At four years old, Latitude has grown out of toddlerdom and is now walking happily on its own two (eco-friendly) feet. It has developed into a wonderful family-friendly festival that is the darling of the liberal media and the middle classes. But such a reputation cannot be built upon vegan food stalls and top-notch recycling alone; no, Latitude Festival is built instead upon that most solid of all foundations – damn good entertainment! Whilst the festival is indeed ‘more than just a music festival’ with its impressive array of cabaret, comedy, literary and poetry acts, it is the music I wish to talk about.
Category: Reviews
Album: Duke Garwood: The Sand That Falls
Duke Garwood’s album is the first of this kind of music I have really paid attention to. What kind is it? Good question. From what I’ve heard I would call it a mix of folk, jazz, experimental and blues, but I would assume each listener has a different perspective.
Album: Dear Reader – Replace Why With Funny
South Africa isn’t renowned for providing us with too much music. In fact I couldn’t name you two that have broke these shores. Not even Wikipedia could shed much light. One South African act I can name, though, is Dear Reader – and now so can you.
Dear Reader is actually the Jo’Burg four piece’s new name. Originally, they were called Harris Tweed until the Scottish cloth company of the same name complained despite agreeing two years previous. A stolen laptop and one letter later, Dear Reader finally emerged. Anyway, petty name issues aside, Replace Why With Funny is their debut album, and you will fall in love with it.
Live: Alessi’s Ark, Left with Pictures and Tristram aboard The Tamesis
Moonshine Jambouree started out a little under a year ago with free shows in The Slaughtered Lamb in Clerkenwell. The gigs have come a long way since then and now promoter Antony Chalmers is part way through a run of shows on the Tamesis. A split level boat docked on the south bank of the Thames.
It is in this picturesque setting that FFS finds itself watching Tristram. We first saw him live eight months ago and his delicate vocals and quiet acoustic guitar have since been transformed into assured jangly pop by his backing band of a cellist, keyboard player and percussionist. Tristram’s vocals have a lovely timbre and the cheery glock and pretty harmonies contrast with a melancholy in his voice reminiscent of Nick Drake. Although he seems almost embarrassed to be watched and applauded, Tristram is a real storyteller who had the crowd hanging on his every word.
Live: TV on the Radio @ Brixton Academy 13th July 2009
It stands to reason that as a band ages their popularity should take that natural ascension up into the stars. It’s exactly what all their fans hope for, to see the band with all that talent finally getting the kudos they always deserve. But the trouble is that when the band reaches that level of adoration from so many people they automatically lose some of that magic that made them so precious in the first place. This is the perilous ledge that TV on the Radio find themselves on as they take to the stage for their biggest show in the UK, following the mammoth success of their last album ‘Dear Science’.
Album: Tinariwen – Imidiwan: Companions
Surely one of the most unique and original ‘bands’ releasing music in the UK today, Tinariwen are a group of musicians out of Mali who came together in the 1970s to play traditional Touareg music. They formed around Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who spent his early life in a Malian refugee camp and made his first guitar as a young child after seeing a cowboy playing a guitar in a Western.
Album: Catherine MacLellan – Water in the Ground/Dark Dream Midnight:
Catherine Maclellan has done the folk world a bit of a favour by not only releasing her third album Water in the Ground but by also including her first album Dark Dream Midnight- two great and very different albums for fans to take in.
Album: The Rumblestrips – Welcome to the Walk Alone
Fans of The Rumble Strips will have been shocked when they heard the hornless first release from the new album Welcome to Walk Alone. Given the band have teamed up with producer Mark Ronson, you might be forgiven for expecting it to sound like Grimethorpe Colliery Band covering the back catalogue of Dexy’s Midnight Runners. Instead it opens with the majestic ‘Welcome to the Walk Alone’ which is reminiscent of Scott Walker’s saturnine best.
Album Sampler: Lisa Mitchell
Nineteen year old Australian Lisa Mitchell has come along way since her breakthrough as a finalist in the 2006 Australian Idol. Even then as a little sixteen year old, she showed immense potential that is finally getting realised. Lisa has taken a hop, skip and a jump from Albury, New South Wales, all the way over to London to prepare her debut album Wonder.
Album: Water Tower Bucket Boys – Catfish on the Line
If you don’t like Bluegrass then you might as well stop reading now.
Hello…(hello)…(hello). This here internet sure has a mighty big echo when it gets empty. Well, since you’ve stuck around I’ll keep on reviewin’: