Favourite Listening of 2017

Another year and another small set of albums have naturally risen to the top of the pile, identifying themselves as the very best, to me, of those encountered in 2017. I note with interest that all voices in this selection are female, not a conscious choice but perhaps Freud could tell me a reason for it; in the year of grotesque behaviour from Weinstein, Trump and too many males elsewhere it seems appropriate, and where the balance of expressed humanity is right now.


Till April is Dead, A Garland of May – Lisa Knapp (England)


A May-themed album may seem a somewhat niche notion but in the capable hands of Lisa Knapp, who has yet to put a foot wrong in an impeccable musical progression, it is an inspired match to her history and talents. Rooted in the weird and wonderful English folk traditions of May time it is constantly yet subtly and subversively inventive, highly atmospheric, and by turns stirring, elegant and beautiful – as befits the season. Listened to on a soggy January day, finally past the shortest day, it keeps the promise of longer warmer days in morale boosting sight; played loudly and repeatedly on the balmy first of May last year it was an absolute joy.


Snowpoet – Snowpoet (England)
 

Gently jazzy, with a fascinating range of musical textures and pace changes, coupled with intriguing words coming and going that demand repeated attentive listening… It all adds up to something alarmingly addictive and pleasing with some truly magical moments, I can neither leave it alone nor fully explain it! It’s a bit like spending forty fascinating minutes in that disorientating no-mans-land between sleep and awake where it’s hard to fully grasp anything; wonderfully understated yet penetrating and persistent. Snowpoet are fronted by the London-based writing duo of Lauren Kinsella and Chris Hyson, with Lauren performing all the vocals, while versatile musician Chris is augmented by a number of others whose collective creativity and self-restraint are to be (quietly) applauded. This is their debut album from 2016 with a second due out in just a few weeks, I intend to be first in the queue.

(Oh and they are playing a double bill with the incomparable Olivia Chaney in May, just a 20 minute drive away in a hall with fabulous acoustics; this in a week I shall be away so can only admire the perfection of my disappointment – go for me if you can)


Agiorgitiko – Stathis Koukoularis & Martha Mavroidi (Greece)
 

Agiorgitiko is an adaptable red grape variety grown particularly in Greece, for a range of wine production, and like it this album could be considered a staple fruit of the nation. Legendary violinist Stathis Koukoularis is on blistering form alongside soaring young vocalist and lutist Martha Mavroidi as they provide definitive performances of a range of traditional music and song from the Aegean and Asia Minor, along with the single fine self-composed title track. There are no gimmicks or concessions to wider populism, this is unashamedly uncompromised traditional, utterly beautiful, music from start to finish. Savour it in a world of artifice.


Viena – Varttina (Finland)
 

Female Finnish band Varttina have surely been around forever, after all I remember buying their breakthrough album Oi Dai back in 1991 so they must be really quite old (like me) now, right? Not so it seems, unlike me they appear to have access to Dr Who like regeneration powers, with frequent personnel changes meaning they have managed to sustain if not enhance their trademark youthfulness and energy. This was brought home emphatically at a live performance locally just before Christmas, fittingly in the week of the centenary of Finnish independence, when the three current members, arriving late after traumatic travel problems and with no supporting musicians, simply blew away a full house. It’s easy to be beguiled by the traditional costumes and humour (almost slapstick at times) Varttina bring to their live performance which disguise apparently effortless yet formidable vocal strength and skill in perfect synchronisation, coupled with impressive musicianship on kantele and accordion. Prior to independence Finland was part of Russia and those roots are a key inspiration musically, witness this tremendous new album (one of their absolute best, which is saying something given the number they have produced down the years) which has been inspired by visits to the lingering traditional villages and customs of the Viena Karelia (or White Karelia) region on the Russian side of the border. Inventively based on traditional words and melodies Viena provides a wonderful mix of powerful and delicate singing, often moving, and unique to this part of world – and well worth embracing.


A Pocket of Wind Resistance – Karine Polwart with Pippa Murphy (Scotland)
 

Having listened to this a number of times I indulge myself with the fanciful thought that it was released in late November, just too late to be included in any music publications “best of the year“ considerations (and probably too early to be remembered next time round), as an act of charitable consideration for other contenders. So yes, it’s a bit special. How special? Respected author Robert Macfarlane when asked for his best books of 2017 by the Guardian newspaper demonstrated his alertness by majoring on a single volume, the 64 page printed version of essentially the words to this album. Yet both of these productions are subsequent to their profound source, the 2016 Edinburgh Festival theatre production Wind Resistance, a theatre debut for renowned Scottish musician and ex-social worker Karine Polwart. All three incarnations of the work individually and exquisitely capture the natural cycle of Scottish rural life both human and animal, with stunning evocations of the natural world, notably through the migration of geese, and human love, pregnancy and childbirth, the hardships of winter, and no holds barred tragedy. A powerful and imaginative combination of music (composer Pippa Murphy deserves significant credit), natural sounds, song and spoken word including Burns poetry delivers a profound story that goes way beyond a normal musical production. Formidable, utterly humane, and be warned - there may be tears before the end.



