The Ninetree Stumblers Shantel the Old Fashioned
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fR395 PAGES 54-71 (15 Pgs)_Layout 1 01/04/2016 12:59 Page 8 f 62 THE OLD FASHIONED Strawberry Leaves No Masters NMCD45 Here is a new trio who have decades of expe- rience with top folk bands playing a lovely varied selection of songs and tunes. The three are Fi Fraser, Pete Bullock and Howard Mitchell and they bring a welcome freshness and delight to their performances on this superbly recorded production. Fi does all the singing, usually to piano and double bass accompaniment and her voice comes over with a youthful sparkle; she sounds as though she really enjoys all these songs whether she is interpreting well known items from the English repertoire such as Our Captain Cried All Hands, William Taylor and The Bonny Labouring Boy, humor- ous items like Jack Lane’s The Rest Of The Day or the gem from Derek Pearce, Reversible Fleece or that ode to an aging dance queen, Stately As A Galleon. Pete Bullock’s career as a pianist has seen him play in widely varying situations with jazz as well as folk outfits as well as Photo: © Judith Burrows stage shows including the National Theatre. The Ninetree Stumblers He adds cheeky fills to the funny items but brings an entirely different and appropriate A total of ten Clifton Chenier cuts docu- British groups play early American music, but accompaniment to songs of women in trag- ment his versatile sound. From playing blues, The Ninetree Stumblers stand out from their ic circumstances such as Poor Murdered boogie-woogie, fashionable dance tunes and more run-of-the-mill contemporaries, not Woman and Jez Lowe’s very moving The pop songs, elements of country and western only for their impressive mastery of the musi- Last Of The Widows. swing as well as two-steps and waltzes, he cal form, but their understanding and feel for Fi’s career has, of course, included play- carved a style and earned a popularity that the function of it. This music just isn’t ing with three of England’s top folk dance eclipsed any other Zydeco artist for two designed for a hushed concert performance, bands and there are opportunities to hear whole decades. but to dance, drink and have a laugh with just what a fine fiddle player she is. On some The collection ends with a glance back at your mates to. Listening to this album will of the dance tune tracks, Howard Mitchell its roots with Canray Fontenot and Bois-Sec make you want to do all of that, just as going switches from bass to melodeon and his com- Ardoin taking us home with some classic rural to one of their gigs will make you want to position, Jack’s Seven Handed Reel is the most creole waltzes and blues. buy this album. interesting and engaging of the instrumen- Anyone looking for a better introduction And also check out The Ninetree Stum- tals heard here. to black creole music in SW Louisiana, or blers Radio Hour podcast, issued monthly via www.nomasters.co.uk indeed a reminder of the scope and variety of Mixcloud, iTunes, etc. this music should look no further than this. www.ninetreestumblers.co.uk Vic Smith An absolute joy. Steve Hunt www.fremeaux.com PEARLY CLOUDS Jock Tyldesley SHANTEL Pearly Clouds Trapeze Music TRACD6514 Viva Diaspora Essay B00U6SW5HM Gary Lucas has only been nominated for a THE NINETREE Grammy, been named as one of the 100 STUMBLERS The Balkan beat boss is back with a bang. greatest guitarists on the planet, collaborat- Germany’s Stefan Hantel aka Shantel burst ed with Jeff Buckley (and co-penned Buck- Complete Recorded Works In onto the international scene a decade ago ley’s greatest song), performed and com- Chronological Order (Vol 1) Nanny State with an unapologetically crowd-pleasing posed with Nick Cave and Patti Smith, paid Records NSCD-4001 blend of Balkan, electro disco and Caribbean musical homage to Herzog and Tarr, and influences, which got right up the hooters of been a member of the Beefheart Magic Band. Back in 1927, the Victor Talking Machine purists and provided the rest of us with hours Company brought a field unit to Bristol, Ten- And he only plans to release three of thumping goodtime fun. Subsequent nessee, to record musicians from the region albums this year. releases have been somewhat hit and miss including Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter and it looked very much as though Shantel Comprehending the man’s picking, Family. Fast forward to 2015 and Bristol UK was a man of the moment whose moment plucking, plans and back catalogue is a and here’s The Ninetree Stumblers, a group had passed. But now we have Viva Diaspora, breathtaking undertaking. But most impres- “born a hundred years late and 4,000 miles billed in some quarters as his “Greek