f68


folk-influenced by any means – and sending them on a magical bus tour round Wales col- lecting, writing and researching together (hence the title, ‘10 On A Bus’) with a view to performing gigs as a collective and releasing a CD. The cameras rolled, the folkarazzi scrawled bilingual, the Eisteddfod threw open its gates, and studio stalwarts Sain Records said “yes, of course, and croeso, thank you all” as the motley trad adventurers trundled purposefully towards the battle- ments on their mission to record a track each for the resulting album. Some were songs, some historical pieces, some original diddly tunes… and, fortunately, it all sounded great. Very fresh, very lively and really quite listen- able. And they all lived happily ever after, it seems, most of the musicians having benefit- ed from the exposure, both to traditional forms of music and to new audiences through radio, TV and all…


I think this keepsake album must have made them quite proud. It’s hard to single out highlights as the album flits through so many different styles and forms, but Gwilym Bowen Rhys’s masterful arrangement and extension of the ballad Wel Bachgen Ifanc Ydwyf deserves a mention (as do his band Plu). Original folky-sounding songs from Catrin O’Neill and Huw Evans sit happily alongside more unusual trad treatments, such as harpist Gwen Mairi Yorke’s jazz/hip- hop mash-up Calennig and Mari Morgan’s delicately psychedelic treatment of Alawon Fy Ngwlad, replete with musical saw and glockenspiel. The CD convinces, the perfor- mances gel, the project most surely a sterling success. (Ah – didn’t they have a lovely time, upon that bus to Bangor!)


www.trac-cymru.org/index.php/en/ projects/10-mewn-bws


Nathan Williams VARIOUS ARTISTS


Music From Romania Caprice Records CAP 21831


However much any revisionist folk ensemble might try and suggest otherwise, it’s the blend of Hungarians, Germans, Russians and so forth, often invading, sometimes assimilat- ing, frequently seeking to maintain their own national identities in new diasporas, that has actually helped to form the unique musical and cultural identity of Romania. Essentially, and fascinatingly, two wildly divergent folk music identities have resulted, both docu- mented and vividly celebrated on this justly renowned and serious document – recorded


Little Brother Montgomery


in Ceausescu year one, 1965, by the great Bengali ethnomusicologist, Deben Bhat- tacharya. The two traditions sit uneasily side- by-side. And that unease is palpable.


Much of Romania remains hard and rural and beautiful, primeval technology in quietly unspoilt hinterlands, resulting in songs based mainly within natural and danced ritual. These field recordings are either unaccompa- nied or sparsely augmented by fiddle and an impressive array of Romania’s highly stylised and intricately decorated woodwind instru- ments. Typically, Maria Sãlãjan yearns the doina, Basama Banatu-i-Bine, in suitably des- perate and worldly style, meaning invested in every bleak silence and word and emotionally weary sustains: “Perhaps it is better in Banat. Here, people are poor and they travel to Banat to find work.” This is a living tradition of the moment, trapped within political isola- tion and geographical impenetrability.


However, it was to the astonishing lau- tari (mostly Roma) musicians that the state turned in order to broadcast its new, big, national vision of traditional music at Sunday lunch times. The lautari seized the moment and performed these often unimaginatively arranged pieces in an energetic exchange of strings and woodwind, control and passion.


Village music was abruptly transformed, sometimes with vigour and ambition, often with crassness and bombast. These are folk songs about meaningful and intimate tradi- tions transformed into orchestrated holler.


But Radu Neget, singing the Doina From


Oltenia (accompanied on the tambal dulcimer that lies at the very heart of such Romanian ensembles), exemplifies the strange subver- sive otherworldliness these musicians often achieve, creating an almost psychedelic land- scape of wild, startling calls, surreal phrasing, woozy climaxes and carefully arranged aban- don.


www.capricerecords.se John Pheby


VARIOUS ARTISTS Dealing With The Devil Lake LACD 230


It’s impossible to overstate the impact visiting American blues musicians had on the evolv- ing British music scene in the 1950s and early ’60s. Unless you happened to be there at the time it might not be possible to judge the real quality of the music if it were not for the recordings made in the UK during this vital period. Cumbria-based Lake Records have previously contributed to our knowledge by releasing the recording of Sister Rosetta Tharpe’s 1957 Manchester’s Free Trade Hall concert with Chris Barber’s Band (Lake LACD130) and material recorded by Sonny Terry, Brownie McGhee, and Chris Barber in 1958 (Lake LACD278).


