MIKE DAVIES COLUMN NOVEMBER 2023

 

I don’t know what COLIN HALL takes before he goes to bed, but his latest single, The Moon & Mr Jones, was the result of dreaming about meeting David Bowie on the moon. Appropriately then, with its swayalong rhythms and cosmic keyboard frills, it has   definite spacey Bowie

flavours, not to mention being another example of the wide range of his musical inclinations. (www.youtube.com/watch?v=32X036QCeGI)

The first of what will form an eventual EP, THE LOST NOTES release their first track featuring new bassist Steve Vantsis (whose CV includes Fish, Candy Dulfer and KT Tunstall), indicating a new country sound with Don’t Try It On Me, a dusty, slow bruised heart swayer (“You can play the angel in my bed, try to put the devil in my head”) with Ben on lead and Lucy and Olly on close harmonies that could have been born in Austin and instantly claims a spot as, not just a diamond in their already vast treasure trove, but one of the best things you’ll hear this year. 

Due for release next February, now signed to Cooking Vinyl, The Pendulum Swing is the much anticipated second album from KATHERINE PRIDDY, the follow-up to the critically acclaimed and hugely successful The Eternal Rocks Beneath. It’s trailed by First House On The Left, from whence the album title comes, intimately, whisperingly sung with Nick Drake-like pastoral guitar and string caresses, inspired by the terraced cottage where she grew up and all the memories it holds of all who ever lived there. Speaking of the track, she says “I wanted this song and the album to feel lived in, and this is captured in part by the ghostly atmospheres, mechanical clockwork sounds, creaking floorboards, indistinct whispers and old tape recordings of my family that are littered throughout. I want to invite the listener to come in, sit down and inhabit the album for a little while, and this song is right at the heart of that”. Ineffably, dreamily  gorgeous  it suggests that difficult second album is going to be a walk in the park.

"Overall, I wanted this song and the album to feel lived in, and this is captured in part by the ghostly atmospheres, mechanical clockwork sounds, creaking floorboards, indistinct whispers and old tape recordings of my family that are littered throughout. I want to invite the listener to come in, sit down and inhabit the album for a little while, and this song is right at the heart of that.”