Wonderfully colourful, mystical and socio-political, the British psychedelic-folk-rock quartet return with their special brand of eccentric, oddball originality, here including Welsh poems, ‘bard rap’ and an a protest manifesto for social change and mental wellbeing in a world gone mad. Dawn Bothwell, Rhodri Davies, Richard Dawson, and Sally Pilkington here explore themes of collapse, persistence, and collective imagination some fabulous videos of strange costumes, children and their voices, and theatricality, with lead variously shared. Scales Will Fall is an 8-minute performance that includes Bothwell doing what she calls ‘bard rap’ in punchy Scottish accent and highlighting protest history from the women at Greenham Common to the Durham Miners’ Gala— a rallying cry against corporate greed by grassroots resistance. The psychedelic, noodly Dead In A Post-Truth World has Davies singing in Welsh nursery rhyme style, while Dawson, the best known of the four for his solo releases, addresses the dysfunctional, and misinformed culture of social media: “the mythical country you claim allegiance of is gone / It was never here / under the effluence… I know you’re in pain / And you need someone to take the blame / Under the effluence / But you've got it wrong / Your brain’s been poisoned for so long.” Clara sees Bothwell singing sweetly over a bed of many sounds - piano, wobbly sax, bubbling, scattering drums and an old projector among other things, while Davies’ delivery has some of the amiable gentle oddness of Scotland’s Ivor Cutler. End of The Rhythm meanwhile is an infectious thrumming, pacy jig in which Pilkington’s voice comes more to the fore, leading a stirring chorus, while Bothwell reminds us that “They want us to fail, but workers can win.” Amser a ddengys is a short, beautiful a capella number, before the anarchic drumming energy that opens the 19-minute epic Clear Pools, filled with experimental acoustic layers across multiple instruements and gentle storytelling, before closer Land of The Dead’s further Welsh storytelling. A truly inspiring, time-transcendent and original, magical release. Out on Domino Records.
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