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where the studio itself is as much an instru- hear Patsy playing solo fiddle while others The music comes both from the Scottish ment as anything wielded by the players. It’s will be seduced by the sentimental song Fiddle tradition and Fraser himself. His much the same crew as before, with Chris selection, but at the heart of it all there’s a Howard Booster’s Style is just a drop-dead Eckman and Hugo Race working with Ben glorious musician playing with soul and gorgeous tune; the five pieces in the commis- Zabo and his band, Samba Touré and singer integrity and that goes a long way. sioned Connie Suite are all inspired by dances Aminta Wassidje Traore. There are more You can hear a track on this issue’s fRoots (the Django-influenced Hot Club d’Écosse lets guests, members of Tamikrest, the band 48 compilation. Fraser do Grapelli impressions while Super 11, rapper MC Jazz and singer Ibrahima www.patsyreid.com Ougadougou Boogie coaxes unusual rhythms Douf, all of whom bring something impor- from the Haas’ cello), while the chirpy The tant. This is an album of dark moods and Colin Irwin Referendum commemorates Alex Salmond’s strong textures, kicking off with the strong visit to the fiddle course at Sabhal Mor Ostaig trance of Stars Of Gao – as hard as anything (the Gaelic college on Skye). This duo always you’ll find in Gnawa – before setting out on STEIN URHEIM go down a storm live, but rarely tour accessi- an aural trip. There are touches of dub bly, so this album is a hugely welcome substi- Stein Urheim Hubro CD2529 colouring the production, but that’s only part tute – an abundance of riches indeed. of the story. It can range from the dreamlike From the Norwegian drone-band and jazz www.culburnie.com sonics of Clouds Are Cover to the nightmare scene comes Bergen’s Stein Urheim with an Bob Walton shards of sound and voice that make up Day intriguing solo album, full of space and mea- The Grid Went Down. Along the way shafts sure. Its five instrumental tracks are based of daylight peek through in the more jaunty mainly around slide guitar and slide tam- Ballade De Ben Zabo. It’s a trip to hold the lis- boura, with the slide rattling against the frets FELA KUTI tener enthralled, down winding roads and and the neck, with appearances by the Chi- Teacher Don’t Teach Me Nonsense; the open desert, the Red Dust of Bamako and nese gu qin, the Norwegian langeliek zither Original Suffer Head; Live In close with the sadness of September 12. Per- and the odd banjo and mandolin, which take Amsterdam; Army Arrangement; haps the most important thing about Dirtmu- up melodies for a short space and then disap- Beasts Of No Nation; Underground sic – a loose name for a collection of musi- pear again, adding to the air of shared noise. System Knitting Factory KFR 1022 – 1027 cians more than any fixed band – is that The Chinese, or rather Cantonese, influence is they’re moving beyond any definition for the strong in the falling cadences of Kosmoloda VARIOUS ARTISTS music they play, showing the different, shift- and Watch The View, where they are repeat- ing forms it can take. ed and built upon in a Philip Glass-like man- Red Hot + Fela Knitting Factory KFR1121-2 www.glitterbeat.com/glitterbeat_artist_ ner. Beijing Blues is a little gem of surprises, dirtmusic.html Completing the latest reissue of the com- concluding in a soft, mutated blues with plete Fela Kuti canon, the last six CDs. What Chris Nickson groaning harmonica as a backdrop, and hasn’t been said about Fela’s musical Great Distances is constructed around aching, achievement, his war against injustice, echoing minor-key slide, blending the desert exploitation and the suffering he paid for it? blues of Tinawaren with John Fahey’s experi- Savage beatings, phoney charges, jail, bro- PATSY REID mental The Great San Bernadino Birthday ken health, early death – this music was born Party and ending early enough to leave the The Brightest Path Classy Trad Records out of struggle and is live, bristling and pow- listener wanting more. It’s all assured, subtle CTREC002 erful. But you know that. and gently humorous. If Les Triaboliques There are lots of wondrous twang your synapses, this one should be right The Red Hot+Fela compilation is a selec- fiddle players in Scotland – up