Category: Folk
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Molotov Jukebox: Tropical Gypsy
Most albums start off well and then tail off; Molotov Jukebox do the opposite and opener Pineapple Girl (nice snare solo at the start aside) is a little saccharine for us, like the music from a kids’ television show. But it’s not bad, with its horns and energy, and it gets the party started.…
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Kimmo Pohjonen: Murder Ballads
Last week we reviewed Kimmo Pohjonen’s latest album (a take on accordion-led prog with classical leanings), but this week it’s one he did a couple of years ago. It’s in Finnish but it’s wonderful (English translations of the lyrics are supplied). The songs are all stories about murders and murderers. The tales are told in…
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Fay Hield: Old Adam
Hield (it’s her real name, her parents were clearly wags) is as traditional folk as they come: she is a teaching associate in ethnomusicology at the University of Sheffield, wrote a PhD on “English folk singing and the construction of community”, guest lectures at places like Leeds College of Music and runs two folk clubs,…
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Basia Bulat: Good Advice
This is the Canadian singer’s fourth album and it’s a fairly run of the mill, even pedestrian, pop album. Two things lift it above the average: her voice (she’s a bit Sade and has the same glamorous sound) and the production, from Jim James of My Morning Jacket, which adds a pleasing retro echo to…
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Kimmo Pohjonen: Sensitive Skin
They’re pleasantly mad in Finland: any country that would enter a hard rock/heavy metal band into the Eurovision Song Contest has got to be eccentric. The fact that Mr Lordi won shows that we find such behaviour endearing. Thus with this, a prog album from an accordionist, featuring the Kronos Quartet and distributed by the…
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Steffen Schleiermacher / Holger Falk: Erik Satie Ultimate Melodies and Songs
Satie is best known for his classic piano piece Gymnopédie No1 (you’ve all heard it) and was endearingly eccentric. He was once so poor he shared a suit with lifelong friend JP Contamine de Latour, meaning they could only go out one at a time, and when he died, his flat — never visited by…
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Leo Brouwer: Bandurria and Guitar Music
This does what it says on the label: Cuban Leo Brouwer is acknowledged as one of the most challenging and innovative of contemporary composers, and this is his music for bandurria — a lute-type instrument dating back to the c16th — and guitar. The former is perennially popular in South America, says the Press notes.…
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Lo’Jo: 310 Lunes
We love Lo’Jo in the Review Corner. We came across them on a compilation we had to review about the new wave of French music (Cuisine Non-Stop: Introduction to the French Nouvelle Generation, 2008, Luaka Bop), which was opened by Lo’Jo’s Baji Larabat. Lo’Jo is a kind of collective, formed in 1982 and blending French…
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Stephanie Kirkham: Tiny Spark
We’re highly impressed with this album, though its slickness might put people off: it makes Mumford and Sons sound like a grim underground black metal band. In a nutshell, she’s written the soundtrack to a rom-com (not starring Jennifer Aniston — it would be really good) with songs that are often jauntier than the Andrex…
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