Billy Bragg "Live at The Union Chapel" CD / DVD

Billy Bragg is like a bottle of Grange - thirty years down the track and he's maturing into the complete package. He's also become a fairly influential political figure, appearing on "Q&A" when he was over here recently and his opinion being sought out by media outlets far and wide when Thatcher died. This CD /DVD combo was recorded just after the demise of "the most divisive Prime Minister Britain has ever had" in the middle of 2013, when Bragg was touring all over the shop to promote his "Tooth and Nail" CD. The Union Chapel - a 19th Century Gothic church in Islington, complete with stained glass windows and ornate pulpit - is the perfect backdrop for this Thirtieth Anniversary celebration. His mix of pop and politics is nowadays infused with some fine musicianship and the timbre of Bragg's voice has changed for the better with age. His newer songs tend to be written in a lower key that suits his older voice well.

What you get here is a carefully chosen cross section of his back catalogue. From "There is Power In A Union" and "Between The Wars" of the Thatcher Years to the more personal political poetry of "Sexuality" and "Valentines Day is Over" from the Bliar Era - all given the Americana / Country treatment that so many blinkered critics have taken him to task for.  I'm not sure why - CJ Hillman's exquisite Pedal Steel and bottleneck National Steel guitar work are second to none, and perfectly matched with Billy's songs. As Bragg points out, there's the added bonus that the American can also pick up a Fender or Gibson and do a fine "Johnny Marr impersonation" for the rockier numbers. On the DVD you get some humorous and insightful commentary from the singer interspersed between the songs, as well as his increasingly droll and relaxed banter with the audience at the gig. Bragg's occasional sermons are laced with an endearing self-deprecating humour and an openness to the ideas of others, both of which give greater resonance to what he's saying. Most of the chit-chat is thankfully edited out for the CD.

What Bragg is saying is as relevant now in Cameron's Britain and Abbott's Australia as it ever was thirty years ago. Perhaps more so with the growth of inequity that we have seen open up. He speaks up for the downtrodden, pricks the bubble of the high and mighty and tries to inspire his audience to activism in the face of this ever-expanding inequity. He reckons that our major enemy is cynicism. His clever way with words and humorous insights, and his relentless optimism that "There Will Be a Reckoning" and "All You Fascists Bound To Lose" are powerful antidotes to such cynicism taking hold. The latter is one of three Woody Guthrie songs that are so wonderfully re-imagined here by Bragg and his comrades - the other two being "Way Over Yonder In The Minor Key" and the sad story of thirties dispossession at the hands of the Banks, "I Ain't Got No Home".

With Bragg there is no real boundary between the personal and the political - his song about the Hillsborough disaster which killed 96 Liverpool Football fans, "Never Buy The Sun", is as pithy a put-down of the execrable Murdoch Press and the British Establishment as you'll hear anywhere, and obviously heartfelt. "Do Unto Others" is an attempt at a distillation of what is necessary to live the Ethical Life, given a certain extra resonance by the ecclesiastical setting. The tear jerker "Tank Park Salute" pays tender homage to his dad - as does the amusing "Handyman Blues" in its own way - and then we are into the timeless rambunctious encore "Waiting For The Great Leap Forwards".

As a one of several bonuses on the DVD we are treated to the second encore, just Billy and his electric guitar revisiting the whole seventeen minutes of his very first vinyl record "Life's A Riot & Spy vs Spy" with classics such as "The Man In The Iron Mask", "The Milkman of Human Kindness" and "A New England" all rattled off in fine fettle. For the audio version unfortunately you have to shell out another few bucks for the official 30th Anniversary ReMastered Reissue - as the man says, "the Revolution is just a T-shirt away". And there's probably a T-Shirt of that at billybragg.co.uk 

 

 

 

Elephant Revival "These Changing Skies"

 

I've never been quite sure what qualifies as "Americana". Wikipedia tells us it is "contemporary music that incorporates elements of various American roots music styles, including country, roots-rock, folk, bluegrass and blues, resulting in a distinctive roots-oriented sound". This quintet from Colorado would seem to fit that bill perfectly. Elephant Revival have recently released their third album "These Changing Skies" to great critical acclaim in the Northern Hemisphere.

