Songs From the Shipyards

This is the 3rd release in what is, at the moment, a trilogy of side projects, Diversions Vol 3 is a score written for a new film by Richard Fenwick, Songs from the Shipyards, tracing the history of the shipbuilding industry using a compilation of archive footage. I have been a Unthanks fan since first I heard their angelic voices meld in harmony. Big Steamers is a favourite here at the Monastery.
But even alone, the album’s jigsaw puzzle mix of song, spoken word and shipyard sound is a haunting folk portrait of a community bearing the emotional and physical weight of industry.
The intimacy of the freshly cut-back band distills the power of a capella showstopper ‘Fairfield Crane’, performed with characteristic sharpness by Rachel Unthank. Jez Lowe’s ‘Taking on Men’ becomes a short and bittersweet recession anthem, immediate as carol singers at your front door, while a cover of ‘Shipbuilding’ is equally focused but rounded out with a lush arrangement, almost choral.
At just a nudge under ten minutes long, ‘The Romantic Tees’ is comparatively expansive, a mix of spoken word, working boat launch sounds and song in three parts, with a patchwork feel. With Graeme Miles’ words rejecting romanticisation of the river with an audible raised eyebrow (‘The ‘romantic’ Tees?’), producer and ‘deviser’ Adrian McNally finds a break in the at times chocolate box melodies of the album at large.
Elsewhere, sweet, impressionistic lullabies and eerie seaside waltzes are again undercut by lyrics insisting on the reality of declining industry and its impact. Diversions Vol 3 paints an incisive portrait of England’s industrial heritage, even beyond the rivers of the North East.

Stillhouse

When I first heard the initial iteration of this project I was speechless. Of course, I'm not generally given to oration as a rule, but the sweet simplicity of this work just seemed so right.
I was immediately enamored with the title track.
A vision realised...
Steinar Raknes is a man of many tastes. A founding member of the fiery modern jazz quartet The Core, a collaborator with lyrical jazz violinist Ola Kvernberg, co-leader of the SKÁIDI duo with yoik vocalist Inga Juuso, and leader of his own quartet that covers tango and bossa-nova classics, on Stillhouse, this Norwegian double bassist features his abilities as a vocalist and interpreter of eclectic, iconic American songs from the past few decades, as well as a few originals.
Raknes’ acoustic arrangements are straightforward.
His vocals are warm but his delivery direct and reserved, largely reciting the lyrics as matter-of- fact reporting, and never attempting to compete with memorable, existing vocal versions. His confident and powerful finger-picked playing strips the melodic content of these songs to their basic skeletal lines, his humble and intimate attitude stressing their emotional impact.
Raknes hosts Nashville harmonicist Mickey Raphael and several Norwegian vocalists on a few songs. Solveig Slettahjell brilliantly adds her warm voice to Raknes’ on John Prine's “Killing the Blues.” Raphael is a perfect partner on the arresting, melancholic cover of Gillian Welch’s “Tear My Stillhouse Down.” Gently, with vocalist Unni Wilhelmsen, Raknes adds touching emotional insight to The Band’s “Twilight.”
Raknes couples Prince’s “Kiss” with Bruce Springsteen’s “I’m on Fire,” transforming the originals’ explicit, seductive and reckless desire with the experience of mature and patient passion. This kind of peace-making with his own past serves Raknes beautifully on his original, “Time to Go” while a cover of Joni Mitchell’s “Woodstock” adds a distant and skeptical view of the historic event.
Raknes’ best cover is John Prine’s classic “Speed of the Sound of Loneliness,” where his modest and sober approach fits perfectly with the words. He concludes this set with two originals, the bluesy “Down the Drain” and optimistic farewell “Walkin.’”
Surprising, beautiful and highly rewarding.
Personnel: Steinar Raknes: double bass, vocals; Mickey Raphael: harmonica (1, 3, 6, 8, 10, 13) Solveig Slettahjell: vocals (1); Unni Wilhelmsen: vocals (5); Kaja Bremnes: vocals (12); Paolo Vinaccia: snare drum (8); Andrew Utnem: harmonium (9, 14).

Hello Black Halo

Just like the late Jessie Mae Hemphill, Becky Lee is a renegade and Lonely She-Wolf in the world of men dominated Blues Rock’n’Roll. She is one of the world’s few female one (wo)man bands. She plays guitar, kick drum, snare w/a foot pedal and floor tom with her strum hand with such co-ordination you could swear it was a 4 piece band.
Hello Black Halo, her debut album on Voodoo Rhythm Records, rolls in with  dark clouds of betrayal, death, and lust, as Becky Lee abuses the hell out of her guitar using the drums only to drive the song into the open country of your speakers and her voice strikes with the power of lightning.
In “Killer Mouse”, she breaks from the beating drum into a small lead that proves Lee understands how a song needs to break down for the words or music to have the desired power.
The tracks that follow are all great and enjoyable, but the track that stands out is “Hip Kids”, a suburban summer lament. In this track, Lee channels the Shondells in a 1950′s dirge about being finished with the posturing multitudes who are too cool to do anything loose or reckless (or even treat a woman right).