January 2018).

This is the follow-up to astonishing 2015 début 'From Here' and I can't think of an act better qualified to be my first suggestion for music that is to be released in 2018, but there are plenty more snapping at the heels.
This is 'Over Again':

In 2017 the band released a record of other artists singing traditional songs live and that is well worth an hour of your precious time too. It features well known artists and also many less so but no less worthy.

FROM HERE: English Folk Field Recordings (From Here Records, 2017).

The idea was to capture what the essence, the making and the performance of English folk music means in the here-and-now.

Joanne Shaw Taylor - live at The Royal Festival Hall

It is rare that I venture to London for live music. Last Wednesday was an an exception and with good reason. It was for to see this artist live a fifth time but the fact that I had never set foot inside the iconic Royal Festival Hall did no harm either.

Photo credit: John Bentley

The artist was Joanne Shaw Taylor and despite a cold that had caused the cancellation of the previous day's show at Bristol Colston Hall we were treated to an awesome set. Her voice held but, sensibly in the circumstance, the guitar parts and the addition of an entirely instrumental number were to the fore. It was to be quite stunning. I have never seen and heard guitar played quite like that by anyone...  the acoustics of the room playing a full part here. The whole set seemed to go so very quickly but was not in fact any shorter than might have been anticipated.
Support was provided by the impressive South African blues-rock artist Dan Patlanky and his band of which I have to admit that I was previously quite unaware. On the other hand I really like being caught off-guard by new music.
Rather suspecting that I would not be permitted to use it I didn't take a camera. In some ways that was liberating too. The whole evening, involving company and travelling to London and back, seems to have pressed some sort of reset button in my mind.  Since the summer's festivals I have been listening to absolutely loads of music but had somehow lost the wish to write about it for a month or two. It has to be spontaneous. It isn't something that I can make myself do though I often think in some detail about what I might post even when I don't actually do it.

New Music 2017 - Part 21 - Paradisia - Sound of Freedom

I often go on about how important I believe it is to see support bands at gigs, and at festivals as many as possible of the bands on small stages and in opening slots on larger ones. As the festival season is now tangibly close and the list of new releases grows ever longer, here as an excellent example of how this pans out.

Last August I was at Green Man festival in mid-Wales. The smallest of the dedicated music stages is the 'Rising stage' and it hosts new acts. These are for the most part chosen from the entries in a competition over the previous months, the winner of which gets to open the 'Mountain stage', the main one, on Saturday. Several acts there caught my attention and London-based three-piece Paradisia was one of them. Its core is the trio of Kristy Buglass (vocals, keyboard), Sophie-Rose Harper (vocals) and Anna Pesquidous (harp).

Paradisia, Rising stage, Green Man Festival. 21 August 2016.

This was the very first time that I was even aware that the band existed. First impressions matter and what I remember thinking was just how good their own songs were, even against the fact that they also covered Springsteen's 'Dancing in the Dark', unlikely although that might seem given their palette of instruments, impressively. That inevitably brings us to this; my next thought at the time.
"What would this sound like on record?" Yesterday I got to find out.

Paradisia - Sound of Freedom (self-released, 26 May 2017 LP, CD, digital)

It was clear from listening to the short live set that they had listened to a great deal of 1970's music and been honing the influences appropriate to what they wished to achieve. This album is just wonderful.  If I had to shorten it by one song then the one to go would be 'Dancing In The Dark'. I have listened start-to-finish several times now and current highlights, although I am really rather reluctant to pick any, are 'Warpaint' and 'Silent Lover'. The title of the LP comes from a lyric in the latter song.
I'm as certain as it is possible to be that is an album that I shall be coming back to time and time again and experience suggests that this isn't something that happens all that often.

New Music 2017 - Part 16 - Heavy Heart - Keepsake

Another band that was new to me as the result of seeing it live at a festival is London-based five-piece Heavy Heart. This was courtesy of Truck Festival 2014 and here they are playing then.

Heavy Heart, Veterans and Virgins stage - Truck Festival (18 July 2014).

As I mentioned in my last post there are acts that once heard are not easily forgotten and Heavy Heart is one of those as far as I am concerned. Throughout 2016 the band raised its profile on social media by releasing a new song each month. If you missed all this you can download or stream the songs from these links. In early 2017 it was announced that these songs would also gain a physical status as 'Keepsake' through new independent label I Can & I Will Records.

