Back in stock: Folk/Americana

Review: Martin Carthy's revolutionary trad-folk eponymous debut hears a repress via Topic, the label through which it was originally released. Truly, if it weren't for Carthy, both album and artist, there would be no Bob Dylan nor Paul Simon; having emerged in the early 1960s to a second English folk revival - which, while existing in the ferment of the sweats of one English folklorist Cecil Sharp, whose lifelong travail was to reinvigorate belief in an Englishness founded on myth, decades earlier - Carthy's music was wholly endemic to the latter-day revival of the 1960s, which was far less 'trad' than Sharp's in that it allowed more room for artists to experiment with the form. Though every lyric here is a folk transmission, it's as if Carthy's socialist upbringing (by trade unionist lightermen parents, no less) comes filtered through its every utterance; Carthy approaches every folk classic from Sharp's own invention 'High Germany' through to more indelible standards, such as 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley', 'Scarborough Fair' and 'Springhill Mine Disaster', all with equal legend Dave Swarbrick in tow for fiddle and mandolin duties.

Review: It’s not too late to add to your Christmas album stockpile with one eye on next year’s seasonal celebrations, and where better to look for a classy addition than Aimee Mann’s modern classic One More Drifter In The Snow? The country legend was clear about her creative aims with the record, aiming for the moody, mysterious tone emitted by the likes of Vince Guaraldi and Julie London in their takes on festive music. It’s a record to be savoured by the warm glow of the fire, when the holiday hubbub has given way to intimacy and reflection, and truth be told these standards and original compositions will get you through the winter months regardless of whether it’s still Christmas or not around your record player.

Review: Lux Interior and Poison Ivy, of Cramps fame, team up to deliver Leather Jackets and Diesel Smoke, a whopping 50-track compilation that documents their utmost personal favourite rock recordings, in the micro-veins of acid folk, rockabilly and psychobilly. We'll doff and eat our hats if both said punk legends' rising signs aren't Scorpio. With madcap performances from Donnie James with the Mighty Joe Houston Orchestra, Tall Tonio And The Mello-Dees, Chris Christian And The Chordaires, Elisabeth Waldo, Fred Katz and John Reedy and His Stone Mountain Trio among many more, this is a cavalcade of no-hit wonders, every last one of them a gem. Amounting to a contemporaneous account of the music that The Cramps heard and loved during their rise to notoriety, not to mention the lesser-known music that would've graced the halls of New York's CBGB club, of which they were favourite performers.

Review: Ghost are sadly an easily confused band - doubly so, for the fact that there is now a wildly popular masked metal troupe of the same name, *and* because there is, uncannily, a 1984 film named Ghost, also rather well known. This confounding is apparently so prevalent that the obligatory Wikipedia entry on *this* Ghost is titled
'Ghost (1984 band)'. We wouldn't usually mention it, save for the fact that this perhaps not so wilful obscurantism actually works in their favour. With Drag City's reissue of Ghost's first album on griseous vinyl here, it's safe to say that this Japanese experimental psych/acid record's aura as a hidden gem feels rare to come by. It's almost as if Ghost (1984) is 'haunting' the other aforementioned cultural touchstones of the same name. Don't get it twisted, though: Ghost formed in the early 80s, but this debut recording didn't make it to the pressing plant until 1990. What explains the gap in their CV, you ask? Legend has it that the band led a truly nomadic existence - as a "band" should, in all senses of the word - roving, drifting from ruined ancient temples to disused subway stations near Tokyo. With that all checked, the album itself is truly free-spirited and eerie, and not what you'd expect from contemporary notions of space rock, with prepared tinkerings and strange readymade detritus seeming to fill each piece at every twist and turn.

Review: ***B-STOCK: Sleeve damaged but otherwise in excellent condition***


As part of a new looking back on German art rocker Nico's esteemed career by the indie label Domino, Desertshore chronologically follows The Marble Index, and is her third album, following the prior project's establishing her as an avant-garde artist with one foot in the mainstream, in stark defiance of the the prejudiced poo-poohs that followed her first (baroque pop) album, Chelsea Girl. Desertshore is more of a reconciliation of her prior two projects, bringing back the initial western pop sensibility while now firmly basking in a newfound weirdness-and-she-knows-it. From the opening dark waves of 'Janitor Of Lunacy' to the piano-balladic injection of sadness that is 'Afraid', this is another avant-garde masterpiece by the musician, never justifiably passed over.

Review: As part of Atlantic Records' 75th Anniversary celebration, the label has launched an extensive year-long vinyl series featuring 90 releases spanning the entire history of the company, from its earliest days until the present. Of these emerges this latest reissue of Crosby, Stills & Nash's self-titled debut album, first released on the label all the way back in 1969. The album features some of CSN's most well known and iconic songs; 'Suite: Judy Blue Eyes,' 'Marrakesh Express,' 'Guinnevere,' 'Wooden Ships,' 'Helplessly Hoping' and 'Long Time Gone.' This album saw a shift in sound to what was popular at the time - blues based rock - opting for a more folk rock, and sometimes jazz-based sound. It would lay the foundations for the California Sound that would be popularised out of Laurel Canyon in the '70s. Artists such as The Eagles, Jackson Browne and Fleetwood Mac would take inspiration from the sound of this record.