See Also:  Favourite Listening of 2016
                  Another Year of Reading - In Pictures (2017)

 

Favourite Listening of 2016

Integrity, not a word you hear too much just now in these messed-up times, but it is the one that best unites the music I’ve reached for most in 2016, often for my own sanity. Though never “easy listening” the following provided me with compelling listening; individually impressively creative and often demonstrating the degree of social and environmental conscience and sheer humanity we currently seem so short of…

Maarja Nuut: Une Meeles, In The Hold Of A Dream (Estonia)

 

A lazy person might describe young Nuut as the Bjork of Eastern Europe, since her highly individual fiddle playing and singing certainly reminds of the Icelander’s quirky style. But she is her own unique uncompromising composer, musician and voice, using traditional elements but also pushing things to their limits and subtly using loops and other augmentation to deliver widely varying, sometimes challenging, but always deeply satisfying pieces.

Julie Murphy: Every Bird That Flies (Wales)

 

The latest solo album from Julie Murphy, lodged in deepest Wales, is as immaculate and beautifully contemplative as all its predecessors; just her and a piano with the subtlest of occasional extra accompaniment. The musical and vocal delivery (all in English here as opposed to the Welsh she often uses with band Fernhill) is stripped back to only what is absolutely needed, every word and note counts, and the entirety feels like the most quietly insightful of poetry. Inclusion of lines from Emily Dickinson in one piece is simply at one with the whole. Julie also believes in keeping things local and comprehensively shuns the corporate approach; the album is only available from her directly via bandcamp, is adorned by a photo of one of her own elegant sculptures, and she was kind enough to sign my own copy when asked.

Nyn: Kristi Stassinopoulou & Stathis Kalyviotis (Greece)

 

Nyn means Now, and this stirring album pulls no punches in capturing the current desperate state of affairs in Greece in pulsating manner. Kristi and Stathis make extensive use of both synthesisers and traditional instruments and have a track record of making compelling music that arguably reaches a new height here. Although sung in Greek the entire lyrics and some additional context on Greece’s dire plight are included in English in a booklet that is essential powerful reading.

Vesevo: Vesevo (Italy)

 

The psychology of living right next to a large active volcano is obviously tricky, but something Neopolitans seem to have managed down the years with a certain panache. This seems to infuse local music and song, along with strong socialist principles that continue to be driven by the parlous state of parts of the city and the disadvantaged of Naples. Back in 2000 the superb but fleeting outfit Spaccanapoli produced the landmark album Lost Souls that seemed to come from nowhere and capture the essence of the city with a possibly never-to-be-bettered perfection. Now, two musicians from that band combine with a third into the new Vesevo (Vesuvius), which stunningly showcases the music of Calabria, to the south of the city. With hand drums, fiddle, keyboards, guitar and emotional soaring vocals, it’s evocative, addictive and rather intoxicating.

Geomungo Factory: Imago (South Korea)

 

Let’s see now, this cost a cool £22, took two and half months to arrive from South Korea, and plays for a mere 30 minutes, was it really worth it? The geomungo is a zither-like traditional Korean stringed instrument with a rather percussive sound, which seems to lend itself to vigorous and innovative playing, witness a bunch of young ground-breaking South Korean bands currently taking it to very new places. Geomungo Factory are prominent amongst these, and made a big impact with their first album Metamorphosis (currently virtually unobtainable in the west) and a brief visit to London in 2013. Fortunately a second album has now appeared that I was able to get via the essential Far Side website (www.farsidemusic.com gateway to all musical things Far Eastern), and am delighted to report it is superb. There’s some mad, bad composition and playing here that absolutely stops you in your tracks! Given Metamorphosis was also apparently short it does however seem a missed opportunity that they didn’t release the two albums on one CD at a sensible price, then they really would have a world beater. Note there are other ground-breaking geomungo bands and albums out there, I also have the longer and more affordable Mask Dance by outfit Black String (smartly released in Europe via a German label) which although superbly deranged still doesn’t quite hit the dizzy heights of Imago for me.

