Some classic folk for a modern audience with 'Folk Songs'
Ah, the genre of folk. Seemingly timeless and filled with quiet warblings about older times. Often associated with the hills and dales of the British Isles and beyond, folk is antique storytelling, an old and knowing art form. Yet, it had suffered by default from its age. It was a genre for old people, who drunk ale in darkened taverns, refusing to join us youngsters in our vibrant clubs and bars, not that we would have let the oldies join us anyway.
But suddenly, our conceptions shifted, and everything changed. Folk became cool. It reached its wrinkled old hands out towards the new generation. Artists like Regina Spektor and Jeffrey Lewis helped create what sounded like the opposing genre; Anti-Folk, but this was still folk. It had just donned the disguise of the contemporary.
While musical evolution is inevitable and yes, a positive thing, history shouldn’t be forgotten. Folk began with the old storytellers, dotted around the British Isles. Now James Yorkston and the Big Eyes Family Players have released them from the vaults with their latest album. Unambiguously titled ‘Folk Songs’, released 10th August, the LP consists of 11 traditional folk songs from Great Britain, Ireland and one from Galicia in Spain. Yorkston (of band The Athletes) has teamed up with James Green, aka Big Eyes. With songs from the likes of Anne Briggs, Shirley Collins and Nic Jones, the album is a quiet, peaceful affair, of acoustic guitar, soft vocals and the strokes of a fiddle here and there.
‘Low down in the Broom’, a less sedate number than average has a fast paced, foot stamping rhythm perfect for spilling pints too. ‘Just as the tide was slowing’ appears like a whisper, with a wonderful harmony of male and female vocals which tells the story of a girl and the sea, and like it, the track ebbs and flows through your ears. ‘Martinmas Time’, previously released as a limited edition single, again has that warm, quiet sound to it. This quiet, slowness, continues throughout the entirety of ‘Folk Songs’ and this is both its blessing and its curse. In one way, it provides a peaceful journey away from the noisy chaos of modern life and for the first few plays; it’s interesting to hear some classic folk retold by Yorkston et al. However, this doesn’t detract from the realisation that this is an album filled with background music. All the songs are so similar that they blend into each other.
‘Folk Songs’ is an enjoyable listen with a positive crusade to bring traditional folk to a wider audience and this kind of output should be celebrated and admired. However, most crucially because of the similarities in content throughout , many a listener may find themselves guiltily shuffling past the tracks on their playlist, in search of something, louder, faster and well, more modern.