duggup

Unlike the members of Stornoway Jools and I have been to Lewis, and I thoroughly recommend the trip to to the band. But I digress… we are here today to recommend Stornoway (thats the band) to you. According to their web presence…. The band consists of an Ornithologist, a wannabe Russian translator, a South African [...]

Time for some of my favourite category – hard listening. Autopilot is for Lovers are awesome. Now I will be first to admit that you are unlikely to see the charms of this outfit on the first listen. BUT you really need to persevere.

Adrienne Hatkin,(the lead vocalist) has a voice that will stop you in your tracks. Her performance is so direct and intense. It takes some getting used to.

Kiss The Mistress caught my ear by surprise. All the more so because they don’t have a guitarist. I truly find their music quite startling. The tune “Priddy Pookah” which romps along in 7/8 time, is a prime example. This puppy slips and slides , the ideas wander in and out and it never sits [...]

I hadn’t been to Magnatune for a while ( along while as it turns out. But I was looking something baroque-ish (don’t ask) and found Da Camera: Celtic Renaissance/Baroque Ensemble, who as it turns out , were just what I was looking for. Da Camera is a versatile ensemble, crossing the line between ‘early’, ‘folk’ [...]

Vetiver is an American folk band headed by songwriter Andy Cabic and often joined by Devendra Banhart, cellist Alissa Anderson, drummer Otto Hauser, violin Carmen Biggers, guitarists Kevin Barker and Sanders Trippe, bassist Brent Dunn. AND They are really really really annoying. I have been listening to them for a couple of weeks now and [...]

A colleague told me about a movie called “Once” and the then up coming tour of this duo who starred in the movie. After that it all got complicated. I rediscovered the track this evening and thought it might make a fine beginning to the week with their romantic and gentle love songs. Glen Hansard [...]

Freak Kitchen is a heavy metal/hard rock band from Sweden, they fired up in the early Nineties and kept the same line up until 2000 when the rhythm section was replaced.  Their music is melodic, rich, harmonically complex and full of interesting approaches to time. Lyrically they mine the usual targets – capitalist society, conformity, [...]