Reviews roundup – Frayle ~ Rory Gallagher~ Chantel McGregor ~ Peter Kovary & The Royal Rebels ~ Sugar Blue ~ Sid Whelan
FRAYLE
1692
Aqualamb / Lay Bare Recordings
I’m an old man. I’ve been places and seen things I want to unsee. Usually, with a healthy application of alcohol, they remain unseen. But this unsettling record brought it all back.
It’s the full length debut from Frayle, following on from the 2018 EP, “The White Witch”, and it’s a remarkable melding of death-gospel and doom metal.
The death-gospel comes from the frail vocals of Gwyn Strang and the doom from the powerful guitar work of Sean Bilovecky. It’s simultaneously soothing and grinding, stirring up things that I had thought long extinct. It makes perfect sense hearing this how they can name both Portishead and Black Sabbath as influences and considering this is their first album the sound they have is fully formed.
There are a fair few folk out there trying to do this sort of thing but they either end up being too ambient or too guitar heavy. Not hear. The heaviness is something you feel internally rather than aurally and songs like ‘Darker Than Black’, ‘Dead Inside’ and ‘Godless’ will be giving me nightmares for quite some time to come.
That said, it’s a record I can’t imagine being without and even though it’s only February I find it hard to believe that anything will supplant this as record of the year. Lullabies for the doomed.
Essential listening, it’s also available as a lovely piece of vinyl.
RORY GALLAGHER
Check Shirt Wizard – Live In ’77
Chess/UMC
Hot on the heels of the best selling “Blues” archive release here comes a new double live album from Rory Gallagher. Considering the plethora of posthumous releases there haven’t been that many live ones. Just the three if you count the second disc of “Notes From San Francisco”. So quite why it’s taken so long for this to come out is a bit of a mystery.
Recorded at four shows in 1977 on the “Calling Card” tour, they’re proper recordings using the Rolling Stones mobile studio at shows in London, Brighton, Sheffield and Newcastle. So the sound is far superior to any bootlegs you might have acquired and showcases Rory Gallagher at the peak of his powers. It’s absolutely fantastic.
Some of these recordings will go down as definitive versions with ‘Bought And Sold’, ‘A Million Miles Away’, ‘Too Much Alcohol’ and ‘Bullfrog Blues’ masterclasses in what blues rock should be like. The four piece lineup of Rory, bassist Gerry McAvoy, drummer Rod de’Ath and keyboard player Lou Martin are perfectly in sync with each other, especially when they stretch out as on the aforementioned ‘Bullfrog Blues’. There’s room for some acoustic picking as well and my only regret is that they didn’t issue each show in its entirety as some sort of limited box set.
A reminder, if indeed you needed one, that is what white boy blues is supposed to sound like.
CHANTEL McGREGOR
Bury’d Alive
Tis Rock Music
From vintage Irish blues to modern Yorkshire blues with Chantel McGregor.
A warts and all live album recorded live in Bury, hence the punning title, but will her ain folk forgive her recording this across the border in Lancashire? I hope so because it’s really rather enjoyable.
Ms McGregor has always been a fantastic guitarist and when I saw her live a couple of years back it was her fingering that had my jaw dropping. I was less impressed with her vocals but either she’s been working on that or it’s true that practice makes perfect. Or better. She works in a power trio format and bassist Colin Sutton and drummer Tom Gardner provide a steady backdrop for her guitar to launch out from.
It sounds good as well, no doubt helped along by the mixing skills of Wayne Proctor (King King / Ben Poole etc) whose name usually results in something good happening to your ears. Ms McGregor usually sticks to high octane material and it’s numbers like ‘Killing Time’ and ‘Your Fever’ that will get you coming back for more. As befits a youngster there are plenty of rock and pop influences dotted about hither and thither but they always slip seamlessly into the arrangements.
It does seem a bit soon to be punting out a live album with only two studio albums under her belt but I forget that her debut came out way back in 2011. Maybe this is to underline what’s went before so hopefully there is something new on the horizon. A good one.
https://www.chantelmcgregor.com
PETER KOVARY & THE ROYAL REBELS
Fly Forever
GrundRecords
Turns out that Peter Kovary spent 12 years in a Hungarian superstar pop band called NEO. You wouldn’t have thought it based on this. But when you realise that prior to that he did five years in a Rolling Stones tribute band. Well that makes sense.
Because what he’s doing with the Royal Rebels is looking back to the days of classic seventies rock as documented by the Faces and their ilk. And their many followers like the Quireboys right up to the modern day with bands like Rival Sons.
Which is a worthy and laudable quest. He doesn’t quite get there, mind. There are good songs here. Things get off to a rollicking start with ‘Get Wasted’ and ‘Low Down Bitchin’. While further down the line ‘Resurrection Day’ is an album highlight. But in between a lot of the songs just blend in together. Musically, the band are bang on and even if Kovary doesn’t have the strongest voice, he just about holds his own.
They’ve put out an EP and a debut album since they got together in 2016 and if they marshal a few more good songs they could have something here.
https://www.facebook.com/PeterKovaryTheRoyalRebels/
SUGAR BLUE
Colors
Blue Savage
I know they say that the blues is an international language but things are starting to get silly when you check an album and see that it was recorded in Chicago, Shanghai, Milan and Johannesburg.
Still, I suppose when you’re a touring musician you take advantage of whatever opportunities come your way. And Jimmie Whiting aka Sugar Blue has been taking his opportunities since he made his first recordings with Brownie McGhee and Roosevelt Sykes. Oh, and if you’re a fan of Mick Jaggers harp playing, well it’s actually Sugar Blue you can hear on the Rolling Stones’ “Emotional Rescue” and “Tattoo You” albums. He’s been recording his own material since the early eighties with ten albums to his name.
And you’re not going to hear anything new here. Why would you want to when what you’re getting is some exemplary blues ranging from the Bo Diddley like ‘And The Devil Too’ to the Afrika Riz enhanced ballad ‘We’ll Be ALright’ through a cover of ‘Day Tripper’ which manages to make a tired old tune fresh into the blueswailing ‘Dirty Old Man’. Which could be the soundtrack of my life! Malt whisky and tight sweaters.
His harmonica playing is fabulous from top to bottom and he has the right type of lived in voice that perfectly suits the songs. A real treat.
SID WHELAN
Waitin’ For Payday
Presidio Records
To answer his first question. No, he can’t sing like Nina Simone. He asks that on album opener ‘Nina Simone, in case you were wondering.
Seems that Mr Whelan used to be a working musician back in the nineties / early noughties working with an array of world musicians before taking a decade long break from music. He returned to the fold and as released two records prior to this – “Flood Waters Rising” and “The Story Of Ike Dupree”.
This record is what tends to be described as roots music. So there is a bit of blues, a bit of country, all making what he calls “Dark Blue Americana”. There are throwbacks to his youth with some of the songs featuring the Dagomba Gyil (a member of the xylophone family) as well as congas and the Yoruba/Lucumi Bata drums. So it’s certainly a diverse set of material. He’s not the most dynamic singer although, oddly, he reminds me of Richard Sinclair from early seventies progsters Caravan. But that’s probably just me.
The songs rarely get above a stroll, something that works well on the album highlight, the slow blues of ‘Midnight In The Country’. The other real standout is ‘The Promise’ which staggers along with marimba and a drunken trombone in tremendous style. A couple more like those and I’d have been a full blown convert.
https://thesidwhelanband.bandcamp.com
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