Reviews / Reviews
Review: Bristol Folk Festival – ‘Music to stir the blood’
Maybe it’s because it’s been so hot.
Maybe it’s the crushing realisation that Bristol isn’t quite as tolerant as you’d hope it might be.
Maybe it’s just mid-decade ennui.
is needed now More than ever
Whatever it is, it feels as though there’s a real need to re-charge and Bristol Folk Festival, with a warm welcome, a wonderfully eclectic lineup, beer and dancing, offers just that this year (and every year, in fairness).
Bristol Folk Festival always offers a warm welcome – photo: Chris Cooper / ShotAway
Friday starts in the way that Bristol Folk Festival Fridays have always started in the last few years.
The massed voices of Heartwood Chorus make their way to the stage, through the audience, with a wordless chant filling every corner of this lovely place. Forty people showing that you don’t need instruments to have a good time.
Neil Johnson, resplendent in flowery May Day headdress, leads them through a short set of absolute wonders. Billy Bragg’s Between the Wars captures hearts while Johnny Flynn’s The Sun Also Rises is just glorious.
As soon as they invite Lizi Morse (of Bristol’s Bowker & Morse) to join them on her own song I’m Proud, a striking anthem to female positivity and race, you are in little doubt that Heartwood Chorus have become the beating heart of Bristol’s Folk scene.
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As much as Bristol adores Heartwood, it’s nothing compared to the way that they feel about Talisk. This is love, pure and simple. And why not when Talisk offer everything that a Festival crowd wants; they’re loud and ridiculously fast, there’s smoke and lights, there’s dancing and clapping and smiling and whirling.
Imagine listening to folk music played from a speeding car as it circles you, imagine the roar of the engines, the squeal of the tyres, as concertina, violin and guitar whizz around your head. Imagine the thrill.
Two seconds in, Mohsen Amini is standing on his chair, arms raised, urging people on, just before he leaps down, snatches up his concertina and burns the place down. The speed of his playing is other-worldly, somehow matched by Benedict Morris on fiddle and Charlie Galloway on guitar.
Tunes dash by, each one picking up pace as fiddle and concertina race around recklessly. The guitar remains steady, almost percussive, while everything else becomes a mad whirl.
There are new songs, old songs, songs that cause syncopated shoulder rolls and delirious bouncing. And there’s always the drop. Amini urging his band fasterfasterfaster until…the place goes bonkers.
Folk with a punk attitude: Talisk never fail to get the crowd going – photo: Chris Cooper/ ShotAway
After the Talisk-shaped Mayhem of Friday night, Saturday afternoon needed to take a breather. To start with, at least.
Sean Spicer is an astonishing harmonica player, his short set a virtuoso performance of incredible musicianship. Jigs and slow, graceful airs were dealt with in equal measure, both controlled yet bursting with energy.
After him, modern shanty seven-piece Standing Stones were proof positive that not all masculinity is toxic. Seven male voices blending seamlessly across Sloop John B and My Mother Told Me, they bolstered each other, each layer adding warmth and depth.
At the end of each song there were thumbs up, back slaps, huge smiles. These are seven friends singing for the simple joy of it. Their joy was infectious and the packed St George’s pews were delighted.
Tobias Ben Jacob has been a feature in the contemporary folk world for a number of years now, most notably when partnering Lukas Drinkwater. Here he was debuting a new partnership. With Chris Cleverley, Joseph O’Keefe (India Electric Co.) and Kathy Pilkington (Said the Maiden), Jacob was magnificent.
There’s a hint of Paul Simon about him, and you feel that he would have been welcomed with open arms in Greenwich Village in about 1964.
Before the Old Ways Are Gone is full of sepia tinged loveliness, Jacob’s guitar accompanied by O’Keefe’s deft accordion. The Caravan is splashed with Spanish sunshine, as warming and dusty and full of life as that implies.
On The Sun Goes Down Over Eden, Jacob casts shadows of Bridget Bardot and gypsy girls, of old Berlin and spies. It is impossibly romantic, sprinkled with sha-la-las.
This was the second year in a row that Filkin’s Ensemble have left the Bristol Folk Festival entirely gobsmacked. Perhaps they were even more impressive this year because, after all, we knew what we were going to get this time. The fourteen-piece folk orchestra were, once again, extraordinary.
Filkin’s Ensemble: “Among the most exciting things in folk right now” – photo: Barry Savell
The logistical nightmare of getting fourteen people in the same place, at the same time, could have been a problem this time but, unbelievably, the loss of their normal singer didn’t seem to faze them in the slightest. So, Ellie Gowers was replaced by Anna McLuckie and there wasn’t a single grumble, not a single misstep.
