Great Escape 2012

Three days of music in the halls and clubs and pubs and nooks and crannies of Brighton. Hundreds upon hundreds of bands. Good, enthusiastic crowds. A well attended industry convention in parallel...

Downloading seems just as far from 'killing music' as home taping was in the seventies. Just as Edinburgh in August can only give you confidence in the energy, creativity and commitment of young people determined to make drama, there's much to savour in the Great Escape's showcase for new music. Of course the quality can be variable, and of course a lot of the participants are never going to make a paying career out of what they're doing. But sitting here on the morning after, with tired feet and faintly buzzing ears, it seems time well spent and worthy of celebration.

I managed to catch sets or songs from 21 acts, barely scratching the surface of all that was on offer but taking in a range from hip hop to folk and krautrock to avant-garde jazz. And acts from Finland, France, South Africa, Denmark, Sweden, the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Spain. Oh, and the UK.

Let's start with some bands I already knew.

Things ended on a high last night with a quirky, energetic set from Beth Jeans Houghton and the Hooves of Destiny at the Pavilion. I saw her a couple of years ago, supporting Stornoway, and she's really come on well. I've got her recent album Yours Truly, Cellophane Nose and the songs translated well to live performance. Only niggle was the sound - from the side of the room I couldn't make out any of the talk from Beth or the band and some of the subtler violin and trumpet textures didn't really come through.

After Jonquil's set at the Prince Albert on Thursday I've gone back to their recent album, Point Of Go, which had initially disappointed me. They are great musicians: stuttering, highlife-inflected guitar; a bit of an afropop flavour in the drummer's oblique fills too; a strong, melodic bass player doubling on trumpet; keyboards; and a second trumpet cum electronics and percussion. I'm less sure of the vocals - a lush, almost New Romantic, style, overfond of falsetto... But when they're playing live you're caught up in the energy and melody of the music. There was a lot of dancing and a very warm reception that they fully deserved. And now I'm hearing those strengths more in the record - and managing to ignore some dodgy lyrics.

Otherwise, a few headline disappointments. I made no revelatory new discoveries - people I'd never heard of that I'm going to rush out and buy albums by and hunt out their next live moves. I was underwhelmed by Shabazz Palaces - billed as a 'hip hop collective', they turned out to be two rappers with a laptop and some percussion (by that token I guess Simon and Garfunkel were a 'folk collective'). Their words were almost completely inaudible: slickly done but unengaging. And I missed out on the Alabama Shakes, when they cut off the queue about 15 people in front of me...

Overall judgment from three days: there is generally more interest and distinctiveness in the playing than in the singing and the singing is usually far better than the quality of the songwriting. Too many lyrics are hackneyed, clumsy, over-earnest or perm some combination of those three.

It's unfair to single them out, but I had to squeeze my way out of a packed Avalanche City set when this musically talented NZ trio - nice fiddle, excellent harmonies - followed up a dull seaside vignette ('hope filled my sails'), with a frankly implausible recollection of leaving city life behind ('we threw our cellphones out of the window") and then left their frontman alone to intone a ponderous ode with a frequently repeated chorus (in full: 'You're beautiful. Beautiful. Beautiful.') which his beloved may have appreciated, but I afraid I didn't. I'm obviously in a minority, because they were going down a storm, but there you go. Or there I went.

Straight into a set from Swedish duo Friska Viljor which really cheered me up. Apparently, they vowed when they started never to write a song when they were sober. The regime seems to be working: lots of original (and sometimes off the wall) subject matter delivered with energy and humour. ('We don't always play like this. Sometimes we play with a band. Then we sound different. That's all I want to say.') They have an attack which suggests familiarity with louder instruments and the harmony choruses lurch engagingly into a dodgy falsetto roar, suggestive of a youth spent listening to Led Zeppelin. And their lyrics put a lot of native English speakers at the festival to shame - 'Tell me what I've done to make you sad/Forgotten your birthday again?/I'm not myself when I am drunk...' I'd like to see them again.