Heavy Heart - Keepsake (I Can & I Will Records, 31 March 2017).

It is still available but there is a catch.  The release  is limited to 300 copies, all numbered and signed, and it is only available on raspberry-coloured 12" vinyl (£10 + p&p), which quite frankly is a bargain given the prices being asked for many main-stream releases on vinyl at the moment.
This is the track listing:

Side A:

Time Will Stand Still

Teenage Witch

High Dive

Pretty Thing

Fruitfly
Yellowbird

Side B:

What Became of Laura R?

Fever Dream

Late to the Party

The World Is a Gumball

The Way Home

Keepsake

Now all I need to do is see the band live once again.

Note added 12 June 2017:
Keepsake is now available on CD too:
https://weareheavyheart.bandcamp.com/album/keepsake-album

New Music 2015 - Part 72 - Stick In The Wheel - From Here

The other strand to modern UK folk is delineated by this. I saw parts of several of the performances that Stick In The Wheel played at Cambridge Folk Festival 2015, but unfortunately all of none of them. Furthermore I was never in a place to take worthwhile photographs, which was a shame too. The album was still many weeks away from release at that time.

The début LP 'From Here' was released on 25 September 2015.

It comprises a mixture of traditional songs and new compositions but what unites all this is the urgency bought to bear on them. The sparse arrangements and the vernacular delivery of Nicola Kearey define it, well actually nail it. There is nothing remotely false or unconvincing about either of these things - in that sense it rather reminds me of the best of Glasgow's (now late lamented) Sons and Daughters and lead singer Adele Bethel. The music of Stick In The Wheel is however acoustic. Messy, but also astonishingly controlled. That brings The Pogues into the equation from time to time but Lucy Ward too. Think 'Alice In The Bacon Box', from her first album, here. It tells a story that could belong to a refugee right now.

It isn't actually backward looking and certainly does not hark back to a golden age. The feeling here is that the daily grind - on Bows of London in particular - just goes on. Whatever the surface shine might belie, it is that nothing has really changed at all.

New Music 2015 - Part 25 - Hannah Rose Platt - Portraits

Can a reason be divined for the mutual issues of mistrust that exist between enemies to be overcome? Possibly not, but we must hope so. I was listening to the news today and while it is not directly about that it made me wonder...
Cut to a longer standing situation, albeit less threatening by a million miles; that is the relationship between US country music, the UK and the rest of Europe and the omens now look pretty promising.
It occurred to me whilst I was listening to this LP. I have decided not to write a post about the album and then another about the ideas that it inspired. It seemed better done as a tract, one non-religious though rather less apolitical.

To an extent I think that that without the former my inspiration for lateral thinking about the other matters might not have happened quite as it did. I shall return to the album at the end, but suffice it to say that I had also been thinking about mathematics and statistics, in a somewhat abstract sense, for a completely different reason in any case.
What then happened is that I started thinking about how all this might apply to the relations between music labels, artists and the consumers over the last twenty-five years or so. I haven't worked this through fully, even in my mind, as yet but I like the idea of doing so. I suspect that this is an interesting case of playing a zero-sum game, initially between the major labels and nowhere more so than in their hegemony of the (and therefore almost entirely US) market for 'country music'. Not only could they control the market they could shape it as they saw fit...  contracts, and failing that sheer dollars, could take care of that. In that model there is an island of stability, within which all participants stand to lose more than they would gain by disrupting the status quo. That is not to say that is a cartel, as such, but it is cozy. This is the zero-sum game by definition and it works until there is enough outside pressure, angst even, for sufficient nascent feelings of power for these people such that they start taking real risks; either by jumping off the gravy-train or simply attacking, guerilla style, from the frustration of not being able to see a way of getting aboard. That includes all people involved in the chain - from artists, engineers, producers and studios to independent labels and distributors and stores.
There becomes a point at which the zero-sum game breaks down. This failure is then liable to destroy the tenets of Nash Equilibrium; this predicts that producers [in the sense of those that bring any product to market and not the more specific 'music producer' sense] will control supply (in whatever way is appropriate to that industry or market) to maximise the profits for all (major) players.  It is a cartel, by any other name, but is not necessarily illegal. The recent collapse in the price of oil is a good example of that unravelling. The various threads of the music industry seem to be making good progress putting that kind of nonsense to bed and it is about time too. 
To get back to where I started...
Portraits is a stunning listen and, whilst it was recorded in Nashville with a phalanx of country music greats in support, Hannah Rose Platt is from Liverpool and now based in London. The album is self-released and all but two songs are her own, the other two are co-writes. The Nashville equilibrium is being well and truly perturbed, from within the US and without, and we will all benefit from that.
Here is a taster of the album.

