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| Track list: 1. Let Her Run 2. Old Dun Cow 3. Rosemary Lane 4. Moon Kittens 5. The March Past 6. Byker Hill 7. The Wife of Usher’s Well 8. Jack Lintel 9. Black Beetle Pies 10. Greenwood Side 11. Sloe Gin 12. London Town 13. New York Girls 14. Frogs Legs & Dragon’s Teeth Running time: 63 minutes Released: 2016 |
Part 2 of the long goodbye (part 1 here). I am apparently going to be traipsing 80 miles each way to see them one last time this week. Having failed to get tickets for the Oxford show, a friend secured a pair for the "bonus" date inserted in Southampton after the original tour was announced.
Disc 2 opens with Let Her Run, an energetic number with a heavy beat pounding to establish a rhythm. The pace though is enforced by the vibrancy of the vocal. Looking down the track list for this half of the Farewell Tour, there are a few track names I can't place because despite years of following Bellowhead religiously I have hardly ever listened to, or looked at the track lists for, any album since Matachin. As a result tracks like Old Dun Cow, Moon Kittens, Jack Lintel which haven't formed staples of the live shows I have seen in that time are... not strangers but not recognisible by name either. The first of those relies heavily on the brass to create a punchy structure. The tune becomes familiar in places, but whilst I like the bright blaring crescendos and I think this allows Jon Boden to grandstand nicely it is actually not really reflective of the tunes I most love Bellowhead for. When it devolves to folk-orchestra disco music it... well, it works and would be pretty easy to get caught up in live but at this recorded distance, not so much.
Rosemary Lane is Scarborough Fair by another name and another tune, as the band like to remind audiences. Unless that is I am mistaking that introduction for another song. Familiarity is one thing, reliability of memory is another. What saddens me today is that after Wednesday is gone I don't know when I will next see live music. For the last few years Bellowhead have been a much needed outlet there, a rare point of intersection of taste with friends of similar availability, and for an active group coming anywhere near to close to me.
Oh, Moon Kittens is familiar by sound, so it has been part of recent shows; I can't help but think James Bond theme, there are similarities in the primary melody and actually the bass-treble balance and separation is similar to at least some Bond film music, if not the main theme. I should be able to pull out the particular theme song (I suspect I have it on David Arnold's reimaginings album Shaken & Stirred) but... bah. Thus far this set has been of the more bombastic variety, but The March Past takes us into dance tune territory, and immediately rockets to the top of my appreciation list for the listen as a result. I don't recognise this at all, but hey... even as a fan of them in general I can say that many dance tune sets feel very very similar. The appeal lies not so much in the specific tunes, notes or time signatures, but the general energy, positivity and the happy and celebratory genesis of the concepts.
I think I may have written before about my self consciousness and the inability to let myself go, even in a crowd doing just that. I should by rights detest tune sets for making me feel that acutely, but somehow despite the regret that engineers in me the geniality of the tunes themselves, the vital nature of the playing and everyone else enjoying them manages to leave me with a net positive.
Byker Hill has a much rockier sound to it, not quite so much that you don't notice the folk roots, present in the lyrics but discernable within the maelstrom of sound from the arrangement too. I have never been a big exponent of this particular song but it far from the weakest track here. This disc includes probably Bellowhead's worst track, a horrid sounding number arising from experimentation with discordant sounds. Actually it surprises me quite a lot, speaking of discordant numbers, that Little Sally Racket does not appear on either disc. The song is so-so, but the sight of a man playing two saxophones at once was a regular highlight of live renditions whilst it remained a popular closer.
I am not so actively or clearly picking up on a flatness of sound with this set compared with the first disc. I don't know why that is. It could be that I am overall less familiar with the specific tracks, or just in a more forgiving mood. Or the recording could genuinely be better. Who knows. To my surprise Jack Lintel is the type of Bellowhead tune I really like. It is an instrumental with a soaring melody as the dominant feature from Revival. I don't think I have ever seen this live, and as mentioned above I have not listened to the later albums much in other contexts either. I missed a trick there. I should skip the horror that is Black Beetle Pies - the outright worst thing they have done. Cacophony and screech. I think it constitutes an interesting experiment, and I applaud the thinking that got them to go there, i.e. not to be static, but to look for new things to do, but the result is simply not something I have ever enjoyed. Here the recording doesn't do the unpleasantness justice as it seems distant, moderated, softened somehow. I am left to wonder whether that is because the band performed it differently, whether the discomfort the tune can cause in an audience doesn't carry to the microphones or whether post-production (live recording or no) has cleaned it up some. It is by far the most palatable rendition of the song I have heard, but that is not really saying much.
Greenwood Side leads us into what is an extended lead out. Sloe Gin was a live staple for too long, London Town is a crowd pleaser and the one-two of New York Girls and Frogs Legs & Dragon's Teeth has formed a standard encore for a couple of years. As a result I find myself feeling that I know what is coming and somewhat detached from the listening process, even as Greenwood Side is another track from Revival that I have less exposure to. I think my mood has changed as I feel impatient for the listen to end - an irritating, nagging feeling. I doubt that I will get another listen in for a week after this (and given it was 10 days before the couple I fit it this weekend) as I have a really busy time ahead. I could conceivably have plans every evening this week and all 3 days of the coming long weekend. In practice that means I am dumping out of something; probably the opportunity to play Bloodbowl in person tomorrow. I used to play in an online league, which I may have mentioned in much earlier days of this project; almost 2 years going now.
Sloe Gin gets its traditional intro - Boden pointing out the repetitive nature of the trombone part in the lead in. Most of the preamble to tunes has been scrubbed from the recordings, there is no banter with the crowd. The difference here is that it happens over the start of the set. Actually I find myself enjoying it despite myself. This set of tunes had got really stale hearing it over and over for years but I find that having not been exposed to it for a while some of what made it a staple and a crowd favourite is restored.
London Town is very flat on the recording, much of the tune is hard to hear, whilst the recording focuses on Boden's voice. It does capture him instructing the crowd (as if they need it) on how to participate... this is always one of the best numbers in a live show despite its longstanding nature (it comes from debut album Burlesque). I can't hear the crowd singalong at all on this recording which is a real shame. They should be loud and proud. They probably were. I suspect we'll hear them later in the song where it is left to them to sing but... that just means they've been excised in production. Yep. Sigh. There is one really long note in one particular chorus; it's always astounding how it is held, especially towards the end of a set... I can tell I am getting older as each time I saw them I could hold on slightly less amidst the crowd of voices. Yeah - I can sing along, but not deign to move; how does that work? If I knew I might have resolved it by now. New York Girls comes in and it does feel a little remote. I am heartened to hear what sounded like Paul Sartin getting the biggest hand as the attributions were done - though I suspect that was mostly because he was the last of them called out in that sequence.
The closer is a pair of tunes that have a really complicated dance associated with them. Jump up and down as madly as possible. The list of things that astound me about the band includes the fact that they can, whilst playing, manage to do this more comprehensively than I, or many others in their audience. Despite my getting impatient with this listen in places, I find the hour has gone past really rather fast. Despite feeling remote, not really getting the full sound and generally feeling a bit useless today - it's spring, a little more warmth would be nice - the tunes have flown by. I am sure the same will be true on Wednesday when I am more enveloped, for the last time. I doubt that in most situations I would choose these live recordings over the studio albums - the flatter sounds and odd balancing are off just so - but this will go live in the car for convenience.
Farewell Bellowhead.
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