Fate The Juggler
Album: One Eye Open
Label: Red Admiral
Tracks: 10
Website: http://www.fatethejuggler.com

Fate The Juggler are a folk rock band that learnt it's craft in London and Kent and with the physical release of their second album, "One Eye Open" will hopefully find themselves reaching a wider audience that the strength of their recordings would suggest they deserve. I say physical recording, because the album has been available as a soft format, for a little while now, something that seems to be becoming a trend.

I also use the term folk rock band in the widest sense because there is so much more to their sound then the narrower interpretations of the term folk rock. By way of example check out "Evolution Waltz" which though rich in folk rock sensibilities also draws extensively on folk as a medium that needed to crossover into the dance idiom to fully integrate into village life. That said it probably wasn't quite as dark as Fate The Juggler have turned it.

As stating intent goes, opening up your album with a track called "Blasphemy", is pretty high up there. It's a song that drives forward relentlessly contrasting soaring woodwind with a marching pace that implies that this is a song that's going to keep coming, one that is going to match a serious challenge.

"One Eye Open" is an album that makes really use of percussion, often kept simple with either just a snaredrum or more hand driven percussion it sets an atmosphere as much as it sets a rhythm and then the rest of the instruments and vocals bring out the body.

Fate The Juggler manage to incorporate a lot into "One Eye Open", folk, rock and cabaret, to name just three and that's before you get onto the narratives and smoky vocals. The result is an album that has a real dynamic to it and hopefully take the band to new audiences and ultimately fans.

Neil King