album” sive is the unrelenting quality of his many too far East,” in thrall to the sounds of “the and there is certainly an East Med influence projects. This album, an exquisitely unreal old, weird America”. (both Greek and Turkish) here, bolstered by Hungarian heartland of the New York imagi- Ruth Gordon, Liam Kirby and Daniel the involvement of trad Greek singer Areti nation, is no exception. Weltman are all versatile and skilled, effort- Ketime (on the excellent Eastwest-Dysi Ki He has joined up with the naturally ethe- lessly swapping instruments and tearing it Anatoli) and Athens’ kindred spirit dance- real and yet tradition-centred vocals of Enik˝o up on guitar, fiddle, mandolin and banjo, floor genre blenders Imam Baildi. Szabó and the endlessly experimental jazz with occasional harmonica, bass and percus- But that’s only part of the story. There stylings of saxophonist Tóni Dezs ˝o, to pro- sion. Soldier’s Joy aside, they eschew the are Balkan-flavoured pop tunes, Latin Ameri- duce a record of spiritual longing and time- over-familiar in favour of more obscure can influences and a pair of pumped up ver- less musical expansiveness. It is possible that gems like Old Hen Cackle, Ladies’ Quadrille sions of Jamaican reggae classics (The Ethiopi- many will be offended by the deceptive sim- and Uncle Ned’s Waltz, sourced from the ans’ The Whip and Max Romeo’s Chase The plicity of the task and the many liberties magnificently-monikered likes of The Happy Devil, re-titled Disko Devil). taken. Others will be transported. Hayseeds, Hoyt Ming And His Pep Steppers, On paper this all sounds like a directionless These are traditional songs – from Gid Tanner And The Skillet Lickers and the Kalotaszeg, in particular – that every Hungar- North Carolina Hawaiians. mess. Yet the album is one of the most coher- ently thought through and consistent I’ve ian singer seems to have attempted at least Individually, their vocals aren’t quite in encountered recently. There’s brains behind once. This accruing of interpretations is the same league as the instrumental chops, these beats. Blessed with an all pervading spirit chipped away at here, and replaced with mys- but when they harmonise, as on Fatal Wreck of carnivalesque playfulness and lightness of tery, placing Dezs ˝o’s saxophones in a multi- Of The Bus, they sound more than fine. rhythmic touch. It sounds as though Shantel’s layered world of his own invention. Through- There’s a lovely self-deprecating and back in the hot seat and enjoying himself out, Dezs ˝o replicates a hot Hungarian folk knowing humour about this release, exempli- again, to a highly infectious degree. ensemble and a contemporary prog rock fied by the title and cover design, which accu- band with apparent unlimited licence. His www.essayrecordings.com rately and affectionately pastiche the venera- contributions are eerie and unearthly, narra- ble Document Records house style. A lot of Jamie Renton tive-shaping improvisations or an extended fR395 PAGES 54-71 (15 Pgs)_Layout 1 01/04/2016 12:59 Page 9 63 f shimmer of fragile life against a big sky. The Swapping between Gaelic and English BLUE ROSE CODE electronica is primal and sharp, and Lucas’s within the same song attests that Runrig long ideas are substantial around the damaged ago achieved their principal goal of giving …And Lo! The Bird Is On The Wing! purity of the vocals. And the songs, so often their native tongue and their heritage a place Ronachan Songs RSCD0003 heard in more reverent settings, suggest a in contemporary culture. Each new album put forward by Blue Rose kind of geographical séance, still holy, for the Runrig’s Story is a tale well told and rural Hungary I know and its severe but Code is a sequel in an intensely personal nar- indisputably worth hearing. rative, an episodic story perpetually unfold- strangely beautiful landscape. Bindweed www.runrig.co.uk blowing through the small village ennui. ing, populated with real, recurring charac- Simon Jones ters. Ruptured romances you had once been There has been hopeful talk of live dates emotionally invested in. Old enemies that in the UK. Last August they premièred much of rear their heads. Familiar neighbourhoods this material at Budapest’s famously swelter- SIERRA HULL previously called home, since forsaken. New ing and dusty Sziget festival, at one o’clock in terrains to navigate. It takes bravery to lay the morning. One cannot imagine a fitter Weighted Mind Rounder Records 11661- the soul bare as Ross Wilson does, albeit place or time in which to experience this big 9166-2 veiled beneath musical moniker Blue Rose music than during a witching hour in the heat of a Central European high summer on a dusty Sierra Hull is a mandolin virtuoso and former Code.