Skip to main content

The Magic Bridge

Richard Dawson can look like a folk singer: one bearded man with an acoustic guitar, albeit an amplified one, and can sometimes sound like a bit like one too. His playing, though, owes as much to avant-garde free improvisation as it does to traditional fingerpicking & strumming, while the subject-matter of his fascinating lyrics can incorporate historical events, mundane contemporary references, and the surreal or fantastical. The overall effect is a singular one, and not readily categorisable.

I first heard him in late 2014, when his song 'The Vile Stuff'' (drawn from his fourth album Nothing Important) was played on BBC 6 Music. Not completely sold, but curious, I looked on-line and found a  YouTube clip of him performing 'Black Dog in the Sky' - and that reeled me in. This song formed part of a 2011 album The Magic Bridge, which, conveniently, was re-issued in 2015 as interest in his music grew. I ordered a CD copy of it. 

'Black Dog in the Sky' concerns a traveller who is robbed, only to see the offending "moon-faced vagabonds" suffer a grisly fate via seemingly supernatural means - as punishment for their crime, or by random chance? It's not really made clear. 'Wooden Bag', another highlight on the disc, has to do with a knapsack "purchased for 30 francs from a market in Geneva in 1968" and its miscellaneous contents. Other songs have titles like 'Grandad's Deathbed Hallucinations' and 'Man Has Been Struck Down By Hands Unseen'. There are a couple of instrumentals too. It's a very striking album by a unique talent who was then just beginning to hit his creative stride.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

All Wrapped Up

Here's another of the compilation cassettes I bought this summer, having taken home a Denon twin-deck hi-fi cassette player from the local charity shop. All Wrapped Up is a 1983 compilation of singles by The Undertones, with Side One filled with A-sides, and B-sides on Side Two. A cassette must be the least desirable medium for such an arrangement, with a long rewind required if one just wants to hear the hits repeatedly. The Undertones were unapologetically provincial and anti-fashionable, with their songs sharply-written slices of life that pointedly avoided any mention of politics, or of the then-continuing violence in their native Derry. My favourite tracks are the obvious choices: 'Teenage Kicks', 'Jimmy Jimmy', 'Here Comes the Summer', 'My Perfect Cousin' & 'Wednesday Week'. Their later singles showed increased sophistication but lack the some of the straightforward charm of their earlier work. The B-sides, not unexpectedly, are mo...
Post a Comment
Read more

In Heat

Having acquired the soubriquet "the walrus of love", Barry White thereafter became something of a figure of fun, something that misled me (and presumably others) into disregarding his music. Only within the last few years have I begun to pay it more attention. After picking up a copy of his '74 album Can't Get Enough last summer, which I loved, I sought out some of the music by his protegés Love Unlimited. From a Discogs seller I ordered well-used copies of Under the Influence of... ('73) and In Heat ('74) for only £6.25. The only unappealing thing about In Heat is its awful title. The songs and the singing are strong; the arrangements rich & warmly enveloping. As one would expect from White, the thematic focus is firmly fixed on amatory matters. The opening number 'Move Me No Mountain' (the only one on the record not written by White) offers a refreshing rebuttal to the kind of lyrical hyperbole in songs like 'Ain't No Mountain High E...
Post a Comment
Read more

Bananas Are Not Created Equal

I knew Jay Berliner's name from his contributions to Van Morrison's Astral Weeks and Charles Mingus' The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady , so when I saw this curiously-titled LP at the local charity shop I was intrigued, and bought it even though I had no idea what kind of music it might contain. This was after the days when one could still buy records there for a pound apiece, but I don't think I paid more than a fiver for it. The music turned out to be an all-instrumental blend of funk, soul & jazz. Berliner's virtuoso lead guitar is only one of many attractions here. The band of first-rate session musicians behind him are all uniformly excellent too, and, crucially, sound like they're having a blast. Cornell Dupree's supporting guitar work, while less showy than Berliner's, is beautifully-judged, and the rhythm section is terrific. Arranger/conductor Wade Marcus was no slouch either, judging from the way everything comes together. Two of the funk...
Post a Comment
Read more