You are currently browsing the daily archive for June 3rd, 2007.
After last night’s avant-shenanigans, a day at Adem’s Homefires was a blessed relief, warm and comforting, in a sit-on-the-floor-drinking-ale-and-eating-falafel kind of way. I love the fact that it is held in the fascinating surroundings of London’s Conway Hall, home of the Ethical Society, with lots of literature lying around from the likes of the National Secular Society (Honorary Associate: Prof. Richard Dawkins, as you would expect). I’m off to the second day in an hour, so content yourself with some photos and some very brief notes on the artists I had the pleasure to see yesterday. Rougophobes look away now…
Anni Rossi: Violins are all the rage these days. No-one plays guitar any more. Anni Rossi plucked, bowed and scraped (mimicking the sound of her father shoveling snow from the path) enjoyably, with a fine voice much like that of Nina Nastasia, who was to play later.
David Karsten Daniels: Had more than a touch of the Will Oldhams about him. Bitter songs (one finished with the line: “I’ll pepper bullets across your spine”!) set atop some finely nuanced guitar playing, some songs dissolving into calm sine wave feedback codas. A highlight.
Adjagas: Full of Scandinavian uncategorisableness, and featuring two wonderful singers, or “joikers”. The woman in particular had a bewitching voice, stronger, higher and idiosyncratic, if anything sounding more Asian - Indian or Nepali perhaps - than I would have expected from a Norwegian band. The last song featured the male singer howling amidst bleak electronics and guitar, passionate and powerful, and comfortably the best thing I heard all day.
Emmy The Great: No lack of confidence here - check that name. Another with a nice line in twisted lyrics, one song finished with “it had your face…I would have kept it if you had stayed”. Ouch.
Not Applicable Artists: A welcome diversion from all the pretty girls and pretty music we had seen so far. Some great electro-acoustic improvisation, with one musician playing a bowl and cymbal, and the resulting metallic rush being processed into a howl by a floppy-haired colleague on laptop. The second section featured fine clarinet and flugelhorn, although was let down by some fairly uninspiring beats.
Barbarossa: I had seen him before, so took the opportunity to indulge in some of the afore-mentioned falafel at this time. Very tasty. We made it back in for the last couple of songs, including that one I really like which I don’t know the name of, but has him and a female backing singer cooing “yooooooooouuuu….and loooooo-oooove” or something. It is most probably called “You And Love”. Very tasty.
St Vincent: “Wow, what a nice day..oh, I’m talking about the weather, great…stage banter 101. This song is about death.” Another attractive and pretty good (she occasionally plays with Sufjan Stevens) female singer-songwriter. The photographers down the front were going nuts.
Fionn Regan: I had seen him supporting Juana Molina last year, although he was a bit better on this occasion. Sang and played unamplified a couple of times, which was a nice way of getting the chatterers to shut up. I started checking out the literature from the Freethinker’s Society at this point (latest news: Churches have a hell of a time selling heaven), so my mind must have wandered a bit. He still needs a decent haircut (yeah, like I can talk).
Nina Nastasia: A predictably excellent solo performance, although I did miss her brilliant pianist Steven Beck somewhat. Gamely took requests for songs which she couldn’t remember how to play (”Dear Rose”). She played some stuff from the new album recorded with Jim White which I haven’t heard yet, but it really sounds like I should.
Adem: Like a comfy pair of slippers. He seemed a bit more relaxed this year than he has been in previous years, probably because all the acts turned up, and were on time and so on. He proved a dependable, enjoyable low-key finale, tossing a couple of covers (Low, Bjork) amongst the staples of his back catalogue (”Everything You Need”, “Love And Other Planets”, “Spirals”). He experimented a little with music boxes and bowed xylophones (had he been to the London Sinfonietta recently? I didn’t see him there), and seemed genuinely delighted with himself and the other bands and the pretty stage and with us. I’m sure I’ll see him again very soon. Must dash…
Photos are from the flickr
Recent Comments