Ruling in its Roots
This has so many excellent touchstones, for example Spirit
with the beautiful The Slow Flow, and
at times on vocal it is Bowie yet also Jim Morrison in a quiet moment.
This is by Essex/English / English/Essex
multi-instrumentalist Trent Halliday. The opening two tracks actually have his
voice slightly distorted, and the sound is more Stone Roses in terms of era so
this isn’t a complete immersion in the 60s/70s. Indeed, second How’s It Gonna Happen breaks into some
pretty harmony so the genre/range is a shifting one.
In third Breaking the
Day I hear Love and Clear Light but not specifically and more that
mid-sixties sound. Fifth So Much to
Remember is the obvious ‘Bowie’ track, though this too has baroque elements,
the organ and guitar more Electric Prunes. I suppose this is a bit of a
guessing game, but the echoes are cleverly and lovingly done, down to the Tyrannosaurus
Rex percussion within the same track. Perhaps I am delving too deep. But Trent
has apparently studied Ethnomusicology, so when I hear Incredible String Band
in Night Garden I think I’m tapping
into some of that academic payback.
The more space-music element of his study is manifested in
the psychedelia of Lemon Air, a
spaced-out gem, wings on the loose a
metaphor for something far out. Is it Nick Cave or Morrison on Places Lost to Themselves? This is the
jazz track, a muted horn intoning something of Miles. There is a fine
instrumental boiling in Kettle.
This excellent eclectic album closes on the pretty Root and Rule, an orchestral sweep of
sound that moves from its beautiful strings to a grumble of horn and what sounds
like applause. Then it slows to sweet acoustic guitar with a crackling in the
background which is the waiting other.
This is available digitally for £5 and £6 as a cd here which
is quite ridiculous so you should order now.
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