Top of the World 83 – Songlines Compilation

When Songlines hit the target with one of their compilations it can be a thing of great beauty and Top of the World 83 is one of those moments. The highlights are as follows:

Ablaye Ndiaye Thiossane – ‘Thiere Lamboul’: I’m not a major fan of African music, but this is a beautiful and enchanting lullaby.

Emel Mathlouthi – ‘Dhalem’: A passionate power ballad with a distinctive and mesmerising voice.

Seth Lakeman – ‘Blacksmith’s Prayer’ – It reminds me of a young version of late era Johnnie Cash. Never liked the sound of Seth before, but this has changed my mind.

Treacherous Orchestra – ‘Superfly’: A joyous Irish jig that lasts for eight minutes.

I’ve never had much time for Huey Morgan either, but his selections on this disk are pure latin quality. If only he played this kind of material on his 6 Music show. The pick of the bunch is El Combo de los Galleros with ‘Soledad’:  It’s a quirky, old school, latin hip shaker!

 

 

Fay Hield and the Hurricane Party – Orfeo

This looks distinctly European from the classy cover to the arty title. However, they’re actually from Yorkshire and whether that is a positive factor is anyone’s guess.

The first track ‘The Lover’s Ghost’ is a beautiful, upbeat folk ballad with mysterious vocals and appropriately haunting instrumentation. I’m not saying it’s worth the price of the album on its own, but it needs to be.

The rest of the LP descends into the most hardcore ‘Hey Nonny Nonny’ style folk music you could ever imagine! We’re in sub-Steeleye Span territory and that’s a scary place to be for anyone. But never one to be put off by seemingly unlistenable music, I persevered and found some positivity and enjoyment in these Old English folk chestnuts.

My top tips for listening to this album are as follows. To gain full enjoyment it’s all in the preparation. I generally limber up by listening to ‘All Around my Hat’ by Steeleye Span and possibly do a little bit of Morris Dancing aerobics. Then I drink a couple of pints of strong homebrew cider with bits floating in it, walk a few miles in the fresh air and admire some trees and finally slip into my llama wool pyjamas and clogs, stick my finger in my ear and press play on ‘Orfeo’.

By following this preparation I ended up liking three from the remainder of the album. ‘The Old ‘Arris Mill’ is an accordion fuelled northern history lesson, ‘The Weaver’s Daughter’ is a beautiful, chilled banjo plucking ballad, and ‘Tarry Trousers’ is harsh on the ear, but ultimately fun. ‘Orfeo’ itself contains the obligatory reference to trees that has to appear on every folk album. ‘The oak, the ash and the bonny ivy tree’ are all fine; thank goodness for that.

It’s a mixed bag of mellow historical ballads and harsh traditional folk, but with a certain level of resilience it’s not a half bad album. Is that a recommendation? I’m not sure!

 

 

Sons and Daughters – This Gift

 

Sons and Daughters make a wholesome Scottish racket, but if anything this is a slightly more commercial offering than either ‘Repulsion Box’ or ‘Love the Cup’. That’s not necessarily a negative thing and this is easily their most consistent album to date. They seem to have lost the dual female vocals that counterbalanced the Scottish male drawl in a similar way to the B52’s, however the trademark Scottish aggressive shoutiness is still at the forefront.

This is music for everyday application. It’s the soundtrack of the kitchen sink drama of northern life. Whether you’re dropping the kids off, washing up or cutting the lawn. ‘This Gift’ is the perfect accompaniment to all that boredom. It will enrich your life and make you feel just a little happier.

All the songs are essentially winners, as Sons and Daughters have rarely made a duffer, but worthy of special mention are the howling competition of ‘This Gift’, the remake of the Banana Splits theme in ‘Rebel with the Ghost’ and the straightforward chugging of ‘Flags’. My favourite is the opening track ‘Gilt Complex’ which harks back to the earlier LP’s but adds the steel of stronger song writing.

A quality, solid album from the Scottish northcore merchants. Like toilet paper, cereal bars and marmite, it’s something you shouldn’t have to live without.

 

 

The Subways – All or Nothing

The Subways have all the constituent parts to produce a great album, but somehow always contrive to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory by managing to subtly spoil virtually every song with something irritating. They’re a ‘do what it says on the tin band’ with energy, hi-octane song-writing and clashing guitars. Basically, a slightly more upmarket Mega City 4 for the 21^st Century.

Let’s cut to the chase. All or nothing is agreeable enough, but none of the songs have that secret ingredient that made ‘Oh Yeah’ such a classic. It’s distinctly average, but in a good way for the first few listens, then each track gets flicked before it finishes. ‘Turnaround’ is the best of a mediocre bunch.

However, there is a plus side to the Subways. For some time now I’ve had my doubts that Mark King may not be the ideal choice when I am selecting my all time super-group. He’s just not a team player and I doubt he’d gell with the other members of the band. In short he’s a bit of a base playing show off with that weird thumb action. On the other hand Charlotte Cooper from the Subways would fit in perfectly and she can sing too. It’s a no brainer really; King’s benched and Cooper is in.

If you’re a fan of the Subways it’s OK. If you’re not I wouldn’t bother.