A few awards to close:

• best of the rest - probably Francois and The Atlas Mountains, a mainly French band featuring electronica and washes from two keyboards, with live percussion and guitar. A layered sound with space and subtlety, working up a real lift and energy. Their last number was almost house - a Balearic beat with dub-like echoey interludes. They were having fun, unfazed by their sampler packing up - distinctive and interesting. 
• favourite musician - I haven't been able to track down his name, but the drummer in Furguson (a five-piece from Catalunya) was astonishing. I went to see them on the strength of their blurb in the brochure including a reference to krautrock and there are certainly elements of Neu's Klaus Dinger and Can's Jaki Leibezeit in his approach. But he can maintain that sort of motorik style at incredible speed and then mix in more polyrhythmic stuff. He seemed reluctant to pause and led the band straight from one number into the next - except once stopping to down virtually a whole bottle of water. He locked into a groove with an essentially chord-playing guitarist and there were also a couple of squelching keyboards and bass, but he was the mesmerising heart of the music. You'd fear for his health in a longer set.

• best cover version - Australian singer-songwriter Ben Salter redeemed a set of rather worthy and ponderous compositions with a brilliant 'Tracks Of My Tears', which showed the strength and subtlety of his voice and his effective, understated guitar style to rather better effect.

More posts coming

I'm ashamed to see how quiet a month April was here at Eden On The Line.

I did have a week in the far south-west of Ireland, where the music (washed down by quite a few pints and rather less tea) included a glorious session in Brick's pub in Ballyferriter and a beautiful unaccompanied song in Gaelic from an eighty-odd year old relative of my friend...

But my main distraction has been working up a pitch for a book about Saint Dominic's Preview for the 33⅓ series on classic albums. Here's hoping they want to commission it, but I'm planning to do the writing anyway. I'm already in touch with a number of the musicians who play on it and it's clear there's a fascinating story to tell about how it came together. (I've just seen that there are a mere 470 competing pitches, including Astral Weeks and Irish Heartbeat. We shall see...)

But back to more normal business next week as Brighton hosts the Great Escape - watch this space for dispatches from the front line.

And finally, who can resist Neil Young and Crazy Horse with a taster for Americana and a quite extraordinary video...

Liz Green at The Hope, 2 April

Liz Green has come a long way since I first saw her at On Margate Sounds in 2010. Excellent reviews for her debut album O Devotion; a fine Secret Sessions appearance; and a single of the week and now gig of the week in The Guardian's Guide. Happily, the whimsy, charm and originality remain intact, but there is a new drive and assurance to her stage manner and performance.

As a declaration of intent, her opening takes some beating: standing in the middle of the audience and breaking into Son House's 'Grinnin' In Your Face' unmiked and unaccompanied, doing her own thing with confidence and grace while slow-on-the-uptake punters were shushed by their neighbours. She then moved on to Pulp's 'Help The Aged' before a succession of her own distinctive songs.

Her reference to Jarvis Cocker and Son House being her main influences got a laugh, but there is something in it: she's a blues singer, but a very European one – marrying Jarvis's clear-eyed and mordant observation to a clipped and unostentatious vocal style. There's also something of the chanson tradition in the mix, as her song 'French Singer' suggests. (She even managed to introduce it in French for the benefit of a couple of fans from across the Channel.)

Overall, it's a jazz take on the blues, helped by skilled and subtle accompaniment from Gus Fairbairn on tenor sax, Sam Buckley on double bass and Phil Howley on drums, deploying brushes very effectively throughout.

Liz plays guitar most of the time: straightforward and unonstentatious fingerpicking which fits in fine with the overall sound. She takes her place behind a Roland keyboard for a couple of numbers, adopting a similar approach, but deadpanning beforehand "I've learnt the piano. And I'm fucking excellent." But the musical contribution that wins the most applause is her parping 'mouth trumpet' solo in 'Bad Medicine' to fill in for a missing band member.

Plenty of variety, then. We get introduced to Starling Joe, as she dons a bird facemask along the way. She ends as she began, singing alone and off-mike in front of the stage for a final encore.

Great stuff: now, onward and upward.

Time is accelerating again

Where exactly did the first quarter of 2012 go? The clocks are about to go forward – another hour lost. My daughter's now 29, I'm about to be 55. And even the treasured album I'm gearing up to write a longer piece about (Saint Dominic's Preview) is in its fortieth year. Time didn't used to run so fast, did it?

