The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #142288 Message #3282934
Posted By: GUEST,Spleen Cringe
01-Jan-12 - 09:07 AM
Thread Name: Alternative Folk Awards
Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
Can't comment about Courtney Pine but I suspect it's a similar story...
It is. Whilst Courtney Pine isn't really my cup of tea, you have to hand it to him that he's an accomplished and versatile musician who can turn his hand to all sorts of things - soul, funk and reggae as well as the jazz he's known for, as I discovered when I was dragged out to see him play live.
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I do wonder why Al thinks that being able to win over a hostile or indifferent crowd at one of the few remaining working men's clubs is some sort of barometer of whether you're any good, though. Is it about some sort of notion of musicians havinga duty to give the people what you assume they want? Personally, I think if someone wants to sit through another pissed-up rendition of Crystal Chandaliers and other boozy favourites in a dismal hall with crap acoustics, fair play to them. Don't be suprised when not everyone thinks of that as a good night out, though - including most ordinary working class British people, if the terminal decline of the WMC and of live music in pubs is anything to go by. And for the vast majority of musicians of any genre, being the background noise at a WMC isn't even on their radar, and why should it be? Mosrt musicians are going to look for audiences who might enjoy what they are playing, not some sort of macho, gladiatoral showdown. Or some illusory lower common denominator set list of tried and tested favourites. It the Beatles had done that chances are they'd still be playing Chuck Berry and Little Richard covers in some back room and we wouldn't have Revolver and Sgt Pepper and all the music that inspired.
Here's a for instance: Harp and a Monkey, whose album Folk Police put out in 2011, are gig monsters who'll play anywhere and always get asked back. One of the things they do is to gig in towns in the back of beyond that don't get many visiting bands. Even they don't make a point of doing these allegedly essential WMC style retro-gigs, though. And they probably tick a lot of Al's boxes - ordinary northern lads who write very hummable songs that actually say something.
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Drat. I seem to have allowed myself to get sucked in.