This show is a sensory delight! Obviously, there are drums… But on top of that, I was met by humour, spectacular lights and passion. And the timing was perfect! Sebastien Rambaud and Yann Coste have a beautiful rapport with each other, the audience and their instruments. Not only do they play all rhythms imaginable, they play anything that remotely resembles an instrument, including their own bodies, and the heads of some unsuspecting audience members!
As a musician, I was fairly sure what I was going to see in this show, and it surpassed all expectations and possibilities! Playing Habenera with tennis balls, Summer Loving with boom whackers and air drumming to Bohemian Rhapsody, this show is entertainment. It’s not surprising I was at the back of a very long queue to enter the venue where I crammed myself in to a full house. These two proficient performers have more than technical prowess and style; they have heart. And they clearly love to play, in all senses of the word.
!Warning! This show is not for the faint of hearing! But if you’re willing to risk it, you might just feel refreshed and invigorated by the end of this show – who doesn’t want that at this time in the festival season?! Fills Monkey is packed with skill, humour and love of music, all brought together by two thoroughly lovable gentlemen. FIVE STARS
“My piano ain’t got no wrong notes” (Thelonious Monk) – that it doesn’t Will Pickvance, that it most certainly does not. This man can play the piano so well you may want to marry him. His performance set in the beautiful Anatomy Lecture Theatre is the most musically delicious lecture you could dream of having.
Will takes us through his early days of learning the piano, his recent lessons(!) and his experiences as a resident pianist entertaining celebrities. Each piece matches his stories and unforced humour perfectly. The audience are enchanted – Will’s funny, relaxed and charming manner creating an easy going atmosphere. He oozes a passion and understanding for music and the piano which makes his sense of 12 notes seem so simple. For musician’s it’s frustrating but addictive at the same time. A musician or not you will be bowled over by his brilliance and leave with a fresh musical perspective, enlightened and smiling.
*****
*****
From chopsticks to jazz, soothing melodies to contemporary rock classics, there is something for everyone.
“The dots on a page are administrative jargon and you find your own way to set them free” he declares. Well get one thing straight – you need to see Will Pickvance set free. He is so comfortable and at one with the piano that it is an extension of him.
A genius craft made into a wonderfully entertaining show. Will doesn’t have a cunning plan just an hour of blissful distraction. An absolute joy! FIVE STARS
I have to confess I have, in the past, been something of a climate change skeptic. Second only in the annals of evil to a holocaust denier. After much scientific persuasion from more enlightened friends and particularly after a recent trip to Uganda I have thankfully had somewhat of a change of heart. I was hoping that not only would this show strengthen my resolve but give me some much needed scientific knowledge of the subject and hopefully offer me some ways I could help improve the situation personally. While this show did a little of both it didn’t offer me anything particularly new, although I must confess Baba Brinkman (the rapper in question) did have a “Wicked flow”. However it was hard to discern at times whether Baba was a genuine crusader in this field or whether he was simply etching a new field of educational hip hop to help further his personal career. Likewise it was hard to discern whether the largely middle aged, middle class audience were genuine revolutionaries or thought all they had to do to combat climate chaos was to see a show on climate chaos.
