Month: May 2019
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Holy Moly and The Crackers: Take A Bite
This lot are one of those bands that are fundamentally a live band, playing raucous (but tight) gypsy / dance rock. Imagine Mumfords with a brass section and disco high-hats. And personality. Regulars at Rode Hall’s Just So festival will have seen many such a band — indeed, Holy Moly and The Crackers were on…
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Daniel Garcia Trio: Travesuras
Pianist Daniel García’s playing dominates this album of meaty jazz, though double-bassist Reinier Elizarde and drummer Michael Olivera do not go unnoticed. The release notes talk about flamenco and jazz being brothers; you’d not automatically think of flamenco listening to this (though there are some exotic sounds down there in the rhythm section); he’s more…
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Blood Youth: Starve
Metal outfit Blood Youth — they hail from the land of cream teas and muffins, Harrogate — are a visceral lot, their music loud and uncompromising. The album is marked by three elements: the frontman’s voice, which gets screamed hoarse over the album’s course — he sounds very annoyed about something, probably the queue for…
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Eitenne Cutajar: Mdina Music For Horn
This is a new recording of (as the name suggests) music for horn by Etienne Cutajar, featuring violinist Carmine Lauri and pianist John Reid. The music comes from Beethoven, Brahms and Richard Strauss as well as modern composers Heinz Holliger, Jesmond Grixti and Jörg Widman; the work Mdina is by Grixti. Cutajar is principal horn…
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BartolomeyBittmann: Dynamo
Out on jazz label ACT, this new album is prog in the same way that Gordon Giltrap could be prog, in his better moments (which is why Heartsong is so famous and his duller stuff not). Opener Elefant lays down the pattern: superfast playing of guitar (it’s actually a mondola according to the sleeve notes)…
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Boogie Beasts: Deep
This is one of those rare records — ones we actually buy. In this case via a tweet from bluesman Son Of Dave, whose single we recently reviewed. Boogie Beasts play a style of blues that seems to be particularly European. When the Rolling Stones played Hyde Park a few years back we were far…
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Ward and Parker: One
Ward, or it could be Parker, was in Nizlopi, who had a massive hit with the JCB Song (don’t play it, you’ll never get it out of your head). The general tenor of that was a wise but homely narrator who knows what life’s about, doing the right thing. There’s the same kind of air…
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Dave Fidler: Songs From Aurora
This fine new album from Dave Fidler — he plays the guitar — highlights the difference between professional musicians and the more amateur. Fidler, who has toured with John Bramwell from I Am Kloot, wrote and recorded this album while touring the festival circuit with his family in his caravan, Aurora — hence the…
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Damien Jurado: In The Shape of a Storm
“There’s nothing left to hide” Jurado sings (sings? more like mutters or whispers) during Lincoln, the opener of this new album, and it could be a comment on this stripped down offering. All that’s here is the guitar, Jurado’s voice and the songs. It was recorded in two hours one afternoon; preceded, one assumes, by…
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Gary Clark Jr: This Land
We knew we’d like this when we read the reviews. We’re not fans of formulaic music genres so we liked some bits of Gary Clark Jr’s music but not the bits where he settled down into what he’s known for, rock blues. He’s a fantastic guitarist but rock blues is rock blues and does tend…
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