Holloway mourns death of student - The Founder

14 The Founder | Monday 8 December 2008
E X T R A
Music
2009 - A Preview
Jack William Ingram
Music Editor
Antony & The Johnsons
The Crying Light
Antony & the Johnsons have been
very highly touted over the past few
years – deservedly so - 2005’s I Am
A Bird Now came out of nowhere to
win the Mercury Prize, and 2006’s
exquisite multimedia Turning tour
proved that popular music can aspire
to vertiginous heights of artistic
merit. Anticipation for the band’s
third album, then, is rather high.
There has been a certain cloak of
discretion smothering the build-up
to The Crying Light’s release, thanks
to the secrecy of vocalist/songwriter
Antony Hegarty and the relatively
cryptic nature of any details that
have emerged. The cover art, for instance,
consists of a photograph of
Japanese guru and butoh dancer Kazuo
Ohno, a figure acknowledged by
Antony Hegarty as “kind of like my
art parent”. It’s a striking image; according
to the press release, “Ohno
is shown reaching towards light, his
striking visage and reclined posture
simultaneously invoking the cradle,
the grave, and transcendence.”
Hopefully the music contained
within will be equally striking; I,
for one, have little doubt that it will
be – every record and E.P. release
up until this point has possessed a
definite upward trajectory, a trend
which will certainly see continue on
January 20th, when this record is released.
Animal Collective
Merriweather Post Pavillion
The eighth offering from the pioneering
electro-folk audiophiles;
I’m not going to say much about
this record. It will be released by the
time we go to print (12th January),
so any ‘preview’ will be erroneous.
Needless to say, however, this is one
of the most anticipated releases of
recent months, and - although it
has been leaked already - perish the
thought that I would do something
so heinous as illegally download
it… Look forward to a (legally
sound) review in the next issue.
The Decemberists
The Hazards of Love
The Decemberists have been busy in
2008, releasing a succession of singles
on vinyl known as the Always
the Bridesmaid series, and carrying
out a limited tour in support. Finally,
in October, the band announced
that mixing had commenced on the
follow-up to 2006’s The Crane Wife,
the hour-long narrative suite that
forms The Hazards of Love.
The track listing has already been
released, and needless to say, we’re
in full-on folk/rock opera territory,
more reminiscent of Peter Bellamy’s
The Transports or Fairport Convention’s
Babbacombe Lee than anything
apparent in even the most ambitious
efforts of the contemporary
indie canon. Folk music is a genre
that purists often allow to stagnate,
but it has always reached its highest
plateaus through fusion with
more contemporary musical trends,
which is why lead singer Colin Meloy’s
admission that, alongside the
influence of Anne Briggs, Pentan-
gle and Shirley Collins, this newest
record owes a debt of gratitude to
the British stoner metal of Electric
Wizard and the pioneering synthesiser
work of Wendy Carlos, makes
the whole project such an enticing
prospect. Meloy has, in addition,
indicated that the band’s spring tour
will involve performances of the album’s
song suite in its entirety. Release
is anticipated for March 23rd;
I don’t know about you, but I’ll be
counting the days.
Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy : Beware!
For the better part of the past two
decades, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy’s (the
operating moniker of Kentucky’s
Will Oldham) albums have constituted
sporadic, but safe features on
the landscape of frontier Americana
– in diametric opposition to
freak-folk eccentrics like Devendra
Banhart and Joanna Newsom, who
chart unexplored perimeters like
psychedelic prospectors trailblazing
their way through brave new
worlds, Will Oldham’s regular album
releases are reliable, certain
things, like safehouses on the way to
the new western terra incognita.
According to early critic’s reports,
Beware!, as always, showcases Bonnie
‘Prince’ Billy’s unique style of
recondite Americana, singing with a
passion that sounds at once uplifting
and devastated - a ragged backwoods
Elijah, preaching a jugband
ethos to hillbilly mendicants. However,
something seems different on
this new record, signalling what
sounds like a sea change - perhaps
it’s the thickening thud of low tone
that rolls beneath the usual rustic
timbre of fiddle and steel guitar -
heralding a certain ineffable ambition
that one critic has labelled as a
sign that this will be Oldham’s “great
contempo-country record”. Oldham
has been lurking in the shadows of
the American indie/folk scene for
longer than many up-and-coming
musicians have even been alive;
there has been the occasional, almost
accidental exposure to mainstream
popularity – such as Johnny
Cash’s cover of “I See a Darkness”
on the Country star’s penultimate
album, and a shout-out on Biffy
Clyro’s 2007 record, Puzzle, but
appreciation of the kind Oldham’s
work actually merits has eluded the
artist. Perhaps, Beware! will be the
album to change this, propelling the
artist to unprecedented popularity.
Or perhaps not. There can be little
doubt, however, that this is shaping
up to be a fantastic album. Release
date: March 16th.
Porcupine Tree
Unnamed Album
Early 2009 will see the release of PT
frontman Steve Wilson’s solo effort,
Insurgentes, as well as a possible
reissue of some previously unavailable
material from the band’s extensive
back-catalogue. The year’s most
tempting prospect, however, lies in
the indications of a new album release
later in the year.
According to reports, the band has
recently spent 2 weeks in the English
countryside working on new
tracks, with recording scheduled to
begin in February. Tour plans are
being put in place for September,
so it’s natural to assume we can expect
an album release at around that
time. There are no clues as to the
nature of the songs or the theme of
the album as of yet, but I don’t think
it would be particularly presumptuous
to assume great things of this
record – Porcupine Tree have got
exponentially better (and, indeed,
more recognised) with each new
release. Music fans who are unfamiliar
with the band are advised to
rectify this oversight immediately.
You have no excuse. I have a feeling
that Porcupine Tree will be remembered
as one of the truly great bands
of this era, a position that, hopefully,
will be cemented come September.