There must be something about the rarefied air of the Rocky Mountains that provides great inspiration for them. Their music, album artwork and heartfelt, mindful lyrics are all imbued with a strong sense of nature and belonging. From the CD's upbeat opener "Birds and Stars" (which is available for free from their website) to the closer "Rogue River" and the lovely "The Pasture" instrumental along the way, a strong sense of place seems to inform the sublime sounds they create. At times, if you close your eyes, you could be in a hippy Deadwood.

Elephant Revival play mainly accoustic instruments: banjo / mandolin, double bass, guitar and violin. The latter brings a jiggy, reely Celtic sensibility to what they do. The unique addition of Bonnie Paine's washboard, djembe, musical saw and stomp-box front and centre is what sets this mob apart from other "Americana" acts. Her affecting tremelo vocals, particularly on the philosophical "Remembering a Beginning", are reminiscent of Natalie Merchant. When the three guys take vocal turns, the sound is more like the Decembrists or Bon Iver. The group's close-knit harmonies are quite beautiful.

Several of the songs on the Cd are pure ear-worm material. Intricate enough musically to stand up to repeated plays but catchy enough to provide immediate singalong enjoyment for the listener. Three songs penned by guitar / banjo player Daniel Rodriguez ("Grace of a Woman", "Spinning" and the aforementioned "Birds and Stars") are ones that you find yourself singing as you go about your daily activities. Expect to hear them repeatedly on the Local Global Show on 2BBB in coming weeks!

"The Gloaming" The Gloaming

One of the most fabulous aspects of the Bellingen Global Carnival over the years (and there were many!) was the way it would introduce us to previously unknown, but supremely accomplished and talented artistes. One of the most pleasant of such surprises came in (I think) 1997 when Irishman Martin Hayes and American Dennis Cahill came to town with their fiddle and guitar duo and left everyone I knew who saw their shows gobsmacked at their virtuosic musicianship.

When I heard that the two of them had teamed up with legendary Irish sean-nos singer Iarla O'Lionaird, whose emotive vocals grace the Afro-Celt Sound System CD's, I knew something special was afoot. For the debut CD of The Gloaming, they have been joined by Thomas Bartlett (aka Doveman) on piano. When Bartlett was ten years old his family stopped off in Ireland for a break on their way to live in India for a year. Young Thomas was besotted with Hayes' music and discovered that he was performing soon after their arrival in Dublin. He persuaded his family to take him to the show, and to follow the fiddle player on tour around Ireland for the rest of the week. Hayes noticed his young stalker and his parents and they became firm friends.

As the make up of The Gloaming took it's highly unusual shape of vocals, piano, guitar and fiddle, Martin Hayes became concerned that his sole fiddle might become overwhelmed in the mix so he called in Caomhin O'Ragallaigh and his Hardanger fiddle as "back up". This Norwegian violin has eight strings rather than the usual four and creates the most achingly beautiful textured sounds. The music that has resulted from this combination of extraordinary talents and instruments is at once traditional and ground-breaking.

The rules of Irish music are often set aside by the transatlantic nature of the collaboration. There are jigs and reels aplenty ("The Sailor's Bonnet", the sprawling 16 minute masterpiece "Opening Set" and "The Old Bush" will get even the most resistant feet tapping) and there are introspective, moody pieces that are at times haunting ("Song44" - an ancient poem set to music),  mournful ("The Girl Who Stole My Heart") and at others simply serene ("Samradh, Samradh"). Another song with a literary source, "Freedom / Saoirse", literally soars on the wings of O'Lionaird's powerful vocal delivery.