New Music 2015 - Part 12 - Robert Chaney - Cracked Picture Frames

It is true that I spent much of January in self-imposed hibernation; the only obvious sign of life being that I wrote a fair number of posts here, which is something that I failed to do in January 2014, and have listened to a whole lot more that I have yet to mention.
This is not part of that, because I only became aware of it and only then via the artist Friday last. There are several issues at work here - I like it a great deal and it seems that it fits so well with much that I have been listening to over the last year or so. If there is a better case of musical 'transatlanticism', about which I wrote here last Spring, I can't think of one at the moment. The simple acoustic, sparse tales of assorted misfortune and missteps are applicable and in measure timeless wherever one might be.

Robert Chaney hails from Florida but moved to London a couple of years ago. This is his first LP.
What I do know is that if someone had spun me a false tale that said otherwise then I might very well have believed it. 'Cracked Picture Frames' is released in the UK by Jagged Lines (JL001) as a download on 15 February and on CD on 26 April. I have had the good fortune to be able to listen to all ten tracks on the LP a fair few times now. It is quite the reflective work throughout and final track, The Ballad of Edward and Lisa, is certainly no exception. In fact the tale it tells is horrific. It is not my favourite here, by a margin, but the point is there are absolutely no tracks that I would skip.
This is very definitely an album for listening to from start to end and then only in carefully chosen company; it's too good to waste on those who would not bother to listen attentively.

The playlist is as follows:

• Black Eyed Susan
• The Morning After
• Does Your Love Pay Out In Full?
• Patch It Up
• The Simplest Words
• The Cyclist
• I Didn't Want Her Anyway
• Birds and Bees
• Corazones Amarillos
• The Ballad of Edward and Lisa

I can also imagine that it could be stunning live on a small stage at a festival - indeed I have several such in mind - but for now I'll keep those to myself and wait to see how the situation plays out. It's still a full four months before the UK summer festival season starts to play out for real.
On 15 February 'The Ballad of Edward and Lisa' made its first near show-stopping début, and the artist's first appearance, on UK- based but internet-wide Amazing Radio on Baylen Leonard's weekly show 'The Front Porch'.

New Music - 2015 - Part 6 - Salwa Azar - Black Feather Wooden Chair

I shall maintain the acoustic theme of my last post with LP 'Black Feather Wooden Chair', which is the début full-length from London-based Salwa Azar on which she writes, sings and plays ukulele for the most part.

 Release date: 15 January 2015

Quite a long time ago I mentioned her  'For America EP1', which is available to stream here and will give you an idea of her background. The first track to be released from the album is 'Clouds'.

New Music 2013 - Part 31 - Mahoney and The Moment

I wrote a preamble yesterday and I'm sticking with it. It was, indeed, probably indicative of a more fundamental truth than I realized at the time I wrote it.
After seven years of blogging about music some things are still difficult; starting new posts is often one of them and yet any resulting criticism is not so, strangely.  This, however, is the hardest thing of all...
Mahoney and The Moment is an act that chose to introduce themselves to my attention and I'm not sure that I really deserve that.
It has therefore taken me about a week to get my head around this. The title of their second and again self-released LP 'Don't Say No!' rather sets the tone to one of expectation rather than denial. That is when it gets really tough for me... so the only thing to do was listen to it. Once, twice... lots.
Very early on in the writing of this little blog I set down a policy of not writing about things that I don't like and I've been pretty good at sticking to it.

