Author: Tim Cumming
View album and artist detailsArtist/band: |
Folkatron Sessions |
Label: |
Upcycled Sound Records |
Magazine Review Date: |
January/2021 |
These sessions – ‘eight musicians, seven days, one experimental folk album from scratch’ – feature a welcomely eclectic mix of players, styles, instrumentation, approaches and genres. It involves musicians from Normandy, Paris, Suffolk, Oxford and Ballymore, working with songs ranging from the Napoleonic-era (‘My Son John’) through Swedish dance tunes and Greek-Sephardic laments to original songs and reels.
The process clearly worked well, because Skiver has a unique soundscape and feel. The eight players switch line-ups for each track, the opening ‘My Son John’ featuring strings and synth quartet, while the title-track has all eight at work, conjuring up a folk-prog entity that begins spare and slow, before building into a variegated wall of sounds. Highlights include the delicate silvery drones of ‘Sien Drahamas’, led by Jack Ó hAonghusa’s flute, and originally a popular Greek song that was adopted by Sephardic singers in Thessaloniki, and the intricate bodhrán rhythms of ‘Resistance Reel’. But the best of this short album is the last, ‘Coachman’s Cottage’, a wonderfully slow air composed by Kip Pratt of the duo Duck and Weave, brought to life by a four-piece of cello, fiddle, clarinet and double bass.
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