What strikes this listener most about the project is that there is a very deep musical empathy and understanding between the five musicians. It is often the spaces that they leave for each other that speak loudest. They are not a in a hurry to go anywhere or prove anything - they are just transported by the music, as i am sure you will be if you invest in a copy of the CD. As Hayes said in an interview recently
"On a personal level, there are no tensions between us, there are no ego battles, because everyone gets to be themselves and gets complete freedom to express themselves fully"

Bruce Springsteen - High Hopes

It was apparent at Bruce Springsteen's Australian gigs on last year's Wrecking Ball Tour that something was afoot. He normally puts on an exhausting three and a half hours for his fans and there tends to be a tingle in the air due to the feedback loop he creates with his somewhat devoted audience. For the Down Under leg of the mammoth world tour Steve van Zandt, his long-time lead guitarist and back-up vocalist, was otherwise engaged filming the latest series of his quirky TV show "Lilyhammer" in Norway.


Springsteen called up Tom Morello (Rage Against The Machine) as van Zandt's replacement and creative sparks flew. With the likes of Jake Clemons (Clarence's nephew on saxophone) and Michelle Moore (backing vocals, occasional rap) already adding their youthful energy, the E Street Band avoided becoming a tired pastiche of itself and has instead evolved into something new and fresh altogether. The best example of this was the new, electrifying version of "Ghost of Tom Joad", which left audiences gob-smacked. Thankfully, here it is on "High Hopes" in all its glory.


This new CD has Morello's imprint on seven out of twelve tracks, providing exciting fresh production ideas and masterful guitar work. You would never have known it, but he talks of being terrified at having to learn Springsteen's entire back catalogue in a hurry, knowing that handmade request signs from the audience are always taken on stage and incorporated into the night's set list. One year on, he is now centre stage with one of his idols, seemingly a fixture in Springsteen's band.


"High Hopes" is billed as out-takes, covers and new versions of old songs, but for all that it does seem to hold together well. The title track is up first, a real barn-stormer of a cover which makes full use of the big brass section and massed backing vocals that were all so fabulously in synch, mid-tour when this recording was made. Then there's a driving, edgy "Harry's Place" with Springsteen's phrasing and characterisation reminiscent of "The Wild, The Innocent and The E Street Shuffle" from back in the seventies, but with Morello helping to propel it very much into the present.


"American Skin (41 shots)" is up next, with its brooding beginning and anthemic chorus. it is the first time this old live favourite has been included on a studio release and again Morello's input gives it a fresh lease of life. It's a harrowing and salutory story of Amadou Diallo, an innocent young West African immigrant in the Bronx who was shot 41 times by NYPD plain clothes officers when he reached into his pocket for his wallet.


"Just Like Fire Would", the old Saints song is another great cover sounding like a Springsteen-penned singalong. Chris Bailey & Co will be fine with that, I'm sure, as the royalty payments pick up. "Frankie Fell in Love" is a big dollop of fun, and "Heaven's Wall" a full-tilt gospel workout which will undoubtedly play well in big arenas. The latter suffers from some over-simplistic imagery as does "This Is Your Sword", with its Irish folky Seeger Sessions sound (lovely Uillean pipes and all). But when did cheesy imagery ever worry Bruce or his audience? Ultimately, both are uplifting, affirmative inclusions - songs about the redemptive power of love.


"The Wall" is a contemplative look at the black marble Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington, remembering and missing one of his old New Jersey mentors and buddies who went MIA in '68. "I read Robert McNamara says he's sorry" sings Springsteen. "Apologies and forgiveness got no place at all here at The Wall."


The CD closes with something quite unexpected - a harmonium's drone and lush strings: the atmospheric intro for Springsteen's popular cover of NY art-school band Suicide's "Dream Baby Dream". Pure ear worm stuff, which echoes in your brain long after the record has finished. Here is the youtube clip of it which features a collage of the emotion-charged faces of audience and band members from the Wrecking Ball Tour and gives us a preview of what's in store for lucky Australian punters with Bruce's return visit in February.

