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1S Friday, February 8, 2013 53 EMILIA MITIKU IBelong To You 3 By SIMON COSYNS IT’S been 14 years since Swedish-Ethiopian singer AS far as this beguiling Emilia Mitiku had ahit album is concerned, Anaïs with Big Big World. Mitchell is afair maiden Mitiku has found her feet and her own “vintage astride a“milk white steed” pop” sound, which and Jefferson Hamer is her reflects her influences, NEWNEW knight in shining armour. who include Etta James and Billie Holiday. MUSMUSICIC They perform exquisitely crafted In parts there’s beauty interpretations of centuries-old –Winter Beach and ByByJIMJIMGELLATLY English and Scottish folk songs about lovers, rogues, betrayal and You’re Breaking My Heart CULANN murder. show off her raspy soul But they come with atwist, for voice –but her cover of WHO: PJ Kelly (vocals/ Dream ALittle Dream guitar), Greg Irish Anaïs and Jefferson are American and they made the album in Music doesn’t do the classic (guitar), Calum Davis song justice and the (bass), Ross McCluskie City itself: Nashville. What makes it so effective is the jaunty (keys), Sean Kelly waythe pair have captured the Ooh La La (drums/vocals) spirit of theoriginals while adding takes the WHERE: Irvine, Ayrshire harmonies, fiddle, accordion and retro jazz FOR FANS OF: Biffy pumporgan ...all of which are vibe astep Clyro, Pink Floyd, typical of so much roots music in too far. Frightened Rabbit the States. JS JIM SAYS: It’s difficult Though called Child Ballads, it to write about any has nothing to do with children or MODESTEP 3 Ayrshire act without children’s songs. It’s named after Evolution Theory referencing Biffy Clyro. Sir Francis James Child, a The fact is they’ve Victorian luminary who collected DUBSTEP is proving By TIM NIXON into believing they were become huge ambassa- five volumes of these wonderful more than apassing fad. recording demos. dors for the area where hand-me-down songs. Modestep latched on to “WE’RE like this ten-legged, It was acrafty move designed they still live, and it’s no Two of them, Sir Patrick Spens the scraggy, over-used to rid them of any tension, and coincidence the Ayr- and Tam Lin, were made famous ruthless, brutal machine many of the so-called practice end of the genre when now,” states Foals frontman shire scene is so by folk-rock giants Fairport they formed acouple of runs ended up as final takes. healthy. From singer- Convention in the late Sixties and Yannis Philippakis with “We were duped,” laughs years ago. songwriters to hard now we can marvel at the latest They have now Yannis. “That happened alot. chapter in their journey. unbridled confidence. Stepson and Moon were done like rock, there seems to be produced adebut record Boasting athird album an endless flow of tal- So here, exclusively for SFTW, that. Anaïs, the singer/songwriter behind designed to be turned up rich in grandiosity, subtlety, “Later on in the process, ent coming through. to 11 by the next genera- vision and muscularity, it’s I’ve been keeping an the hugely acclaimed folk opera we’d go there in the evening Hadestown, tells the story of her tionofadolescents seek- hardly surprising he’s not with acouple of bottles of eye on Culann for a while. Singer PJ Kelly fascinating new project. ing the “cool” feeling of a shying away from wine and we’d play asong all sub bass vibrating their celebrating their career night —five or six hours acknowledges the WHEN did you first discover the Child impact Biffy have had. typical themes of these mouths, they had to be eyeballs. high. without interruption. ballads? great old songs? bent alittle this way and that. If justice prevails, He told me: “Biffy are How did you get that warm live-in- Impeccable in terms of “Once we were tired of When Iwas akid, we had a As anon-academic, here’s my On the other hand, we love the Holy Fire will propel playing it, we’d come out and abig inspiration to book in our house called Rise Up the-studio feel for the recording? quality or originality it sense of them: Alot of the ballads exoticness of these songs so much may not Foals to the highest they’d say, ‘We’ve got it’. bands in Ayrshire. They Singing. It was ahippie-era We recorded the album really and we didn’t want to dilute that echelons of aUKband have achieved success are love stories and it seems like be, but “In that process, you forget hymnal and included folk songs, many of the protagonists are live, both guitars and both vocals too far. scene badly in need of yourself when you’re allowed on their own terms and labour/union