Don't Say No! - Mahoney and The Moment (2013)

    

As it happens I didn't have to worry about that, so here it is. They describe the music (Steve is from London and Emily from Boston, MA.) as transatlantic folk or Anglo-American folk rock. Those labels, whilst accurate, seriously under-sell this album - although perhaps better describe their self-titled début album.
The deal is that this is very good and it is quite distinctive too. Given the current situation concerning the cross-over between UK and US folk/roots/alt-country-rock, and every conceivable hybrid thereof (that is all to the good) this is one phenomenal achievement.

Track-by-track reviews are something I rarely do but, since I rate this album highly as a whole, I might just make an exception in due time... not least because the opening track 'Who Is Archie Lane?' begins with the lyric "I don't like you...", before some seconds later the brass section comes to the fore. What's not to like?
So good it is, indeed, that I shall share it with you.

Anyone for a little West Coast pop?

This will not be to everyone's taste. I know that but if you fancy an early summer dose of West Coast pop, and obviously I do and that is why I am mentioning it, how about this from Seattle-based Seapony?

It won't change the world - it doesn't need to.

New Music - Part 13 - Tasha Taylor Johnson

It is none too rare for something like this to happen and oft-times I make nothing of it. This, however, was destined to prove an exception. I only got the chance yesterday evening and having now listened to the album four times I must say I'm impressed.
That album is 'Feed Your Ego' and is to be released by Quiffman Records (her own independent label) on May 5, 2013. The artist is Tasha Taylor Johnson. There is plenty going on here and my first thoughts are about how it is a throw-back to earlier times but almost always in a wholly good sense. Track-by-track dissections are not really my kind of reviewing. The mark of an album, I believe and especially in these download days, is if it stands as a satisfying whole. This one does.
She is young, this is her first album but that, as has been the case quite often of late, should not cloud your conceptions of it. My first thought was "OK, then", because I had no idea what to expect. My second thought was rather more telling; "I need to see this live."
Some things, many things actually, are so much better live and this music had all the hallmarks of being one of them. Of course I have as yet had no possibility of testing this theory. Here, instead and plundered from the website mentioned above, is a reason to believe that I might be right:

The image itself gives the only clues as to where this is. If it isn't 'The Old Queen's Head', Islington, London then tell me about it.
  
This is one of the songs from 'Feed Your Ego'.

Ol' Blues Eyes might be rolling his, whilst rotating in his grave, at the lyric. What the hell - who cares anyway - this album is so much fun. In a way I think that he might have seen the funny side of it, and Nancy likewise. I'd wager that Basil Kirchin would not have been displeased. 
  

*** SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT ***

Why am I not adding new items in 'Recently Listened To...' and why are the light-box views of images not working? These are Google Blogger issues at the moment and are widely reported. I hope that they will be fixed sooner rather than later.

New Music 2012 - Part 10 - Trailer Trash Tracys

Just as a starter, what an awesome band name. It tells of something and nothing in equal measure - leaving you to contemplate the beauty that it promises in complete isolation.

It could be all-out metal, for the band name would suit that, but in fact it isn't. It is actually so 2012 that it hurts in the very best way imaginable. I'm wary of saying what I think is comparable, or indeed influential, except to say this.
I like it. You know what I like in music. The album 'Ester' has it all. It is available on vinyl (Double Six Records) and how could you not want that album artwork on 12"?
When it comes to individual tracks that is just something that will have to wait for now. It is too much to take in one go.
  
Note added February 21, 2012:
Trailer Trash Tracys was today confirmed to be appearing at End Of The Road 2012. 

My Latest 'Thought on Music'

Is a stunningly simple revelation:
Much of the best music is that which I failed to find, appreciate or write about last year. My year-end report says that I must try harder.
If you want an alt-Christmas song then Pulled Apart By Reindeer might just be for you and the guilty party is London-based Kimmy Reader, who is one to watch in 2012.
If you want a cover song then here is her take on Temper Trap's 'Sweet Disposition'; covered acoustic and unplugged on a late night Metropolitan Line tube train. Why not take live music to unsuspecting people and record their reaction?

Acoustic Moon 3 - Where were you when...?