Shellie Morris and The Borroloola Songwomen - "Ngambala Wiji Li-Wunungu - Together We Are Strong"

The cultural importance of this ABC release cannot be over-estimated. Shellie Morris's paternal grandmother, the celebrated Hilda Muir, was a proud Yanyuwa woman from the Borroloola region, and a member of the Stolen Generations. Shellie herself was adopted by a non-Aboriginal family and brought up in Sydney where, after some troubled teenage years, she found redemption in music.

After some operatic training she became a singer with the Black Arm Band. Parallel to this, she has spent many years touring Aboriginal communities, learning fourteen indigenous languages along the way and running countless workshops to encourage indigenous people young and old to record their stories in song. In 2011, Shellie was invited to take part in the Song Peoples Sessions - to go back to her grandmother's country in Borroloola and record traditional songs from her grandmother's extended family. Nannas, aunties, sisters and daughters came together to share their language and songs with Shellie.

She in turn composed new songs entirely in Yanyuwa, songs which pay respect to ancestors, totems and identity, songs of life, celebration and survival in the Gulf Country. There are two discs in this release - the first is made up of Shellie's own Yanyuwa compositions, performed with the Borroloola Songwomen and embellished with a lush string ensemble and great beats and atmospherics from Tim Cole (ex Not Drowning Waving) and Wantok's Airileke Ingram. The ten songs bring us a seamless soundscape of life in the Top End, celebrating the elements and the seasons and a way of life. The standout track would have to be "Ngabujiyu a-Kuija (Nanna Song)", which neatly encapsulates the emotional roller coaster that Shellie embarked on with this very emotional musical homecoming. The second disc is a priceless socio-historical document.

It brings us the pure, unembellished field recordings of the Gulf country Songwomen. Sung in Yanyuwa, Marra, Garrwa and Gudanji languages, these songs reflect everyday events and the flora and fauna that give life to the land's custodians. Songs about Rising Tides, Lightning, Seagrass, Turtles, Black Plums, Green Plums, Red Parrots and Torres Strait Island Pigeons. Songs that document a Wife Driven Away or that tell stories of Ancestral Dreaming Women who rose up out of the sea, like mermaids. These Songwomen are the social historians of their communities, and these recordings are National Treasures.

 


 

David Bridie "Wake"

It's a crying shame that Bellingen is missing out on David Bridie's 2013 tour to promote his recent release "Wake". He has been here before in several incarnations to great acclaim, most recently a couple of Global Carnivals with Frank Yamma and George Telek.

Apart from being a prolific artist in his own right, Bridie has long championed indigenous music from our region through the Wantok Foundation and record label. It is good to see him now in his own solo career, circumventing the tyranny of the Record Company A&R people by using crowd-funding to help finance the creation and recording of "Wake".

Instead of the album that the record company thinks he should create, here we have the one that he's been threatening to make for years, the one that's totally from his heart. It is a thing of beauty, even down to the artful sleeve and liner notes. In promotional interviews, he has explained that he chose the title for its many meanings.

We can be awakened, we can have a wake when someone dies and we can be in the wake of someone or something. Bridie's previous three solo Cd's, as well as a bunch of "Not Drowning Waving", "My Friend The Chocolate Cake" and Soundtrack albums have always featured quirky wordplay, and subject matters that make you think about issues. This new release is in the same vein. Intriguing titles such as "Dr Seuss is painting in the sky", "The shortest day of the year" and "Stoned in Kabul" draw the listener in, and Bridie gets to wax lyrical about such varied matters as wars on foreign soil, lovers growing old together, dementia and our nation's shameful treatment of refugees.

