Bellowhead
Album: Revival
Label: Island
Tracks: 11
Website: http://www.bellowhead.co.uk

This review is a touch late in arriving on-site, for which I must apologise (it's also the first time in Bellowhead's ten-year history that my promo copy arrived after official release date!). Anyway, was it worth the wait? You bet! It's almost certainly one of the finest encapsulations yet of the genius of Bellowhead on silver disc, for a start - although John Leckie's production of Hedonism and Broadside would take some beating for conveying the magisterial essence of the band's live act. The formidable - but not over-overwhelming - sense of studio weight and presence achieved here by producer Rupert Christie is as extraordinary as the careful display of texture and elements (although this extreme clarity in separation by technique also begets some slightly distracting quirks of balance, even the occasional impression of fussy artificiality). Needless to say, the band has become renowned for all those factors in live performance, with reality living up in every way to the legend - and as a consequence the awards have repeatedly, and deservedly, rolled in. As I'm sure they will for this new album, through the grooves of which mainstream acceptance beckons ever more enticingly.

But first to the repertoire: to my mind it contains some of their finest reworkings of traditional material, and some of their most persuasive arrangements. For instance, the punchy, supremely invigorating innovation that Mr Boden brings to his reconstituted sea-shanties is strongly in evidence here, and scores especially on the fiddle-led, heavy-stomping rendition of Roll Alabama (which gains a chorus-refrain and gloriously survives the transition) and the opening Let Her Run (Eliza Lee/Clear The Track here transformed into a rapid-fire brassy 60s-soul-style extravaganza). Another archetypal Bellowhead success is the naughty-nautical forebitter Gosport Nancy (originally collected by Cyril Tawney), and the whole ensemble makes a good fun fist of the drinking song Let Union Be, while traditional murder balladry is not forgotten with a storming take on the Cruel Mother variant Greenwood Side which boasts a thumping, driving Undertones-style drumbeat and takes the disc out in style. It's a pity that Revival only sports one instrumental track, the intriguingly metred Jack Lintel, which brings Sam Sweeney's creative talents to bear on a north-eastern hornpipe from an 18th century manuscript collection. Only with Seeds Of Love do I feel that the arranger's penchant for tricksy syncopation gets in the way of imaginative reinterpretation of the narrative and as a result the argument (and plot) is either lost or at best mildly overgrown.

It's strange, but this time round I'm rather less convinced by the remaining three tracks, the arrangements for which are by coincidence all down to Pete Flood, a man to whose quirky aural visions I'm normally acutely responsive. Rosemary Lane arguably works best, with its cathartic, almost aggressive horn dynamic urgently pushing the Scarborough Fair derivative ever onward and upward into exotic new territory; whereas the decision to take a similar route for the broadside ballad Fine Sally, choosing a pushy disco groove, feels just misplaced. And even after a number of plays I still can't get on with Moon Kittens, which feels bloated and over-scored (even muddy), completely losing any intended sense of sinister, eerie and surreal mystery through a wash of blowsy, glitzy cinemascope-style orchestral swooshes; to me this is evoking the wrong kind of bedlam for the nursery. Having said all that, Pete's own playing is both more bedded-in and more wildly imaginative than before, and its visceral driving force is a standout feature on so much of the disc. It even brings an extra degree of lift to the disc's odd-track-out, an almost-too-perfectly-realised (and thus quite routine-feeling and mechanical) cover of the Richard & Linda Thompson classic I Want To See The Bright Lights Tonight, which is done as an uptempo crowd-pleasing belter that no doubt works ok live but whose original sense of joyous (and gleefully savoured, even measured) abandon doesn't shine at this furious lick, and can't really satisfy on disc (the homage and heritage angle is clear, and I can see why it's been done, but it doesn't quite do it for me).

So - while Revival takes the career of the mighty elftet a step forward in terms of studio savvy and potential mass acceptance, I miss the band's darker and more thought-provoking explorations of tradition, which have been replaced by a desire to party - and impress with their sharp new party clothes; this may increasingly place the band in danger at times of succumbing to glib auto-pilot. Not all of the time though, I hasten to add, for there's still so much on Revival to admire, and so much that can still tingle the spine. Presentation-wise too, the complete package may be scaled down from its predecessors (the lavish hardcover book has been replaced by a more "standard" booklet, albeit with good and informative liner notes), but the quality - and attention to detail - is still present and correct, reflecting the disc's musical content and its attention-grabbing "sit up (or should I say stand up!) and take notice" stance.

David Kidman