If you were bemoaning the vile weather, thinking about the logistics of Christmas and being autumnal in all the wrong ways, together with the fact that it was still only Thursday, then here are three words:

YOU . MISSED . OUT
  

If that is so then you have only yourself to blame. You could have been in a cosy village pub, with great food - from three-course feast to bar snacks - and drink at very reasonable prices, listening to some of the finest and most varied acoustic music that the UK has to offer. That is Acoustic Moon and the admission charge for that aspect is £5 on-the-door.  Trading Standards Authority motto to the public is this: "If something seems too good to be true then it probably is."
It is indeed good advice but, then again, all rules need a few exceptions for validation and this is one of them. Yesterday's selection of music was nothing if not varied except in that it happened to include two very different artists playing one of the rarest of percussion instruments and one that is new in the 21st century...
One of the oldest tuned acoustic instruments of all is, in its various forms, dulcimer. It doesn't have to look or sound ancient and around here we know that. It has been hammered into us in the best way possible.

Opening the evening - Intricate.

Barbara J Hunt on guitar and lead vocals with Dizzie on a thoroughly modern hammered dulcimer and sometimes including theatrical interpretations. There are absolutely no warm-up acts here and very soon that 21st century creation - the hang. It combines mid-19th century physics of acoustics, courtesy of Helmholz, and late 20th century metallurgy in the form of ammonia-gas-nitriding in an instrument that both looks and sounds like it might have actually been around since forever.  The first example did not however make a public performance until 2001 and they are all still made by a "cottage industry" in Switzerland.

To see one hang player in an evening is good fortune, to see two is a miracle.
  

The second hang player was Venus Bushfires and I do not actually have any pictures of that. It is for a reason. I was borrowed for another duty. I was watching, listening and recording but have no pictures of the set. She played solo, sometimes actually acapella, and showed a completely different aspect of hang playing. It sat in her lap rather than on a stand and was in support of a quite different style of music.

This is the one photo I did take, just after her set had finished.
    

It is rare that I don't write about an evening such as this in a single post, rarer still that I don't stick to the order in which the artists or acts appeared. In this case I have decided to do both - the three acoustic guitar artists are to follow.

What the Truck? In search of music as fun...

Never before have I attempted two 3-day festivals on successive weekends: Latitude followed by Truck Festival this weekend just gone.  When I added the latter in April it was because it just seemed an interesting thing to do and a way of seeing a wider range of live music. It did occur to me that, whilst almost certainly interesting, that might not be wholly in a positive way.
After two wet days at Latitude I was still wondering about the wisdom of it all. The contrast, not just in the weather, was such that once I had arrived on site in Oxfordshire I forgot clean about it because they were so different and that is the starting point here.
The following comments are not intended as a criticism of either event: Gone was the throng and corporate sponsorship gloss of Latitude and in came the homespun, almost folksy, intimacy of Truck Festival. It was very much a place to go to see and listen to music rather than a place to go to be seen to be listening to music.  It was certainly a whole lot of fun and one very much got the impression that the artists were enjoying themselves too. All kinds of music were on offer, from acoustic folk on the Wood Stage (and elsewhere) to technicolour noiseniks on the Last FM Stage and most things in between including more than a few lesser-known acts from middle England. As usual the problem is where to start.

Let's start with two bands that admitted that they had been burning the candle at both ends before appearing!

London based Tribes on the Last FM Stage on Sunday afternoon. They had been performing, and partying, at 'Secret Garden Party' the night before and apologized for being jaded. If this is what they can do in that state then the mind boggles. Despite the guitars and drums set-up and the powerful sound their songs are hook-laden.  Should you want to know how I think guitar-led pop should sound then it is pretty much like this.

Cashier No. 9 hails from Belfast. Here it is on the Clash Stage on Sunday lunch time.

Another good effort because this set was faultless despite the fact that they came on stage just twelve hours after they had come off the one at their previous gig in Londonderry.  It was summer music played out live on a perfect summer's day and the band has recently released its first album, the aptly titled 'To The Death Of Fun', on Bella Union Recordings.
  

This last comment leads me to another thought from the weekend - the resurgence of the record releasing 'label' as a guide to style and content. It was also a weekend that involved much discussing music and, in that sense, was much more reminiscent of End Of The Road than of Latitude.

Stick No Bills! - a day for posting posters...