Dealing With The Devil features four blues artists who all first arrived on our shores at the very beginning of the ’60s: pianists Lit- tle Brother Montgomery, Memphis Slim and Speckled Red, and harmonica player James Cotton. The first eight tracks feature a relaxed Little Brother recorded in August 1960 play- ing some of his own compositions (Farish Street Jive, Chinee Man Blues etc) as well as the more familiar Pinetop’s Boogie Woogie and Broonzy’s Keep Drinking (backed on this track by Alexis Korner’s acoustic guitar and Jack Fallon’s bass). Alexis’s guitar is again heard on all eight James Cotton items. Chris Barber is also present playing either bass, trombone or guitar while, on three numbers, Keith Scott contributes his pianistic skills. These 1961 tracks were originally issued on two Columbia EMI EPs in 1962 and present Cotton’s distinctive vocal and harmonica work on such solid blues as Goin’ Down Slow, Deco- ration Day Blues and Dealing With The Devil.


Memphis Slim is on fire on the previously unissued seven tracks presented here. Recorded in July 1960, Slim’s vocals and piano exude unbridled energy propelled by the British rhythm section of bassist Brian Kirby and (probably) drummer Kenney Buckner. He literally romps through Rock ’n’ Roll Boogie, I Can’t Get No Mail, and Walkin’ The Boogie, and is effortlessly entertaining in front of a live audience (hear the roar of appreciation at the end) on Beer Drinkin’ Woman. Com- pleting this great collection with just three tracks is the equally exuberant Speckled Red. Littte Girl, Early In The Morning and Oh, Red all display Red’s individual ivory tickling and raucous style of singing. Here’s hoping Lake Records will dig some more into the archives and unearth more musical nuggets like these.


www.fellside.com Dave Peabody ASHLEY HUTCHINGS


By Gloucester Docks I Sat & Wept: A Love Story Talking Elephant/Paradise & Thorns TECD236


The ruin of a musician’s personal life often allows for great albums – vitriol and vengeance flow through the core of Grace & Danger or Shoot Out The Lights, to name- check just a couple. Where those run on a frantic whirlwind of dissolution and discord, By Gloucester Docks… – originally sneaked out in 1987 – is full of bittersweet questions, regret and a sense of frustration. Tyger Hutchings worked out any romantic neurosis with plaintive reflection, fond remembrance and raw emotion set against a country dance/ rock framework and littered with appropri- ate prose/poetry. It remains a very brave statement 26 years on. Water has undoubted- ly flowed under any bridges, yet the separa- tion afforded by time cannot blunt the album’s steadfastness. His liner notes appear elusive yet are revealing; the record was, I guess, his way of coming to terms with a rela- tionship that could never be; this actually happened, it isn’t fiction.


Supported by handpicked collaborators, concurrent and past Albions, particularly effective are Polly Bolton’s vocals (To Ireland I Made My Way, Dancing Under The Rose, I Don’t Go Dancing Any More), Graham Tay- lor’s scything electric guitar leads, John Shep- herd’s thoughtful keyboard especially under My Dear Friend where an insightful Dives & Lazarus/The Blacksmith buoys an emotional communication. Dave Mattacks’s drumming is responsive and efficient throughout.


Atypical of usual work, By Gloucester


Docks… is as it says on the cover, a love story, heartfelt and profoundly sincere. Good to have it available at long last as a silver disc. It remains Ashley Hutchings’s most acute, deli- cate, confidential creation.


www.talkingelephant.com Simon Jones BRATSCH


Brut de Bratsch 1973-2013 Apasaca WVF 479085.88


Bursting with all manner of 40th celebration, including three CDs (together with mandatory live renditions and rarities) and a DVD of scratchiness, graininess, occasional oddness and many strong shots, this is a superb record of Bratsch, their itinerant genius and their roads.


Bratsch are renowned for their allying of ’70s rock sensibilities to explorations of East European Roma music, French gypsy swing and jazz. Self-consciously radical, the band are mainly concerned with revelatory re-creation. So the cimbalom is hammered out on the gui- tar, the accordeon breathes saxophone, the


Photo: Dave Peabody


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