Kate Tempest: Let Them Eat Chaos (England)

 

Has anyone got a more appropriate surname right now than Kate? She’s not a singer, she’s not a musician, but some refer to her as a performance poet (though she’s also a prose author). On this album though, she’s simply and appropriately a force of nature. Let Them Eat Chaos is a book length poem that is a stunning read in published form, describing the variously messed up lives of seven Londoners as a vehicle for nailing where our society is right now, before delivering an environmental coup de grace that nature is all too likely to do for real. But the piece is designed to be read aloud and this album is that reading (and rapping), to often powerfully effective musical accompaniment. The result is astonishing and vital; it tells us all exactly where we are right now and what we need to understand before we can even begin to get out of the huge hole we’ve dug for ourselves. This is not background music, this is the main event that demands you pay attention, and the most essential listen of the last year, and today.

See also: Favourite Listening of 2015
                A Year of Reading - In Pictures
 

Favourite Listening of 2015

It’s that time of year again, and 2015 has provided a particularly diverse and exciting range of new (to me) musical listening. My favourite half dozen albums of the past year are detailed below for your consideration, and hopefully enjoyment.

As an aside, my listening was briefly interrupted this year by the final expiry of my trusty hi-fi, after 23 years sterling service, as the amplifier died and the attached CD player made an increasingly alarming range of noises. So what to do? I’m as impressed as anyone by the clever new ways of listening to music; my credit card sized iPod containing 250 CDs-worth of music still amazes me, providing tolerable sound quality and a handy ability to be plugged into the car stereo, and networked and blue-toothed options abound. But still nothing comes close to a decent hi-fi with a couple of reasonably-sized high quality speakers, fed by good quality source material, for fully appreciating a piece of music in all its detail, mood and subtlety. It frequently even trumps live music when focussing purely on the music, as the latter is at the mercy of remarkably common dodgy sound systems, engineers and acoustics that can leave you deafened and/or puzzling over the lyrics or the crudeness of the sound.

Reports in recent years of the impending death of the CD in favour of the download, streaming, or some such internet-enabled nebulosity, left me wondering if it would still be sensible or even possible to invest in a replacement CD-based system. It became necessary to take a deep breath and plunge briefly into the rather disturbing world of hi-fi magazines (£200 for a 1m cable anyone?) to educate myself. The message I got from this little exercise was strangely reassuring; buried in many of the reviews of weird and wonderful digital audio devices at absurd prices was the frequent referral to CD-quality sound as the standard that many new devices still aspire to, but frequently don’t reach. And since I’ve also detected a renewed commitment to the issuing of new music of the sort that interests me on physical CD (not to mention my existing collection), I decided I was going to stick with it for as much of the next 23 years as possible. So a couple of shiny new boxes have been installed at moderate expense, the sound quality is even better than before, and I can get promptly back to thinking about the music rather than equipment (very much the opposite, I fear, to regular readers of those magazines - I believe it’s largely a male thing)...

 

The Gloaming

The Gloaming are the new band of the profoundly impressive Irish sean-nos singer Iarla O Lionaird that I was fortunate enough to see perform in great style in 2014 (see 19May2014 post). On this, the bands eponymous first album from 2014, the deeply moving Gaelic songs performed by Iarla on the first and final tracks would alone justify its purchase price, yet there is so much more to it than that. Indeed more than half the tracks of the highly coherent whole, more like a symphony of movements rather than a collection of disparate tracks, are instrumentals. And these, including both fiddle and guitar played respectively by the formidable Martin Hayes and Dennis Cahill, but also fine sensitive piano from Thomas Bartlett, are measured, consequential, and often semi-classical in range and flow, though always with a traditional Irish core that is occasionally allowed freer rein. Overall this is a serious, magnificent, timeless piece of work that will always reward the thoughtful listener.

Olivia Chaney: The Longest River

So at last the long awaited debut album arrives, and has to immediately run the gauntlet of the sky high expectations that have been given too much time to accumulate. On initial listen it’s a pretty good piece of work: crystalline, emotive, intricate, elegant and polished, with material centred on youthful growing pains that the recording label, witness promotional tours in Australia and the US but not the UK, have clearly decided is best suited to an offshore/transatlantic market. Good yet measured and caveated early press reviews however, prioritising timely publication perhaps, suggest that those high expectations have not been exactly met. After a couple of listens I tended to agree, there seemed no immediate wow-factor of the sort perhaps we were all expecting, knowing just how uniquely talented and engaging Chaney is - based on live performances and the 5-track EP of a couple of years ago. And yet. This album has refused to let go and has drawn me back again and again, and has grown in stature with every listen in a way I recall of the best of the likes of Joni Mitchell. I’ve finally had to admit that this is actually a very fine and often poignant work, with sufficient depth and quality to provide substantial and sustained rewards, and am left pondering whether some of the writers so keen to be first with a review would actually write something different given a later opportunity.