your street. tion of Fela’s pieces reworked by modern musicians, not following the Afrobeat route and indeed the rest of the www.hubromusic.com British Isles. What perhaps too closely. We have rock, hip hop and Ameri- sets Patsy Reid apart is musi- Ian Kearey cana, contributors including Angelique Kidjo, cal hunger and her willing- My Morning Jacket, the Kronos Quartet – get ness to explore supposedly about, don’t they? – and Tony Allen. A good alien territories of technique, ALASDAIR FRASER & and often surprising CD. Red Hot is an AIDS content and culture. This NATALIE HAAS awareness organisation. inevitably contains no small element of risk www.knittingfactoryrecords.com/ Abundance Culburnie CUL124 but, as accomplished as she is, Patsy has not Rick Sanders only earned the right to take the bow on a More than ten years in and only the fourth journey of discovery, she’s gathered the album from this remarkable duo, who still know-how to get it right. sound as fresh and inventive as they did back EDDI READER Already vastly experienced in a conglom- at the beginning. Fraser’s fiddling is always a eration of different techniques via her work joy to behold, and Haas’ cello – sometimes Vagabond Reveal Records REVEAL022CDX with Breabach, VAMM, the Cecil Sharp Pro- almost a percussion instrument, sometimes a ject and innumerable Celtic Connections col- wall of sound, sometimes taking the lead lyri- FIONA HUNTER laborations, Patsy really extends herself (and cally – go together like a horse and carriage. Rusty Squash Horn Records RSH004CD sounds like she’s having a lot of fun too) dab- As with the last album, the duo make judi- bling here and delving there with lively cious use of some extra musicians (including Always a great live performer, Eddi Reader jaunts between hardcore tradition and con- Donald Shaw, James MacIntosh and even a has travelled far and wide both geographical- temporary experimentation. The album was Nashville brass section) but they’re always ly and musically, skirting the areas that might conceived, workshopped and refined at the subservient to the soaring fiddle melodies. fall under the category of acoustic pop, folk, Crear arts retreat in Argyll, where she was folk rock, jazz or original songwriting. Five joined by Mhairi Hall (piano), Ewan MacPher- Patsy Reid years after her last studio album, and follow- son (guitar, banjo, mandolin), Ben Nicholls ing a personally turbulent few years, she has (double bass, harmonium), Fraser Fifield (sax, returned to her roots, with many of the songs whistle), Signy Jakobsdóttir (percussion) and relating to her past and her wanderings; the Mattie Foulds – co-producer – on drums. album was partly recorded at her home. Most What emerges is a veritable jamboree of of the writing credits go to Eddi, in conjunc- styles. It opens, for example, with her own tion with her partner John Douglas and long- Hooray Henry, a meandering jazz ensemble time collaborator Boo Hewerdine, while work that suddenly explodes with a startling Michael Marra, Declan O’Rourke, and a cou- volley of sax before being replaced by a ple of traditional songs round things off. sparse piano accompaniment ushering in the Her usual touring band are augmented plaintive Reid fiddle on a gorgeous tradition- by the cream of the British folk scene, here al tune, Donside. The contrast is striking yet producing a lush, relaxed, smoky, occasionally somehow seamless, but before you know it jazzy French café feel that’s a perfect foil for she’s singing Ewan MacPherson’s heart- Eddi’s downright glorious singing. (Frankly, warming song The River Princes with confi- she could sing the telephone directory and dence and panache. make it sound wonderful.) From the opening Patsy also plays cello and viola amid the Gus Kahn standard I’ll Never Be The Same to rapidly changing textures and while the the perfect closing gem of Hewerdine’s It’s A issue may occasionally be clouded by a Beautiful Night there’s nary a duff track. marginal overload of sound and finicky After publicly slagging off her singing of arrangements, it generally does all hang Burns’ songs in the House of Lords, I can’t see together remarkably well. Some may Lord Steel going for Vagabond, but that’s just inevitably bleat about purity and wanting to fine. It really is a lovely laid-back album: light