Seth Bye (fiddle) and Chris Roberts (guitar) are flanked by a wind section and a brass section and the sound they make is among the most exciting things in folk right now.
A touch of jazz, a pinch of classical, great heaps of sweeping cinematic brilliance, but always, always folk songs delivered with an infectious love.
Richer is such a great song, starting with a torrent of violins before becoming a psych-folk knees-up, the whole band revelling in the noise that they make.
A cheeky version of Glen Campbell’s Wichita Lineman is just joyous, Michelle Holloway’s whistle dancing about all over the place as the fourteen just have enormous fun.
Finally, Wind and Rain brings Bellowhead-levels of excitement. The strings bounce in unison, the wind section swell and McLuckie is fantastic. It’s just as well that Filkin’s Ensemble are the headliners for the Saturday afternoon, because no one has a hope of following that.
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If Filkin’s Ensemble overwhelm with a wall of sound, then Saturday evening’s headliners need nothing but a guitar and some brilliant songs.
Martin Simpson is, simply, one of the greatest folk guitarists of all time. Nominated for 30-odd BBC Folk Awards, and winner of plenty of those, he was at the vanguard of the 70s folk revival and continues to astound.
His version of Leadbelly’s (or Nirvana’s, I suppose) In the Pines slurs and slides, as bewildered and disorientated as a wronged lover. His guitar is the counterpoint, assured and fluid, it crackles with life. If the words are full of dismay, then the playing is warm and sleepy.
Simpson is a great interpreter of songs, he hops between Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Richard Thompson and Anne Briggs, his guitar gliding over each leaving silvery traces.
Simpson is a veteran of the scene and an acclaimed guitarist – photo: Barry Savell
Don’t Think Twice It’s Alright is glorious, Guthrie’s Deportee startling in its honesty and relevance. Mary Hamilton is deliciously dark and Down Where the Drunkards Roll has Katherine Priddy sweetly guesting to undercut his gruffness. In Simpson’s hands these songs are magical, they are everything that you want folk music – any music – to be.
He ends with Never Any Good, one of his own songs. It’s brilliant. Nothing more, nothing less. A lesson in songwriting, a reminder that you don’t need much more than a guitar to touch a soul.
Admittedly, it helps if you can play that guitar like Martin Simpson.
Simpson invited second headliner Katherine Priddy to guest with him, adding sweet vocals to his gruff delivery – photo: Barry Savell
If there was some sort of recipe for the perfect singer-songwriter then it would probably produce Katherine Priddy. A voice that is utterly irresistible, songs that gently knock on your heart, waiting to be allowed in, a warm and generous host. Priddy has it all.
Still promoting her wonderful The Pendulum Swing album, her set was similar to the one she played at Strange Brew a year ago. The difference, this time, was that she was entirely solo. If that suggests vulnerability then that couldn’t be further from the truth. Priddy is no shrinking violet.
She has the sort of voice that you could listen to for the rest of your days. First House on the Left brims with rose-tinted nostalgia, it has a fuzzy warmth, like flicking through old photo albums with a bottle of red wine.
Boat On a River is equally coated in a misty glow, one that perfectly captures the far-away smiles of an especially good daydream.
Drawing on gothic romance, classical Greek mythology and the words of our poet laureate, Katherine Priddy fashions a world around her. She draws us in with Icarus and Wolf, with Eurydice and Daybreaker until closing the curtains around us with Northern Sunrise.
She wraps us, softly, with streams of sunlight that push the clouds away. “There’s no need to worry”, she sings “we’re taking this slow”. A whole room swoons.
Sunday’s afternoon session was full of the things that make UK folk festivals among the finest places to be. There were brilliant songs, beautiful voices, incredible musicians and a healthy dose of silliness too.
Sam Brookes is one of the vocalists in the fantastic John Martyn Project but here he was strictly solo. Possessing a voice that calls to mind either Buckley, he is extraordinary.
Contemporary indie-folk at its absolute finest, songs seemed to be fashioned from the atmosphere around him. Black Feathers, recently featured on the soundtrack to Eddie Redmayne’s Day of the Jackal, is moody and magnificent, full of psych-folk shadows and inky darkness. Breaking Blue has a hint of melancholy scouse-pop about it and Little Light a surprising mod-groove.