This may seem a little harsh but I couldn’t help thinking throughout the show that if Baba had concentrated less on making his rhymes and content so intelligent and dense and a little more on making it accessible it may have had a more positive effect. My suspicions of his possible cynicism were further fueled by the fact that he had done Rap Guides to all manner of subjects from Religion to Business. Still, a guys gotta make a living right? And he did confess to being as much of a contributor to carbon emissions as anyone in the audience. So I guess he may be a hypocrite but at least he’s an honest one. Still, so much for solutions. However one cannot argue with the worthiness of the cause and the originality of taking on such topics in this particular medium. And maybe if I would have took the time to chat to the chap I may have found him more sincere than I first suspected. I was initially wrong about Climate Chaos so maybe I was initially wrong about Baba Brinkman. The truth, as they say, is out there… THREE STARS
Southern Fried Festival: Salutation Hotel, Perth 2nd August 2015
This is my third and final review from Southern Fried this year. Maybe this wasn’t the last concert I went to or the last event I saw, but the thing about the festival is that it packs so much into three days – concert hall performances, small venue gigs, outdoor stages, late night sessions, peripheral events, too much to write about with a quick turnaround – that it’s a wonder how folk keep going. And yet they do. I see the same people turning up to see Rhiannon Giddens and the Punch Brothers, the Songs of Dolly Parton, Chris Smither, and Alvin Youngblood Hart. And I see those same people hanging round the open-air stage, the soul food servery, and the bars. Southern Fried is something you can immerse yourself in wholeheartedly from lunchtime until the small hours, for an entire long weekend, leaving little time for sleep and food. Not everyone does; there are some people who are blind to anything that doesn’t happen on the main stage of Perth Concert Hall, and those are the people who miss out. The rest of us put up with exhaustion and carry silly smiles around on our faces.
The little ballroom at the back of the Salutation Hotel may not have been there since 1699 – that’s when the hotel is said to date from – but it’s a good place to go and see solo artists. It’s smaller and more intimate that the Concert Hall, you can feel more engaged, and the artists can give a more intimate performance. “Come and take pictures round the front,” said Alvin Youngblood Hart to me, as I tried to get a from-behind shot. “Why’s that guy taking pictures of my ass?” General laughter, it’s that kind of venue.
Alvin Youngblood Hart
*
My visits to Southern Fried this year have been to see artists who, apart from Rhiannon Giddens, I don’t know very well. This means I can appreciate their performances with fresh senses, and the artists can draw me in. Messrs Smither and Hart were no exception to this. Chris Smither… Chris Smither… wasn’t he the guy who wrote ‘Killing The Blues’? No, actually, Rowland Salley wrote it, but it’s just one of those songs that has stuck to Chris Smither’s name, become a part of his repertoire that people call out for from the audience. He grew up in New Orleans and has actually been performing for the best part of half a century, releasing his first album in 1970. And he’s a joy to watch and to listen to – straight picking, helping the music along with a tapping foot, making vibrato by shaking the neck of the guitar, a gentle performance, a man whose face never loses a natural smile.
Chris Smither
Chris brings his parents alive for us, telling us all about a conversation with his mother:
“Can’t you just play me something sweet? Play me a love song.”
“Momma, that was a love song.”
Or treating us to ‘Father’s Day’, a remarkably tender song written for and to his aging father when Chris himself was no longer young. Chris has some brilliant lyrics:
“I’m so slow my shadow kicks me from behind…”
“A heart that’s beating like a hundred dollar Valentine…”
“It ain’t what I lost that makes me sad,
It’s what I thought I had…
It ain’t what it is that’s such a sin,
It’s what it might have been…”
What can you say! For me, the song of the afternoon from Chris was ‘Leave the Light On’. It summed up what was a near-perfect gig from him.
Alvin Youngblood Hart is from California, but spent enough time with his relatives in Carroll County, Mississipi, to have absorbed something of the country blues of an earlier generation. He plays blues of the kind that you’re glad someone is still playing, linking back to Charley Patton whom an old uncle of Alvin’s heard playing. There is a modal quality to his music, with the steady tread of the bottom string moving it along. He has been playing long enough to make it seem easy – or rather he has been playing long enough to make it seem lazy, there is that much of a laid-back quality to it.
Along with traditional tunes, you can hear – and he admits to – influences of Patton, Memphis Minnie, Skip James, J B Lenoir, and others. His song about ‘Bloody Bill Anderson’ the Confederate guerrillero and mentor of Jesse James seems to have echoes of Bob Dylan’s ‘Ballad of Hollis Brown’; but that only shows how musical ideas flow this way and that in American roots traditions, as Dylan worked and Hart works in the same chantier, so to speak, and there’s no telling who hears what, and what music is playing in someone else’s head. ‘Bloody Bill Anderson’ is a fine song about murder and mayhem, “two great American traditions we excel at,” as Alivin puts it.
