Here I Stand
SO, HOW do you like your folk music?
Gently picked out on resolutely unamplified acoustic guitars by bearded and be-sandalled chaps singing of fair maids fighting for their honour in a Thomas Hardy-esque landscape?
If so, look elsewhere because Here I Stand is most definitely not the album for you.
If, on the other hand, you like your folk followed by a hyphen and the word rock this may well be what you're looking for. Here I Stand is folk-rock writ large.
Very large. In bright-red caps.
Many of its songs are great big anthemic pieces hewn from chunky slabs of chords by five blokes who would, in all probability, cross the road rather than walk past a shop selling the old open-toed footwear.
Oysterband have been around long enough to know what their fans like and they provide just what's needed.
Opening track, On the edge, sets the tone for the band's livelier side with vocalist John Jones preaching the anarchic over-throwing of global corporations, with a certain internationally famous burger chain coming in for a particular mention.
The frenetic pace keeps up through This is the voice (featuring Chumbawamba on "vocals, trumpet and shouting") and In your eyes before Street of dreams lightens the pace and Jones is joined on vocals by the sweet tones of Rowan Godel.
Drummer Lee Portis shines on Ways of holding on, establishing a foundation of a mesmeric backbeat over which atmospheric strings, fiddle and keyboards intertwine with a gloom-laden lyric. The song has a definite Middle Eastern feel and is possibly the album's standout track.
Someone you might have been is the album's oddity; easing in from a barely audible rumble, the drums build, only to fade again as bassist Chopper turns his hand to his cello to take over and dominate a percussion-heavy track topped with an echoing vocal filled with the despondency of failing to keep one's head above water.
Here I Stand is a strong and confident release and, co-produced by the band and Alaric Neville, is their 13th album (including the greatest hits collection Trawler,) since 1986 but the first on their own label.
With 16 tracks it offers the band plenty of room to stretch themselves instrumentally and lyrically and proves there's life in the old boys yet.
And, with such an assertive label-debut, they prove the world really is their . . .
Fred Hall