Anyway, some fragments I have shored against my ruins:

• Bruce Springsteen's Wrecking Ball is better than the flurry of mainly 4* reviews suggested. Some reviewers seemed a bit overwhelmed initially, or thought he was going on a bit. As I live with it, I find I'm buoyed by its range and sweep and passion, not drained: the absolute killer trio of brave and uplifting songs that close the record – 'Rocky Ground', 'Land Of Hope And Dreams' and 'We Are Alive' – make me want to go straight back to the beginning again. Of course, it's not perfect and some of the clumsy lines (see 'We Take Care Of Our Own') can still rankle – but its overall strength means that doesn't matter: it carries you along. It's fascinating how the apparent leftfield diversion of the Seeger Sessions is now fully integrated into the Springsteen sound; and its further mutation into the Pogues-like martial stomp of 'Death To My Home Town' seems entirely natural. Hyde Park in July should be special, despite the large and Clarence-shaped hole in the band... Here's a taster from SXSW.

• it must be twenty years since I bought any new music on a cassette, then suddenly two come along: a limited edition release from The Young Obese from one of those glorious, quirky, labour-of-love labels Art Is Hard Records (who I came across because they will be releasing a 12" from the mighty GUM); and a fine sampler from another of those labels, which I've already recommended - The Great Pop Supplement.

• Jonquil's new album Point Of Go is a disappointment to me - well played and pleasant pop but the weirdness and charm of 2007's Lions, which I loved, seem to have slipped away with line-up changes and new production values. Maybe they always wanted to sound like this but have only now learnt how to...
• Toronto's finest, Wooden Sky, on the other hand, have another winner in Every Child A Daughter, Every Moon A Sun. Strongly crafted, creatively arranged, well sung: fine stuff. Sample them here. They would be ideal for Secret Sessions if they can be lured across the pond.

• Finally, for those who may still doubt that the universe has a deep structure and plan at its heart, what about this? At the very same time that we are thrilled to hear that Englebert Humperdinck will be carrying the UK's fragile hopes to Eurovision's killing fields, none other than Lyle Lovett decides to cover 'Release Me'. Mere synchronicity? I think not.

The Civil Wars at The Komedia, 21 March 2012

So, my phone takes crap pictures from the back of the hall. But you get the Civil Wars vibe: all in black and white, John Paul's tux and guitar, Joy Williams constantly moving and grooving, clearly delighted to be doing what she's doing...

A packed house at Brighton's Komedia last night, sold out weeks ago, gave a very warm reception to a confident and spirited set from the duo of the moment. One album into their career and two Grammys to the good: Best Country Group and Best Folk Album, which hedges the business's bets nicely. Joy affected surprise at the crowd singing along, word perfect. She's going to have to get used to it.

They famously have friends in high places: endorsed by Adele, a collaboration with Taylor Swift just out on The Hunger Games soundtrack. The nudge-your-neighbour gossip last night was that Eric Clapton was sitting at the back with the soundman. But, for once, the hype-detector can stay in its case: they're making it on merits. Their voices do something magical together, entwining, blending, soaring; Joy's alto and John Paul's tenor in similar sonic space but always finding room to be distinctively themselves. They've got the guts (and chops) to do their thing to one, spare guitar (with Joy adding keyboards to just a couple of numbers) and to move off mic on occasion to pull the volume right down.

I'd say their songs are mostly good rather than great, so far. They're always well-constructed and melodic, with some interesting twists, but they can blur into one another. The exceptions are the album's  title track 'Barton Hollow', their most intense and dynamic number, gothic and threatening; and 'Poison & Wine' with its yearning harmonies and great hookline,

'I don't love you, but I always will',

a compelling picture of what might be an abusive relationship – or a mood in a normal marriage. 

Their covers are also exceptional, fine song choices interpreted very distinctively: they encored with 'Billie Jean' and 'Dance Me To The End Of Love' and both were superb.

Now, what next in their rise to world domination? We won't be seeing them play to 500 again soon – they're already booked to play in Brighton again in November at The Dome, which can hold a couple of thousand. In the meantime, Joy will be translating her bump into a baby and they will start thinking about the proverbially difficult second album. It was interesting to hear 'Barton Hollow' introduced as the last song written for the first album – might it signal a change of direction? I wonder whether it will still be just the duo for the bigger halls, or if they'll add some of the instrumentation which brings helpful texture to the first record. And I hope they don't turn their back on covers, as songwriters proud of their craft can sometimes do...

It's going to be an interesting year, however they choose to play it.