Other stand-out numbers included Skip James’ ‘Illinois Blues’, the traditional ‘I Wonder Will I Ever Get Back Home’, and his own version of Bukka White’s ‘How Long Before I Change My Clothes’ complete with cow-calling holler. For his take on the Flaming Groovies’ ‘City Lights’, his tribute to 1970s Rock, Alvin strapped on a mouth organ, which he dubbed his “German Misery Whistle”.
It was Alvin Youngblood Hart I came to see, and he was damn good, but if I’m honest I think Chris Smither edged slightly ahead on the day. Nevertheless, well done both, and well done the folks at Southern Fried. Next year I’ll be certain not to ignore the festival’s smaller venues.
Southern Fried Festival: Perth Concert Hall 31st July 2015
Rhiannon Giddens
Perth’s Southern Fried won the 2014 ‘Best Small Festival’ crown at the Scottish Events Awards, rather begging the question “What’s a ‘small’ festival?” It’s certainly getting bigger, more ambitious, laying on an outdoor stage with free acts, open mic events, music in outlying venues, soul food, hot rod car parades, and so on, as well as the major concerts. I have had the feeling that this year’s Fried was veering a little towards Country and Gospel and neglecting Soul and Blues. But having said that the two opening concert draws had clout, which was just what was needed.
It wasn’t Rhiannon Giddens’ first visit, having appeared here before with the Carolina Chocolate Drops. Fronting her own six-piece gave her much more musical control, and enabled her to show off her vocal range. It’s extensive, she can go from sweet to raw, soft to stand-back, in a heartbeat, and that’s perfect for her mission to tear down the Chinese walls between the various musics of America, and for her status as a matchless interpretive singer.
The emphasis of her set was indeed firmly on interpretation. There was one original song, which she had composed, following her intensive study of African-American history, about how slaves, whose liberation by the Union army left them rootless, lived in squalid camps close to wherever the army was encamped. There was another original song – ‘Spanish Mary’ – from the Basement Tapes collection, with lyrics by Bob Dylan. Pretty much everything else was gathered in from elsewhere – Dolly Parton, Patsy Cline, Jacques Wolfe, Cousin Emmy, Sister Rosetta Tharpe. Her ‘Puirt a Beul’, starting in clear, faultless Gaelic and developing into an exploration of guttural rhythm-making, deservedly drew a standing ovation. I was on my feet too. In fact there wasn’t one duff song in the whole set.
Rhiannon yielded the stage once, to her principle banjo sideman Hubby Jenkins, who gave us ‘Parchman Farm’, accompanying himself with abrasive attack on guitar. Hubby is well-known as a member of the Carolina Chocolate Drops. Every member of the band shone, but I’m going to make special mention of cellist Malcolm Parson. When Rhiannon gave us the Appalachian-Scottish ballad ‘Black is the Color’, Malcolm put by his cello in favour of a melodica, almost injecting a touch of Augustus Pablo. At one point he and Rhiannon were holding a musical conversation, taking alternate phrases, she singing scat. At another point his solo improvisation included phrases from John Coltrane’s ‘A Love Supreme’. Now this is what I call breaking down walls! Malcolm is a jazz enthusiast who plays old-timey music, travelling, as it were, in reverse to the direction taken by someone like Charlie Haden.
The bad news of course is that by the time you read this, Rhiannon and her band will be packing up their gear and flying back to the States, so if you want to hear more live in the short term, you’d better fly out after her! Otherwise, I suggest you tune into BBC Radio Scotland’s Another Country with Ricky Ross on Tuesday 4th August at 9pm, when sounds from the whole festival weekend are due to be broadcast.