I just could not resist adding this one, the latest from a band that I first saw performing live at EOTR 2009 and who are currently in the US for their performances at SXSW 2011.

The best bit, apart from the music of course, is that in this space I can fly-post to my heart's content with near impunity and, yes, you do need the 'Fugitive EP'.

It is free and legal too (see link in poster)!
  
Staying with events taking place across the Atlantic...

Poster art is, happily, still alive and well in the 21st century.

 

Real - Martha Tilston live at The Union Chapel

Now I realise that I made an error of judgement here.  I mentioned in the side-bar, back in December, an album that I regard as the live affirmation of the folk-influence in new music, both in the UK and also in the Americas.  I never expected that it would become so sought after...

That it has done so fully justifies it being the subject of my first blog post of the second decade of the 21st century - and the most common key words that led people here in the last 36 hours!  It's awesome and I thank you.
It is available to buy from the link below - and being 'Real' you need it in a physical format so SQRCD06 is available, direct from the artist:
http://www.marthatilston.co.uk/shop.html


This is the track list:

• Red
• Duvet
• Space
• Winter flowers
• Artificial
• Seagull
• Who are you
• Golden
• Corporations
• Good world

Direct artist-to-listener sales is a trend that I can see making much headway in 2011, whether that be via download, CD or vinyl.

As the winter winds...

It is twenty-one years since a non-Christmas seasonal song has had such resonance: The last being 'Fairytale of New York' by The Pogues and featuring the late Kirsty McColl. It still sells well on download, better than the following actually, but it finally has a rival.

Yes it was chosen by BBC Radio 1 as its seasonal song but that only makes it more remarkable: it prominently features banjo and even in the UK there has been love. That alone is an affirmation of the effort and dedication that it must have taken to write and record it, but was certainly no guarantor of its success.

Winter Winds

As the winter winds litter London with lonely hearts

The warmth in your eyes swept me into your arms

Was it love or fear that lead us through the night?

For every kiss your beauty trumped my doubt

And my head told my heart

Let love grow

But my heart told my head

This time no, this time no

We'll be washed and buried one day my girl

And the time we were given will be left for the world

The flesh that lived and loved will be eaten by plague

So let the memories be good for those that stay

And my head told my heart

Let love grow

But my heart told my head

This time no, this time no

The shame that sent me off from the God I once loved

Was the same that sent me into your arms

And pestilence has won when you are lost and I am gone

And no hope, no hope will overcome

But if your strife strikes at your sleep

Remember spring swaps snow for leaves

You'll be happy and wholesome again

When the city clears and sun ascends

And my head told my heart

Let love grow

But my heart told my head

This time no, this time no.

If this were the only good track on the album that would be something but it isn't. I am, in fact, unsure that it is any better or worse than the others, which is saying something given that this is a début album, but it is the one that is just perfectly allied with the current scenario. Most of the album would be probably be perfect listening at a barbeque on a warm summer night.

Its depiction of London has just reminded me of another song, again quite recent, and in this instance by an artist from outside the UK but that will have to wait for another post.

'True Love', and the patience of a saint?

Good things take time but ever since I mentioned the 'Bad EP - Emmy The Great' 7" vinyl EP in August 2007 I have been, and continue to be, amazed by the number of people looking for it.

Well here is more good news in 2009 - at long last I can tell you something important!
One of the long-mysterious, yet hardly underground, treasures of UK nu/alt/anti-folk (or whatever you care to call it) is about to release her début album True Love. If you are really quick you might get a signed copy of the CD for £10 + p&p, which would be a bargain, mail order from Pure Groove in London.


I'm certainly no saint here because I've put my money where my mouth is - I've already pre-ordered my copy - which is why I'm telling you this. That said, a vinyl release is also expected (no release date known to me as yet) but don't say that you weren't warned!

Yet more lyrics - Nitrogen Pink & Corridor

You will almost certainly have to click on the images below to enlarge and hopefully then make them readable but, since I can provide them thus, here are the lyrics from the 10" Nitrogen Pink by Polly Scattergood scanned straight from the fly-sheet provided with that release.

The surroundings here are urban, near industrial rather than sylvan, but then why should that be surprising?

Live at 'The Walpole', New Cross, London on 27/09/08.