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their drooping career? But this one’s a little different. For a start the westerners involved are young unknowns and this is their first encounter with the African tradition in ques- tion (that of the Luo people of Kenya). Tom Skinner (drums), Jesse Hackett


(keyboards/vocals) and guitarist/singer Sam Lewis flew out to Nairobi and mixed it up with local Luo players, most notably veteran vocalist and master of the eight-stringed nyatiti lyre Joseph Nyamungu (the band are named after his grandfather). The resulting recording has a light ‘n’ lean sound, mostly unlike anything of its kind I’ve heard before.


The British urbanites and Kenyan country- folk met each other halfway, so that the nyatiti, one stringed fiddle and traditional percussion work with the contemporary pop, dub and dance elements rather than being subordinate to or swamped by them. Most tracks are built around Nyamungu’s vocal chants with all involved working together to hypnotic effect. Producer Chris Morphitis has stripped everything down to its groove-based essentials (there’s no noodling self-indulgence here) to create short ‘n’ snappy blasts of Anglo-Afro folk-rock (or maybe folk-rock- dub-drum ‘n’ bass…). There are a couple of tunes from the London contingent that sound attractively close to Vampire Weekend and their ilk, but the rest take the lead from the Kenyans. OSG have got a trendy pedi- gree, what with the album being released on Gilles Peterson’s label and Damon Albarn playing organ on one track, but on this evi- dence, they’re more interested in creating unusual and interesting music than upping their cool quotient by association.


www.brownswoodrecordings.com Jamie Renton


THREE CANE WHALE Three Cane Whale Idyllic IDY4


On the eve of the very estimable Spiro recording their next album, here is a pro- ject from their man- dolinist Alex Vann, recorded by guitarist Jon Hunt. The latter doesn’t play on this offering, where Vann expands his repertoire to include haunting and confident bowed psaltery and a music box on the opener Aphe- lion. He is joined by fellow Bristolians Pete Judge, who contributes half the 20 composi- tions and plays smooth trumpet, Bina harmo- nium, glockenspiel and lyre, and Paul Bradley, who confines himself to holding everything together with acoustic guitar. The fact that this is an instrumental album will inevitably invite comparisons with Spiro and there are similarities at times such as when the harmo- nium has touches of Jason Sparkes’s accordeon work, and Vann’s wonderful metronomic, intricate mandolin lines – but the nearest one can find is with the very short pieces on Lightbox; there are no long work- outs and the traditional music influence is pretty well absent.


At times the musical scenery is lush and


warm, as on Sluice and Bird From A Cloud, and at others there is a spikier, almost abra- sive feel – Isserley and The Stone Lanes – and throughout, the interplay between the musi- cians is assured and intuitive. The trumpet has a classical tone whether playing lead and con- tinuo lines or contrasting with the ghostly psaltery and crisp mandolin and guitar. The overall sound is immediate: the album was recorded live in Redland parish church, which provides a natural ambience and grace.


For the most part the pieces are short and say no more than they need. Indeed some, such as Song Of Rescue, are no more than a brief exposition of a theme and then a stop. If I had to name similar expeditions, the


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