Question: If Rhiannon Giddens is first on stage, who can follow? I’m going to write this part of the review from the point of view of someone new to both the Punch Brothers and to the phenomenon of ‘Newgrass’, for the benefit of readers in the same position. Those of you who are in the know, please be patient. Thank you.
Given that a genre of music comes up, establishes itself, has recognisable and comfortable parameters that musicians accept and settle into, it is nonetheless inevitable that other musicians arise from within that genre and want to explore. That exploration doesn’t just expand the existing genre, it often creates an entirely new one, taking value from the old and yet creating new value. This happened with Bluegrass; people still play Bluegrass, thank heaven, and long may they continue. But now people play Newgrass too, thank heaven, and long may they continue.
Punch Bros
Having said that, are the Punch Brothers actually a Newgrass band? I would say only inasmuch as it’s hellishly difficult to put them anywhere else. What they are is an outfit creating innovative songs and music, using Bluegrass instrumentation and musical vocabulary. Initially, therefore, they are hard to get into. Their first number is hardly explosive, creeping up on the audience rather than mugging them with brilliance. There is a spikey almost camp feel to the act, much due to the naturally comedic presentation of the band’s apparent leader, mandolin-player and lead vocalist Chris Thile; if you haven’t heard them before, for a while you’re left seeking a way in, hearing echoes of – oh, I don’t know – Nickel Creek, Béla Fleck, Crosby Stills & Nash, even the Quintette du Hot Club de France! Then suddenly you realise that every single member of the band can shred like a demon, whether it be on fiddle, guitar, mandolin, banjo, or even double bass, and you’re hooked! You can then listen to them as they sway first towards traditional Bluegrass and then float away on a musical trip of their own.
I was at a disadvantage in not knowing any of their songs (yet!). As a result I related most easily to two exceptional items in the act, which showed their remarkable versatility, and were I believe the only ones barring a single traditional number that they had not written themselves. The first was an incredibly precise arrangement of Claude Debussy’s ‘Passepied’ from his Suite Bergamasque. It was delicate, lyrical, and captivating, coming as a complete contrast to the rawness of some of the other numbers in which the band often used the percussive characteristics of their instruments. The second was an a cappella version of ‘The Auld Triangle’ from Brendan Behan’s The Quare Fellow, the last chorus of which we all joined in.
Anyhow, having anchored me safely with those two, the Punch Bothers got right under my skin and stayed there. I am now a fan, and that’s that. They’re back in Scotland on 3rd August – actually up in Shetland – but that concert is sold out, so again your only chance of catching a live concert soon will be to emigrate! Don’t worry though, I’m sure they’ll be back.
Southern Fried Festival: Perth Concert Hall 1st August 2015
A ‘Songs of’ evening has become a regular part of the concert hall sessions at Southern Fried. If you have never been there it needs some explaining. The stage is set up like a bar, with tables, and with a small stage for the house band band to the side. The tables are occupied by singers and musicians who are due to appear elsewhere on the festival schedule. This way, the evening is not simply a tribute to a well-known songwriter, but a chance to get to sample many of the acts you can make a point of going to see, as each singer gets up in rotation and takes a shot at one of the featured songwriter’s canon. As a concept, it doesn’t always work. A few years ago, when it was in its experimental stage, one or two singers seemed uncomfortable with the material, which was outside their normal musical genre. Add to that the fact that often the final organisation happens about a week before the show, and you can see why the format runs the risk of being a bit ragged round the edges.
Della Mae in rehearsal
Tonight, however, for an all-female presentation, we were blessed by a good combination of factors. Firstly the house band was Boston-bred, Nashville-based Della Mae, who had obviously worked very hard at arrangements and coordinating the other musicians. They are, I have to say, and excellent band in their own right. Secondly their guests were from across a range of genres, each one a fine singer in her own right. And thirdly, probably most importantly, the material they were working with consisted of compositions by a brilliant songwriter.