Attwenger: Spot

23 tracks in 40 minutes from Austria’s finest alpine duo delivers a quick-fire Germanic accordion/ drums/ synthesizer based object lesson in rampant creativity and sheer beguiling entertainment that leaves many other established artists looking comparatively shabby in those departments. See my previous (15Nov2015) post on this splendid, criminally unsung outfit for far more.

Stick In the Wheel: From Here

This is not a nice album. It’s brash, in-yer-face, Essex. Raw down-to-earth contemporary stories are mixed with almost brutal no-nonsense reworking of traditional folk standards for an effect that some of a nervous disposition might find offensive (“the antidote to twee” has been one description, “punk-folk” I might almost suggest). Somehow evocative of many current injustices and with an air of not-so-quiet desperation; but boy is it bracing! They still call it folk, but it seems to have blown guys in Arran jumpers with fingers in their ears to kingdom come. fRoots magazine Critics Poll Album of 2015. Awesome. Nuff said.

Moriarty: Epitaph

I picked this up while stranded at Orly airport, nudged by a vaguely remembered favourable review and, yes, its exquisite hardback book format. Moriarty are a well-established French-based band fronted by distinctive singer Rosemary Standley, who sing in English but have been strangely absent from British soil for some years. Whatever their origins, the bands core sound is, if anything, gusting towards American traditional (blues, ballads, hillybilly…), though always versatile and, as I’m discovering, always compelling. Epitaph indicates an album whose central theme is death, and how it is variously coped with, yet this is not the complete downer it might sound – Moriarty have a talent for originality, atmosphere and for getting the feet tapping, and spirits (pun intended) can’t be kept down for long. They also put a high value on craftsmanship, evident both in the sheer quality of their performances and their beautifully presented albums – Epitaph comes in a cloth-bound book full of intriguing and elegant drawings and hand-written lyrics.

The White Stripes: De Stijl

OK so this is catch-up time for the old codger who is just 15 years late on this one. Based on the well proven rule that 90% of current mainstream pop/rock music is mutton dressed in myriad different ways as lamb, I don’t really track it very much. This obviously runs the risk of missing the odd gem, which is a pretty good description of Jack and Meg White, alias The White Stripes. This is the first album of theirs I picked up, and I was immediately blown away by the power of rock music being performed with greater charisma, originality and sheer competence than I’ve heard it for a very long time. Superficially some of it may sound like much that has gone before, but this is somehow considerably superior to most, with some great classy musicianship, and very very addictive. It’s a while since I bought three albums by the same outfit in as many weeks, and it was also rather novel to be twice congratulated on my choice by young music shop staff; respect!

The White Stripes also have an irresistible ability to tease you into nudging the volume up, and up, and even to wonder if perhaps some slightly bigger speakers might be in order…  Hmmm, where exactly did I put those magazines?

Happy listening, however you do it.


See also: Favourite Listening of 2014 

Alpine Punk Anyone? The Genius of Attwenger (and John Peel)

I always struggle when someone asks me what sort of music I like. The honest if facetious sounding answer is good music, of any sort. This seems to run counter to a common expectation that you should instead name a limited number of widely recognised genres, bands or singers. Musical categories are something of a necessary evil; they provide a vocabulary for trying to describe what you hear and feel but can also act more negatively in reverse by creating perceived boundaries beyond which many fear to tread. This can be reinforced by the music media which often operates in a correspondingly compartmentalised fashion, with both media and public hence having to choose which individual “compartments” they are going to engage with, the natural consequence being that all else gets excluded.

I’ve just finished reading the hefty, addictive and cumulatively impressive tome Good Night and Good Riddance by David Cavanagh which documents the late great radio DJ John Peels’ approach to, and profound influence on, new music engagement and taste in Britain. 35 years of subversive and provocative broadcasting that miraculously survived BBC conservatism allowed Peel to encourage large numbers of new unconventional musicians, and steered listeners to the vastly enriched world thus created. However, Peel broadcasts were never easy listening; they were akin to panning for gold: often deeply uncomfortable, patience testing, and with large amounts of crap to get through. Yet you still knew you were in the best possible place to encounter genuinely life-changing nuggets, and so you did – everyone who stuck with it will have their own prizes.

A key part of Peels radio approach was a kind of shock tactic; in addition to being willing to play virtually anything on his shows, however obscure, rough or provocative, and of any genre, as long as it had some sort of (often well disguised to his listeners) merit to his ears, he made a particular point of sequencing tracks in the most jarring way possible. This left the listener all over the place, constantly trying to re-adjust; it was hard work and challenging – but I soon realised that was the point, to (often brutally) challenge his audience, to see if they would “get” yet another music possibility. In so doing they had to constantly question their current preferences and boundaries – mind expanding stuff.