songs, and afew of at the same time, sitting as close this album leadership. women, young women who have to As far as the instrumentation to just play and play and that is something that the Child ballads (there had been “win” ahusband or afather for as we could get away with, given goes, that was fairly intuitive and most cer- The 11-song collection is the play. They captured the every unsigned band aresurgence of the ballads in the the microphone placement, never tainly does sum of many parts, not least their babies. There are supernatu- natural. Gary lobbied for essence of songs in the best should aspire to.” Sixties via Joan Baez, Bob Dylan ral stories of fairies and witches once putting on headphones in the accordion, we lobbied for fiddle. its job. PC their self-assuredness as a way possible.” Despite their prog etc). That was my first exposure studio. song-writing unit and their whocast spells ...lots of shape- We worked with some wonderful Holy Fire is out on Monday rock tendencies, I’m but Ididn’t fall head over heels shifting. We worked in Nashville with a Nashville musicians and they FRONTIER broad-reaching ideals. and Yannis is justifiably itching really digging what till about five years back when I beautiful producer called Gary “The only rule was to not There’s betrayal and couldn’t help but bring their Amer- RUCKUS for people to hear it. Culann do. With my started listening to Andy murder too, and some of Paczosa, who is most famous for ican personalities to the music. 4 have any rules,” explains However, his fervour is Irvine &Paul Brady, Mar- Eternity Of Dimming Yannis, 26, between bites of a radio head on, five min- the ballads depict spe- his work with Alison Krauss. He’s What do you think of the Fairport tempered by fears that the utes is far too long for a tin Carthy, Nic Jones, Dick cific political events. got awonderful set-up and agreat burger at anorth-west London album format is dead, because Gaughan, Anne Briggs, Convention versions of songssuch EMERGING from the US pub. single, yet the songs There’s nearly an entire ear for acoustic instruments, and as Tam Lin and Sir Patrick Spens? of the vast conveyor belt of have enough twists and Fairport Convention, Pent- volume dedicated to he really helped to get the breath state of Michigan is this “We didn’t have aset of music available at no cost. angle and the list goes on. We love Fairport Convention and quietly compelling band. defined goals. There was very turns to maintain inter- Robin Hood stories. I into these songs and the focus on He muses: “The problem is What fascinated you about the storytelling. were very inspired by their Over sympathetic folk little analysis and there was est. Amix of classic haven’t read them all, versions of Tam Lin and Spens. that the internet has created them? but I’ve made adent. and country textures, almost no talking about the and contemporary How did you set about giving English We actually did an entirely dif- this flippant, appetitive, As asongwriter, I’ve frontman Matthew Milia material as we were writing it. gimme gimme gimme attitude How come you hooked and Scottish folk songs an American ferent recording session about a delivers two discs of “We didn’t want it to be always been interested in up with Jefferson Hamer to make the twist? year before the sessions that where people think they’re storytelling, and the Child ballads thoughtful rites-of-pas- something that engaged with entitled to free music. album? Ithink both of us wanted to be became Child Ballads. In that sage songs. the brain —wewanted it to are such fascinating stories, Iwouldn’t have made this album able to sing these songs that we early session we were somewhat engage from the neck down. masterfully told. Wistful, melancholic, Mildew without Jefferson. When we first love so much in our own country Fairport-inspired, Jefferson played nostalgic, it’s like opening They’re so sprawling, epic, met, Jefferson was playing in my and have them be understood in electric guitar and we laid down Appeal “You can download all of fantastically poetic and they’re afamily album of sepia- Fela Kuti’s or Frank Zappa’s band and we immediately sensed real-time by Americans who might some drum tracks and had abit of tinted photographs that “This time in the band different from American folk that we had aspecial harmonic not be familiar with the archaic afantasy of making ahighly life work in ten minutes and it music, which is also an inspiration summon fading memo- recently has felt like the most will sit there and rot and thingtogether.