 

 

Kirsty Hawkshaw - Face to Face

Pick of the Week 35 – Kirsty Hawkshaw

Opus III singer Kirsty Hawkshaw is still going strong and has featured on tracks by, amongst others, Tiesto and BT. Her voice retains that crystal clear integrity and she’s moved on to become a solo performer/songwriter in her own right with an interesting looking album ‘Meta-Messages’, approaching the top of my listening pile. ‘Face to Face’ is an ambient/drum and base/trance crossover with Kirsty’s vocals again taking centre stage. It’s subtle, understated and soulful electronic music.

Django Django – Django Django LP

This is an odd little album, but surprisingly enjoyable at the same time. I’d never heard of Django Django until I received this as a Christmas present and on first listen I wasn’t impressed. However, repeated listens wore down my defences and I ended up really enjoying the whole experience.

It’s hard to define what Django Django sound like, other than it’s definitely a fusion of styles, from world music to 60’s psychedelia. Imagine the Beach Boys crooning along to a Transglobal Underground soundtrack and you won’t be too far away. And there’s some lovely slide guitar on the odd track as well.

The best tracks are undoubtedly the folky ‘Hand of Man’, the mellow ‘Life’s a Beach’ and the hey nonny nonny electro folk of ‘Default’. Best of all is the anthemic ‘Hail Bop’ which manages to combine all the best bits and influences from the album in one bite size chunk with the sing-a-long ending of the year.

This is a decent, original and interesting album and I’d definitely recommend it. Thank you Father Christmas.

 

(A lovely ginger beard in the photo too.)

 

 

Trentmoller – Late Night Tales

I generally like these Late Night Tales compilations where artists produce a mix incorporating their influences from different styles and genres. Trentmoller’s selections are no less eclectic and varied, but none are especially fun or innovative.  The main problem is, it sounds too much like Trentmoller.

All his picks are from a varied palette of  musical tones, however the atmosphere they evoke is the absolute spitting image of Andreas himself. There’s that trademark dark beauty, a starkness and an icy chill that permeates all of these songs. None are particularly offensive, but in a bizarre way for an ‘eclectic’ album, they’re just too’ samey’. It’s essentially like listening to ‘Into the Great Wide Yonder’, but through an ancient magical gramophone that allows you to access the sounds of yester-year.

Of most interest are the contributions of Eden Ahbez, Darkness Falls, Jacqueline Taieb and The Shangri-Las. This Mortal Coil, The Velvet Underground and Mazzy Star are also worth a listen if you’re not already familiar with their work.

Maybe I’m being harsh, because it would be spookily clever if it wasn’t so boring at the same time. If you like Trentmoller you may like this, but if you like Trentmoller then you may as well just listen to a Trentmoller album rather than this deconstructed soundscape of his influences. And with the money you save, buy the Belle and Sebastian Late Night Tales instead.

Kakkmaddafakka - Restless

 

Pick of the Week 34 – Kakkmaddafakka

They look Australian, but they’re actually from Norway, which means they’re positively mainstream for Scandinavia. It’s catchy indie pop from geeky looking northern Europeans. It’s possibly too catchy to hold your attention for long, but the video is a humorous take on 1980’s style PE lessons with a dinky little dance routine as an extra. I look forward to hearing their other output, however it's probably another 'Country Pancake' moment.

 

 

Okkervil River – Down the River of Golden Dreams

Once upon a time there was man who went by the name of Will Sheff. He lived in a dingy, depressing shack in mid-America somewhere between Neutral Milksville and Bright Eyes Creek. Because he had a Mr. Twit style beard and pungent body odour, neither of these local towns would let him live within their boundaries, so he created his own homestead on the banks of the Okkervil River. He invited his buddies to come and stay with him and together they decided to make music.

This was not the everyday music of the era however. They made music that wasn’t quite country, wasn’t quite rock and wasn’t quite folk. Sadly not many people wanted to listen to the dark, dirgy, folky concoction and Will and the band went largely unappreciated. This state of affairs remained unaltered for many years.

Until one day the Evil Witch of Dirge looked into her mirror. ‘Mirror, Mirror on the wall, who is the dirgiest of them all?’

‘I’m not quite sure,’ said the mirror, ‘It’s a toss up between you and that band near Okkervil River.’
The witch went a strange green colour and roared ‘I am PJ Harvey, the Evil witch of Dirge, and nobody produces a worse dirge than me!’

She gave their album ‘Down the River of Broken Dreams’ a listen and found that it was nowhere near as dirgy as her Godforsaken output. Some of the songs were indeed dark, but actually had a level of interest and melody that was always missing from her own terrible output. In fact ‘The Velocity of Saul at the Time of his Conversion’ was an absolute cracker, so there was no contest really.

The evil old bag PJ Harvey smashed the mirror to smithereens for his mistake and cackled, ‘No-one on this planet can produce the boring, dirge-fest of an excuse for music and still sell records like I can! Sorry Will Sheff, but you are not in my league so I will let you live. Mwooaaahahahahaha!’ And that’s exactly what happened. The end.

Mimicking Birds - 10%

Pick of the Week 33 – Mimicking Birds

Murmuring, miserable folk  music, what could be better? Portland, Oregan’s Mimicking Birds are Nate Lacy’s vehicle to release some low key, introspective folk numbers. He achieves this in spades with 10%; a muttering chunk of Americana with bonkers lyrics, timeless melody and no video. I can see the similarities to Iron and Wine, but it’s more subtle, haunting and lacking in facial hair. I like it a lot!

 

Sorry can't seem to make the Youtube link work!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8HCAvHiVrs