All of which is a rather long-winded introduction to celebrating a rare new release by one of my favourite category-busting bands of the last twenty years. A largely unrecognised duo from Austria about which Peel in typically perfunctory style simply said “I have no idea what it’s all about, but I like the general noise a great deal”.

Attwenger

Attwenger comprise Markus Binder and Hans-Peter Falkner from Linz, Austria who on their emergence in the early 1990s had a highly distinctive, rapid, in-your-face sound, which could be broadly described as manically fast drums and accordion overlaid with inscrutable Germanic lyrics, often spoken rather than sung. It was sufficiently new, raw and engaging that it provoked the (possibly tongue-in-cheek) coining of a new genre – Alpine Punk, recognising its core building blocks lay in the traditional music and instruments of their homeland. Their initial 1991 release Most captures this style best, and is still a fun listen – with even the occasional yodel creeping in. Others such as the notable Bavarian band Hundsbuam Miserablige subsequently joined in and developed the theme further (their leader inspired by an Attwenger concert), and their eponymous first album from 1996 is also well worth a spin.

Early Attwenger were highly influential in firing up a whole Alpine New Wave and enjoyed considerable acclaim, locally at least, to the extent that it all got a bit much and they ceased to exist in 1995 to get a break from it all. Two years later however, they roared back with something very different, and this ability to move on with great originality and panache has proved to be one of their key assets. The 1997 release Song left the punk moniker well behind and hinted at how their longer term evolution would progress, to something far more sophisticated and interesting. Dominated by clubby repetitive trip-hop and jungle beats, centred around the synthesizer with only light-touch folk and traditional elements, Song broke very different ground with its small number of long mesmerising tracks. Yet it in turn was something of a transitional step, marking out new territory of interest, before inventively amalgamating this with the earlier more traditionally based style to arrive at a far more creative, varied, yet balanced and satisfying sound that gelled fully for the first time in 2002 on the album Sun, which took them to a whole new level and remains a firm favourite of mine.

Attwenger largely sing/speak in an Upper Austrian dialect that is beyond even many Bavarians, let alone a wider audience; a situation the duo use to advantage by treating the vocals more as another interesting sound source than an explicit source of meaning. But with each album from Sun onwards it’s got a lot more intriguing than that; wordplay has become a key part of their art, with careful positioning and emphasis of occasional words or phrases that have alternative meanings across several languages they create fascinating ambiguities and pulses of meaning (or possible meaning anyway) that jump out at the careful listener of a particular language in time with the music. It can all get quite beguiling.

 

This complex and absorbing style has developed and matured in unhurried fashion from Sun through the subsequent albums Dog (2005) and Flux (2011), to the very pleasing latest offering a couple of months ago, Spot. The latter is an object lesson in creativity and sophistication, with 23 diverse tracks nearly all under two and half minutes, showcasing a level of entertaining and playful inventiveness that most artists would give an arm for. Seek it or its predecessors out for a rewarding new musical experience ranging from the languid to the frenetic. Oh, and play it loud for greatest appreciation, this really isn’t music for half-measures.

Getting my first Attwenger albums in pre-internet times was a rather mysterious experience; sending cheques off to the sole UK distributers, the splendidly named Klang Records at the Tolkienesque address of Midgehole Road, Hebden Bridge in the deepest darkest Pennines. I had visions of a flea-ridden establishment like something from the slightly disturbing TV black comedy series The League of Gentlemen. They now have a clunky, rarely updated website of exquisitely obscure recordings – are they really still there I sometimes wonder?

Coincidentally I only recently discovered that klang is German for sound – so actually a rather boring name. Sometimes it’s better not to know; although such changes in perception with language are pure Attwenger!

 

Despite nearly 25 years of inspired music making Attwenger are hardly known in Britain and as such they epitomise the great music that is out there in the wider musical world that many would find exciting and rewarding if only they knew about it and could hear it for themselves. John Peel was a special and relatively lonely explorer and champion of new music on the national airwaves in his time, an impressive one-stop shop for those with sufficient open-minded hunger. A few others on the radio have subsequently picked up the baton to varying degrees, and arguably across a wider front, though generally with a lot less appetite for the truly experimental and half-formed. But the key now, in this digital era, is perhaps for each of us to develop that appetite, beyond any simplistic constraints of familiar artists or genres. The internet-enabled means for new musicians to put stuff out-there and for listeners to find it, with or without the help of intermediaries, means exciting and rewarding new music is literally at our fingertips if we want it enough to go looking. Maybe we just need to first hear that one fantastic piece of music that tells us just how good it can be…



The tip of the John Peel tribute iceberg

 

World Music, and its current British suffocation

World music, perhaps you’ve heard of it? It’s that little afterthought category in the corner of your (increasingly rare) music store. So what exactly is it if it’s so small and unimportant?

