f54

Stick In The Wheel

STICK IN THE WHEEL From Here From Here Records

Stick In The Wheel’s first album is one of those records you can’t really ignore. Well, you can, but that would just be foolish. Drenched in attitude and intent, they make good their loudly trumpeted mani- festo… “We play the music

of our people. We sing in our own accents. We record in our kitchens and living rooms. This is our culture, our tradition.”

It’s not always pretty – in fact it’s never

pretty – but Nicola Kearey’s confrontational vocal style certainly makes you look upon these mostly well-known traditional songs anew. When she sings “What care I for me goose-feather bed?” on Seven Gypsies, the snarl is so fierce you imagine her husband is reduced to a quivering wreck on the spot. Its scarcely the tone of a lord’s lady, but that’s maybe the point.

It’s this vivid sense of reality which applies such a genuine vitality and urgency to familiar old songs (the frenzy engendered on Bows Of London is immense) that makes this such a compelling album. In Kearey’s hands, the defeated sadness and resignation usually offered on The Blacksmith suddenly sounds like a bitter call for revenge; the feigned madness of the various vagrants, outsiders and mental patients incarcerated in the famous London asylum is all too believable on this frenetic take on Bedlam; and their very real rawness not only attaches a genuine

sense of despair and helplessness to Hard Times Of Old England, it makes the old Cop- per Family favourite firmly relevant today. A relevance emphatically underlined when they follow it with their thoroughly modern morality tale Me N Becky, inspired by the London riots.

Despite the stripped-down starkness, it’s not devoid of subtlety or technical prowess. Sparing they may be, but Ian Carter’s sensitive accompaniments on dobro and guitar bring plenty to the party, as does Fran Foote’s gor- geous harmony singing. Some earnest percus- sion and astute use of handclaps add to the overall impact of an album which, despite – or maybe because of – its apparent simplicity strikes well-aimed and far-reaching blows to our perceptions about traditional song.

www.stickinthewheel.com Colin Irwin KAIA KATER

Sorrow Bound Kingswood Records KWR1502

Originally from Quebec, and now based in Toronto, Kaia Kater also spends extensive time in West Virginia, explor- ing Appalachian music, dance and culture, and the complex racial history of the mountain traditions that range from eastern Canada to Alabama.

Familiar songs like West Virginia Boys are made fresh, while her own compositions are

Kaia Kater

both elegant and eloquent. There are plenty of young artists who have mastered the tech- niques of traditional music, but few whose original work seems so naturally a part of the traditional continuum. Opener When Sor- rows Encompass Me Round, borrows a line from an old-time song to begin a new story, “delving into slavery and longing”, while En Filant Ma Quenouille is affectingly sung in French, and Moonshiner is delivered unac- companied (with additional vocals by Melanie Brulee and Jadea Kelly).

Salt River and Rose On The Mountain are fine fiddle and banjo tunes, played with pro- ducer Chris Bartos, who elsewhere variously adds baritone electric guitar, five-string fiddle, six-string electric violin, acoustic and electric bass, piano and moog in just the right mea- sures; subtly embellishing Kater’s soulfully unaffected vocals and terrific old-time banjo playing with a modern groove more implied than stated.

Sorrow Bound is a remarkably assured debut album which both honours tradition and declares Kater’s credentials as a distinc- tive, original artist. Listening to it I’m sudden- ly struck by the thought: ‘if Robert Plant hears this, it’ll flip his legendarily leonine wig!’. The inclusions of Anna Roberts-Gevalt, Elizabeth LaPrelle, Dom Flemons and Rhian- non Giddens among those to whom “special thanks” is given, show that she’s already gar- nering plenty of impressive peer-endorsement.

We’re going to be hearing a lot more from

Kaia Kater, so remember the name, folks. www.kaiakater.com

Steve Hunt

Photo: © Judith Burrows