The auditorium was packed with Dolly Parton fans – you could tell this by the reactions to the songs – but I would say that even if you don’t fit neatly into that category there was a lot to gain from the evening. I’m someone who can only take Dolly’s singing in small doses, and I mean that without taking anything away from it. It’s just a familiarity thing – because she is now simply part of our general musical landscape, her own singing has lost a little of its power to impress and surprise. So having her songs showcased by a collection of other singers gives an opportunity to appreciate them and savour them, and to realise what strength there is in her songwriting. Interpretation was the name of the game.
Lisa Mills
The singers. Allow me to mention, first of all, Amythyst Kiah. She has a kind of let’s-do-it delivery that somehow appeals to me and commands me to listen, drawing attention to the content of what she is singing. If one of the side issues here is to persuade us to explore a singer’s own material, then I’m going to explore hers. But I guess I could say the same about each of the contributing singers, in their own way. Lisa Mills, Samantha Crain, and Meaghan Blanchard each brought an interpretation that reminded us that Dolly is a country songwriter. I had heard Meaghan before in rehearsal; in performance she shifted up a couple of gears. Lisa and Samantha were entirely new to me and, once again, have persuaded me to explore.
The McCrary Sisters
The McCrary Sisters – Ann, Deborah, Regina, and Alfreda – brought us a gospel quartet interpretation. One of them (I’m ashamed to say I don’t know which!) gave us a full-on, Whitney-Houston-style ‘I Will Always Love You’, bringing the crowd to their feet before she had even finished. In my previous review, I said that I felt that Southern Fried this year was orienting itself too much towards Country.
Well, the presence of Yolanda Quartey (billed as Yola Carter), formerly of British band Phantom Limb, moved things a good way back towards Soul. Slowing Dolly’s ‘Jolene’, she turned it into a hard-edged Rhythm & Blues song. Yola’s voice is utterly amazing, and if I had to hand out a golden apple for tonight’s performance it would be to her.
I’m also going to mention Della Mae’s Jenni Lyn Gardner, who was a little tearful by the end of her solo in ‘The Grass Is Blue’. A touching moment, and a tribute to Dolly Parton’s ability to move us. This is the essence of Country music – some people consider it merely sentimental, but that sentimentalism carries real, close-to-home emotion.
The songs. Apart from those mentioned, we were treated to ‘He’s Going To Marry Me’, ‘Do I Ever Cross Your Mind?’, ‘Joshua’, ‘Shattered Image’, ‘Coat Of Many Colors’, ‘But You Know I Love You’, ‘Travelling Man’, ‘I Am A Seeker’, and several others.
Were there any weaknesses to the performance? Well, perhaps the ensemble rendition of ‘Because I Am A Woman’, and the predictable encore of ‘Nine To Five’, were a trifle haphazard. But it was a time to let their hair down, and the audience was in a totally forgiving mood. Afterwards a concert-goer, noticing I was a media rep, made a point of telling me he thought they should take that on the road as a show. It would indeed be a sell-out wherever it went, but the fact that it coordinated acts from as far apart as Tennessee, Canada, and England just goes to show how much hard work, quick work, and sheer talent went into pulling it off.
A couple of days back, I opened my emails & found this bandcamp link to a certain band called TheSuns of Albert, & their first album, Waking up in Eden. Little did I realise I would be opening a Raiders of the Lost Ark style casket full of psychedelic sound phantoms that are still swirling about my inner ears as I type.
*
In the grand tradition of the vinyl experience, the album is divided into two 20-odd minute sides, whose tunes segue effortlessly into one other. The first side begins with bird song, which lulls the listener into a heady state of mind before being dramatically shocked into life by a spine-chilling opening chord sequence played out on a rasping acoustic guitar. Some fairy strings come in next to set the mood, then the electric guitars, before the beautiful harmonies attained by The Suns of Albert leap leopard-like to the fore.