Of course it essentially means “rest of the world” music from a western English-speaking perspective, since the store, its internet equivalents, the music media, and increasingly the live music scene, in Britain at least, are dominated by music made by and for English speakers, with a little gaelic folk and a fair bit of classical thrown in. After all, that’s what people want… isn’t it?

But hang on a minute, isn’t world music actually something rather enormous? In fact, strictly isn’t all that western English-speaking music really just a small subset of it, and given western English speakers probably make up considerably less than 10% of the world population, isn’t there an awful lot of great music to be had from the other 90% of that population? The answer, for anyone who’s taken the time to look, is an absolutely deafening YES; there’s an overwhelming amount of excitement, richness and diversity to be had everywhere you look, with genres and sub-genres galore. I’ve spent most of my adult life discovering and savouring this treasure trove and remain bewildered at what a minority interest it is given the gems on offer. The sheer scale of this missing (in Britain) music is nicely illustrated by the two massive tomes that comprise the Rough Guide to World Music, first published fifteen years ago at over 1400 pages in an act of apparently almost lunatic enthusiasm and erudition, and which has continued to grow significantly since. To put that in perspective, the corresponding Classical Music guide barely makes 500 pages.

A rather large catalogue of what's currently missing in British music coverage

To my mind this begs a few questions, mainly stemming from the basic point that people can only want what they know about. So who’s telling them, and more to the point who’s not? Of course there are specialist sources out there for those already plugged into this area (e.g. the excellent fRoots and Songlines magazines in Britain) but how do you get to listen to stuff to establish what floats your boat? How can you be serendipitously drawn into different areas of world music if you never chance across it being played? At this juncture it’s impossible to avoid pointing a finger at the mainstream broadcasters in Britain, and the BBC with its public service remit in particular.

Current BBC radio music broadcasting has four main channels to play with (Radio 1,2,3 on analogue and digital and BBC6 on digital only), with Radio 1 and 2 catering for the established mainstream music (all that English-speaking stuff from the music store). Classical-only Radio 3 roams the airwaves like some sort of superannuated dinosaur that has somehow failed to go extinct, with slightly patronising token forays into jazz and (very rarely now) world music; I have nothing against classical music but the monopoly the BBC allows it, given their limited resources, increasingly seems like something from a bygone age. To its credit BBC6 Music does try, and does manage to be more diverse and stimulating, but even it has not fully and openly grasped the whole world music thing. Interestingly though, following a robust repelling by listeners of BBC plans to axe it, BBC6 Music is now going from strength to strength with its listening figures beginning to outstrip those for Radio 3.

BBC World (Music) Service anytime soon?

So what of live music, which is usually the best way to do justice to outstanding talent? If all else fails surely you can just try going to a few concerts/gigs where recommended foreign musicians are playing? This may still work if you’re London-based, but good luck anywhere else in Britain. Within the last twenty five years there have never been fewer such world music performances going on than right now. It’s tricky to nail the reasons for sure, certainly they fell off very sharply after the last financial crisis perhaps because venues or labels couldn’t afford the costs, and the tightening of security may be making it trickier for some foreign performers to get visas. But my overwhelming sense is of a depressing level of conservatism amongst event organisers. Festivals are more popular than ever all over Britain and run through much of the year, and yet when I scan the impressively long lists of performers for them, they’re full of competent but same old same old names that you only want to see so many times, and it’s rare indeed to spot a truly outstanding and exciting new name from overseas despite the vast untapped talent out there.

Rumour has it that the new controller of Radio 3 has a taste for world music, and the editor of fRoots keeps hammering festival organisers to show some gumption, so let’s hope things have reached rock bottom and that the only way is up – it certainly feels that way. If popularity and success require the oxygen of publicity then world music in Britain is currently suffocating.

As for me, I’m fine – the exciting and uplifting discoveries keep coming and the obscure CDs from sometimes equally obscure addresses keep arriving; it’s all those who are missing out I’m concerned about.

And what of the Welsh? - the most elusive music in Britain

Since the spine-tingling performance by 9Bach I described in May, and the deserved recognition they’ve been building in the mainstream press ever since, I’ve found myself repeatedly musing on the curious state of creative Welsh-rooted music more generally. Wales resolutely remains a place apart within the UK despite its intimately close proximity to its dominant English neighbour, a situation long sustained by geography and history. That the only motorway links between the two run along the north and south coasts like the rods in a wall hanging, neatly isolating and preserving the vast rural heartland in between, surely assists this even into modern times.

