The False Beards
Album: Ankle
Label: Ghosts From The Basement
Tracks: 10
Website: http://www.thefalsebeards.com

Ben Mandelson (baritone bouzouki, mandolin) and Ian A. Anderson (guitar, slide guitar, vocals) combine forces - and countless years of experience of playing - calling themselves The False Beards, apparently for the express purpose of nothing less than having a good old time playing what they call "old time english psych folk blues world twangery" (ha!). The chaps' varied CVs include stints with outfits such as 3 Mustaphas 3, the Yiddish Twist Orchestra, Tiger Moth and Hot Vultures respectively, to name but four - which should give you an idea of their sensibilities. And, befitting the good Mr. Anderson's pedigree with the Village Thing label, several of the songs on this latest excursion will be found on his own earlier albums - though here duly reconstituted, re-imagined in new, often what might be termed literally other-worldly contexts, where folky country-blues takes on a curiously Greek, African or psychedelic-jugband tinge. Think a little Holy Modal Rounders perhaps, or Spider John Koerner, or a skewed Clive Palmer, with distinct echoes of the Incredible String Band and some of those early VT projects…

The general feel of Ankle is that of a totally relaxed trip, one of those unforgettable at-home sessions steered by two slightly oddball, yes appealingly eccentric musos with oodles of good taste and buckets of musical savvy (and a healthy acceptance and embracing of the skeletons in their capacious musical cupboard!), where music emanates naturally and eclectically, and entirely modestly, from their bodies, continuously inspired by any and all musics that just happen to flow effortlessly from those fingers flying up and down the fretboards. Naturally virtuoso but not in the twiddly-noodly sense, the guys produce a witty, quirky, seriously feelgood set of tracks that are guaranteed to bring a knowing, more-lasting-than-temporary smile to the grimmest visage. From a jolly Greek romp through the Stones' classic Paint It, Black to a widescreen acoustic treatment of Derroll Adams' early-70s song The Sky, a most apt airing of the timelessly contemporary sentiments of the Hezekiah Jenkins number The Panic Is On to a cover of Cake's Friend Is A Four-Letter Word that arises like a gleeful phoenix from the ashes of a Guinean tune, interleaved with other strokes of genius such as the conscious pairing of the music of two different men both called Oscar Woods (melodeon player from Suffolk and blueser from Louisiana) - on the track called Oscar's…

And finally, tucked innocently in there amongst the above-mentioned somewhat unlikely delights we find a fabulous pair of bonus tracks (happily, these come on the nicely-packaged CD edition as opposed to the boring old download!), where the superb singer Katie Rose interprets in her own personal fashion the traditional ballads Lord Allenwater and The False Bride - which, interestingly and coincidentally, were originally collected (by Vaughan Williams and Sharp respectively) from ancestors of Mr. Anderson; these might seem to belong to a not-yet-made Folk Police album (indeed, in a further example of canny connectivity, the song Marie Celeste On Down has itself just appeared on Folk Police's Weirdlore compilation). Ankle is a massively priceless little gem that just cries out for a (longer) sequel - and hey, let's make it real soon please!

David Kidman