*
We have now entered the full band sound – a mish-mash-mesh of inspirations and ideas, all served up with excellent control & musicianship. The guys have eclectic tastes, and throughout side one I was sure I could make out audio-nods to the Incredible String Band, Kasabian ninja-vocals, Iggy Pop, Leonard Cohen, Pink Floyd, the axemanship of Bernard Butler during his halycon Suede days, while all the way through the album an appreciation of the Beatles harmony-work is clearly evident. Underneath it all the drums are sublimely efficient, full of creativity, driving us along the sonic-rails that that listening to Waking up in Eden involves.
*
Lyrically, the songs are top-notch; imagine what Coleridge would have done with a recording studio & a few bottles of laudanum. We hear such gems as;
* From a caravan we rock Into a dusky beatific reverie….
* Syncopated footsteps… Synchronising heartbeats…. Marching with a message to carry it down the road
*
What is the message we transmit Are we just children trying to fit
*
Suns of Albert
This album seems to reflect the ebbs and flows of the psychedelic experience, an oral-odyssey of ups and downs, of twinkling pianos, warped loudspeakers, swirling Hammonds & haunting violins. The journey undertaken by the listener is both geographical and, as I have already stated, a time-traveling soiree through the sonic soundscapes of yore. In between the lyrical sections, The Suns jam the tunes out really well with an accomplished brand of guitar music that although sounding familiar, is pretty unique in its overall effect.
*
The first half finishes beautifully, a spacey twangling guitar flourishing to fade, and I eagerly put on side two to see what else The Suns had up their sleeve. As I did so, I was like, ‘why don’t people do this anymore; rock operas, pop operas, whatever you’d call them are so friggin’ cool!’ The second half continues where the first left off, that is with a pulsing memory of the great Stones track, Play With Fire, called ‘I Know How it Feels‘,’before a master of ceremonies invites us all to, Sergeant Peppers-like, ‘look through the soul window and gaze upon the creature.‘ Next up is a baggy classic, reminiscent of the Happy Mondays at their best, full of well-polished space effects and extravagant guitar sounds. As we continue through the second side, we get the feeling that all the albums’ classics were saved for the resolution of the story, where euphoric strings sit side-by-side with infectious choruses. One of these tunes – Are You Kool? (a pretty cool track) inspired the lads to shoot the following video.
*
*
Another great moment of side two is Law Of The Land – a Roy Harper inspired beautiful liquid jam, with vocals reminiscent of the solo work of John Squire. We then have a real foot-stomper in the vein of Cast’s Sandstorm, which has a rather obtuse main lyric of; ‘Welcome to the Vegetable Alphabet.’ As we approach the end of album the boys break out into some lucid clear jamming , before reaching the epic finish of ‘Shalalalalalalas.‘
*
The Suns of Albert are a mysterious bunch. They definitely live in the Edinburgh area, but refuse to give out their real names. Instead, Manuel Enok (Guitars, percussion and voice), Nathan Toulouse (Drums, keyboards and voice) and Riff Ghrys Jones (Bass, wind and voice) are the avatars under which The Suns of Albert operate. What they do in the real world, I do not know, but does it really matter? Waking up in Eden is a brilliant piece of escapism, a highly poetic project and lyrical feast on which to surf the silver soundscape; a classic piece of musicianship, which seemed to me to be avant-garde, old fashioned and futuristic all at once. It feels like the musical spheres have come full circle and at £7.50 the download is a steal. It is also possible to download individual tracks at 75p each.
*
Reviewer : Damo Bullen
*
*
I pressed play and was expecting Adam to find me and give me a tour of Eden, but instead The Suns of Albert found me hitch-hiking within the middle of my own little lost galaxy, and flew me round the musical universe of all that has been revolutionary and passionate. We saw stars such as Led Zepplin, Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles, Louis Armstrong style brass, Zappa was glimpsed in there and for more modern ears, Kasabian will reach out to you. It was like being taken by the hand and flown through Apocalypse Now on a magic carpet while the co-pilot gentle whistled through a shenai until we reached Strawberry Fields again! A modern reassurance that the revolution is still on – excellent!
Mumble Music 