Llanthony Priory, in the peaceful Vale of Ewyas

As to the people, I should first declare a piece of personal baggage:

Some twenty or so years ago a couple of friends and I found ourselves in Caenarfon, the epicentre of Welsh-speaking North Wales, early on a Saturday evening after a long day on the hills of Snowdonia, dishevelled and in search of food and drink. We went into a busy, promising looking pub in the main square, whereupon the place fell silent within seconds. Undeterred we strolled to the bar and waited for the oddly absent staff to reappear, to no avail. As the minutes passed customers quietly and smugly peered round at us, and after a while we realised this was going nowhere and headed for the door. As we opened the door to leave, the banter in the main bar smartly rose, the apparent culmination of an impressive and well-practiced piece of communal passive aggression. Given that we knew that if we’d strolled into a similar establishment in Scotland or Ireland we would have been new best mates with the locals at the bar within minutes, it all seemed rather sad. Fortunately the staff at the Chinese takeaway in a nearby side street had no such hang-ups and did us proud.

While possibly an overreaction, I’ve never entirely shaken off the sense this gave me of a certain wilful insularity in parts of Wales, and particularly in the Welsh speaking areas that also currently provide the source of much of its finest and most exciting music. This combination does however seem to have created a strange situation where that music is held very close, and rarely strays outside the homeland, which is why 9Bachs uninhibited recent breakout into England and the stir they’re currently causing at a number of major festivals has been so striking. Many with even a casual interest in the locally rooted but creative music of Britain and Ireland will be able to name major singers or bands that represent most geographic regions whether singing in English or Gaelic; but for Wales?

I’m still in the early stages of my exploring, but two key things I’ve discovered are (a) there is absolutely no shortage of terrific Welsh-rooted music whether instrumental or sung in Welsh and/or English, and ( b) if you currently want to hear the best Welsh music live you are (with very rare exceptions) going to have to go to it because it’s not coming to you. This second issue even extends to the difficulty of buying recordings of the music, a number of the best artists I’ve found being unavailable via mainstream websites or shops, and only obtainable via an individual specialised website that needs seeking out. Deliberate insularity? Lack of confidence? If the music was so-so it might be understandable, but it’s absolutely wonderful! So to stop whinging and start promoting, here are some current favourites:

 

The harp permeates much Welsh music, giving it a unique and often gentle or delicate texture, and to enjoy it in its purest form with spell-binding compositions and playing of the highest order you can do no better than to savour the work of Anglesey-based Llio Rhydderch. Don’t be fooled that she looks like everyones favourite bright-eyed gran, this woman is exceptional and mentors a number of young up and coming players. Blending harp with exhilarating Welsh vocals, soaring and gentle by turns, Sian James is an established and justly major artist within Wales but has been inexplicably absent much further afield down the years. Her 1993 album Distaw remains her clear masterpiece and is well worth seeking out. More outward looking is harpist Catrin Finch from Aberystwyth who has teamed up with renowned Senegalese kora player Seckou Keita to recently create the mesmerising intricate instrumental album Clychau Dibon, so good that in a coup for Welsh music it won this years highly prestigious fRoots magazine album of the year award.

So far, so refined, but Wales does edgy and pulse-racing too. I won’t rave any more about 9Bach here but the absurdly unknown Taran really do need some trumpeting. This is varied, innovative and energetic pulsing dance/house-influenced music with a sharp Welsh cultural edge, with both Welsh and English lyrics and occasional powerful use of the spoken word. At the heart of the spine-tingling final track of their recent captivating album Hotel Rex is a riveting reading of the Dylan Thomas poem And Death Shall Have No Dominion, the gravitas of which is quite something. Good luck finding this album which comes on a particularly home-recorded looking CD!

 

And so to Fernhill, named after another fine Dylan Thomas poem. Not so much a case of Wales reaching out, as of someone reaching in. Core singer Julie Murphy hails from Essex but married a Welshman, moved to deepest rural Wales, and speaks fluent Welsh (better than her husband!). I’ve found it impossible to liken Fernhill's style to anyone else’s; it is quiet, complex, often jazz-influenced and sung in an intriguing mix of Welsh and English. As such it has over the years become a unique and sophisticated Welsh sound. It is certainly not “easy listening”, but if the listener has the appetite it is hugely rewarding, more like the musical equivalent of a good piece of literary fiction than a lightweight chick-lit novel. With time I’ve got the hang of this music, and perhaps it has also been made a little more accessible, certainly the most recent album Amser is proving particularly stimulating as the layers and subtleties emerge with each new listening, marvellous intelligent stuff! Once again, you won’t yet find this on Amazon.

The diversity and pleasure to be had from all the above music is considerable, and interestingly they all have a distinctly Welsh feel in their own individual ways which are hard to nail with any single glib explanation and it’s probably foolhardy to try. Nonetheless, appreciating it all, I’m drawn strongly to the dark suspicion that they all thrive on a degree of apartness and otherness that a measure of insularity may be necessary to preserve. Maybe the Welsh know exactly what they’re doing!