It’s when he lets his voice explore its full range that the St George’s jaws drop. Pacify scales all sorts of high notes but it’s on Numb that we are dumb-struck. Starting entirely unaccompanied, you can almost hear his heart breaking. As Brookes unfurls his four-octave range, his pain is palpable, before dropping us, wrung out.
Hazel Askew has played at the Folk Festival several times but, generally, as one third of Lady Maisery. This afternoon she is joined by her sister, Emily and, she wonders, “are you ready to go trad?” The answer is, of course, a resounding “yes”.
Dipping into the tradition for all manner of gleaming treasures, the Askew Sisters are the most charming of archivists. Goose and Common, The Wounded Hussar and The Unfortunate Lass are all old, old songs but here they are vital and fresh.
Emily’s fiddle is remarkable while Hazel touches every corner with accordion and voice. Somehow, they fill this room, even though it’s just the two of them.
As much as the songs are really lovely, it’s the tunes that bring a sparkle to the eye. A set of three waltzes are upbeat and swirly and two hornpipes – Our Cat Has Kitted/Crimson Velvet – wonderfully dynamic. Emily, especially, making toes tap but the two of them driving these wonderful dance tunes.
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Ten years (or maybe more) since Granny’s Attic first played the Bristol Folk Festival, they’re back again and are, reliably, loads of fun.
Promoting their soon-to-be-released new album, Cold Blows the Wind, there’s plenty of new songs but some crowd pleasers too. And there’s nothing more crowd pleasing than watching Cohen Braithwaite-Kilcoyne, George Sansome and Lewis Wood fall over themselves, and each other, with unrestrained glee.
Braithwaite-Kilcoyne and Sansome are in fine voice throughout, one tapping into the folk clubs of yore, one much more contemporary.
It’s on the tunes where the silliness spills over though. How the three of them can manage to play such complex tunes as Conversations or Riddle’s Hornpipe/The Circus whilst balancing on one leg, twerking, doing the splits and laughing uproariously is anyone’s guess. But they manage it.
Granny’s Attic are equal parts brilliant players and tons of fun – photo: Barry Savell
While the queue for the evening concert at St George’s snaked on to Great George Street, in anticipation of the gorgeous eclecticism of Suntou Susso and Catrin Finch & Aiofe Ni Bhriain, something altogether different was exploding out of the Folk House.
The Goblin Band are signed to the ultra-cool Broadside Hacks and are right at the forefront of the Queer Folk movement. They seethe and rage. They laugh and stomp. They are, without question, the highlight of a weekend absolutely stuffed with highlights.
They offer a very different kind of Folk music. One that is febrile and incendiary. This is the music of the pub and the field, it’s the music of suffering and anger, of wildly celebrating joy when you find it, it’s the music of the people.
The four-piece of Alice Beadle, Rowan Gatherer, Gwenna Harman and Sonny Brazil are unapologetically political and intentionally backward looking.
They offer a rejection of the modern world – presumably that’s why there’s so many hipster types in the audience – and offer a furious sense of rebellion. If folk music is supposed to challenge the orthodoxy, to offer an alternative, the Goblin Band do it in spades.
Nu-folk with a political edge: the Goblin Band offer up an alternative and it’s being seized with delight by audiences – phoot: Barry Savell
Two Crows – a story of birds pecking out of the eyes of the dead – is dedicated, with venom, to Keir Starmer but the Tories, capitalism, empire, war and anti-trans legislation all come in for a deserved kicking too.
They take no prisoners and, as a consequence, this is itchy and edgy. There’s an exciting simmer to things.
Their version of The Watersons’ Country Life is joyful; it’s full of stamping and bells, humming and concertina, harmonies and fiddle.
Down in Yon Forest is a Sheffield carol that emerges from the mists surrounding a stone circle, Harman’s voice unbelievably strong and Beadle’s fiddle haunting.
For Jim Jones at Botany Bay Gatherer spits the lyrics, furious and hurt. It’s dark as pitch, a hurdy-gurdy only adding to the sea-sickness swell.
Sonny Brazil tackles the wordy intricacies of The Clyde Water and Willie’s Lady. They are reminiscent of Martin Carthy and there can be no higher compliment than that.
After three days of astonishing music, The Goblin Band remind us that Folk music is the music of protest, of giving voice to the voiceless, the music to stir the blood.
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As Friday evening started, we were all in need of a re-charge. By Sunday evening energy was fizzing from us all. That, quite simply, is the effect of a wonderful weekend at the Bristol Folk Festival.
Main image: Bristol Folk Festival
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