The video for "Delegate" is challenging stuff, with a Department of Immigration public servant becoming so distressed at having to deny refugee status to so many that he sets fire to himself in the office to the horror of surrounding work colleagues. For this CD and tour, Bridie has teamed up with his fellow "Not Drowning, Waving" band member John Phillips and it is Phillips' abrasive guitar work that gives the more angry songs their emphatic edge. On several of the songs it appears that Bridie has completely relaxed and discovered new registers to his voice, a Nick Cave-like depth to his voice that lends itself to much more varied tones and textures than we have heard in the past. Apart from a host of indie stars helping out, there is also a sign of things to come with young Stella Bridie providing sparkling backing vocals that complement her Dad's so perfectly on four of the songs.

Not least of these is the CD's closer, and probably my favourite track just for the impish sense of fun that imbues the recording - made in a log cabin out in the Victorian bush, it features the banjo picking of one Anthony Morgan and is a haunting reinvention of the old Hank Williams classic "I'm so lonesome I could cry". Sure, David Bridie can still pen a tune that you find yourself singing several times a day. But it is the sign of a confident and mature artist that he can create such nuanced colourful soundscapes by what is left out. It is the silences and spaces that mark this album's greatness. I get the feeling that in years to come this will be regarded as an Australian classic.

Jackie Oates "Lullabies"

There is something about a good lullaby that can have a very primal, calming effect. English Folk singer and musician Jackie Oates has long been fascinated by them, being struck by the way that adults can hear a lullaby and have very strong childhood memories and feelings. This new album is a collection of her favourite lullabies and sleep songs, found in old song collections, books and recordings - and, particularly if you have small children to calm down in the evening - I can heartily recommend investing in a copy.

Jackie Oates has long been a firm favourite on the Local Global Show. She has folk music in her DNA and first came to world-wide attention with Rachel Unthank & The Winterset. Between 2006 and 2011 she released a series of four solo albums to great critical acclaim - "Hyperboreans" and "Saturnine" being the most recent and most feted. Along the way she has won an array of awards and been involved in a number of side projects, two of which have featured in these pages before.

She was an integral part of The Cecil Sharp Project and is now a permanent member of The Imagined Village, re-inventing English Folk with an infusion of multiculturalism. But with this new solo project, she has really come into her own. The intrumentation is always gentle and sparse and she has chosen some great musicians to accompany her on this journey. There's Belinda O'Hooley on piano and Barney Morse-Brown on cello as well as an Icelandic string quartet which creeps in from time to time to great effect. Oates herself plays violin, viola and shruti box.

The CD opens with a cracker: "Dream Angus" is a well-known Scottish lullaby about Angus, the Celtic god of dreams, and the arrangement is quite beautiful. We then have two short "Dandling Songs" of Swedish origin - to be sung while dancing your baby on your knee. Next up is "Waiting For The Lark", one of her own childhood faves, often sung by her folkie family. There are also a couple of sublime Icelandic lullabies contributed by guest musicians during dark winter's night recording sessions in Reykjavik.

Oates has found and dusted off some real gems that have long been hidden away in historical song collections, and she uses the words of Shakespeare, AA Milne and Thomas Hardy to great effect in three songs. There's even a fine traditional Australian lullaby "Little Fishes / The Rainy Day Fisherman".

One of the most successful - and surprising - song choices is the quirky and insightful "Junk" by Paul McCartney, written while he was in India with The Beatles and recorded on his 1970 solo album. While not strictly a lullaby it has a lilt and rhythm that seems designed to soothe and calm and it's a perfect fit for this collection.

The strongest, most arresting song is the Cd's closer - "Sleepers Awake", sung with great tenderness by Oates and the talented Chris Sarjeant. It is acapella apart from the hum of the shruti and is a brilliant rendition of the 1969 Incredible String Band classic. I imagine you'll be enjoying some peace and quiet by the time you get to the end of this CD. I'd be very surprised if your little ones weren't asleep halfway through "Dream Angus".