Useful Welsh music source: www.sadwrn.com

Afon Cwm Llan, Snowdonia

 

Favourite Listening of 2013

As someone with a lifelong passion for searching out and savouring new, interesting and exciting music it's always instructive at the end of the year to identify those albums that I have most reached for in the last 12 months.

 

In no particular order, they are:

Olivia Chaney: Olivia Chaney (EP)  Even though I am continually trying new music it is usually several years between those full-on "hair standing up on the back of the neck" moments. Ms Chaney is responsible for the latest of these, being an astonishing singer and instrumentalist who simply has to sit down at a piano and get stuck in to hold you in her hand. Elegant and slightly classical in feel, with mostly traditional/folk style (but highly original in content) song material it manages to be both simple and spellbinding. Exasperatingly, given her obvious talents, Chaney has for some years remained almost wilfully inaccessible - preferring to play many random supporting roles for other better-known (but possibly not better) performers rather than release any albums of her own, or tour solo. This EP contains just five songs and is stunning, and is clearly a kind of holding action in the face of growing pressure to do more. Unfortunately it's so good that pressure is now likely to rise noticeably to get that first proper album out! Rumour has it she has finally signed a deal to do such a thing in 2014, fingers crossed!

Katy Carr: Paszport  Katy Carr is half-English, half-Polish and seemed to arrive in the music worlds consciousness about 18 months ago - mainly as a result of this captivating and moving album (though its predecessor Coquette is arguably just as good). Paszport tells the wartime exploits of various Polish protagonists in varied and engaging ways, demonstrating Carrs huge musical versatility in the process - it is utterly involving from start to finish, including the sound of a Spitfire flypast on one track! Carr is a qualified pilot (something I read suggested an ex-RAF pilot), has a band called the Aviators, and is always immaculately dressed in 1940s vintage fashion. She spends a lot of time performing to Polish audiences both in Poland and the UK, and I continue to try and triangulate on a live performance I can attend. One to savour when it happens.

Helene Blum: En Gang Og Altid  Danish singer Helene Blum is stunning in both appearance (well someone has to say it) and in terms of what she is capable of vocally. Although sung entirely in Danish this debut album from 2008 remains my favourite for being more lively, varied and just plain beautiful than the two more measured subsequent albums I have (Christmas album Liden Sol and Men med abne Ojne) which are still very satisfying but in more of a slow-growing sort of way. Blum is married to fiendishly talented fiddler Harald Haugaard and the two have toured the UK regularly in recent years, generally playing in small village halls and churches. The prospect of seeing them perform in such a venue is very enticing; frustratingly I have yet to be able to make the date/place combinations on offer - but hopefully next time...

The Jimmy Hendrix Experience: Electric Ladyland  Well, how did I get to my age without doing Hendrix justice? I thing it's a measure of how much wonderful music there is out there that the temptation is to ignore the big obvious stuff and seek out the embarrassment of well hidden riches. This would be played even more if I didn't have to wait for the neighbours to go out first, so I can put the volume up to where it has to be. This is guitar playing that will never be surpassed, and to think I now have the rest of his back-catalogue to discover!

Lisa Knapp: Hidden Seam  This is Lisa Knapp's second album, a solid 7 years after her very promising first (Wild and Undaunted), and it confirms she is on her own very special and creative trajectory and not "just another folk singer". This album is so full of highlights, and lacks a duff track, that it's hard to pick out just one. I love the simplicity of the Shipping Song, based on the BBC shipping forecast, which burrows into your head - never to leave, and a number of other songs are similarly captivating and memorable (like the best (or worst?!) pop songs). Innovation is everywhere so that despite an underpinning traditional ethos this is highly engaging, accessible and entertaining throughout. Seeing Lisa and talented husband Gerry Diver performing recently in a very small, modest venue was a joy, the highlight being an extraordinary rendition of the Shipping Song.

PJ Harvey: Let England Shake  Released in 2010, this is an album I will continue to play regularly for a long time to come. That it would win the Mercury prize was a given for me as soon as I heard it was on the shortlist - it is so powerful and untouchable, and clearly the pinnacle of PJs output to date. Focusing on Britain's military history and the brutal realities of war and its legacies, it is pretty important, relevant stuff that everyone should engage with. That it was recorded in a country church, yards from where my grandparents are buried, adds considerable personal poignancy. I also recommend the DVD version of this album that contains 12 short films by Seamus Murphy to accompany the songs. Given the powerful nature of the songs it seems unlikely the films should work - but they really do.