52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #24

John Knox Sex Club – Raise Ravens

(Self-released, 2011)

Buy the album here

Scotland is renowned as a proud country of great national beauty, from the coves and jagged rocks of its coastline to the beguiling and ever-changing scenes of its highland ranges, but for most of its inhabitants Scotland is a far more urban experience.  With massive population centres like Glasgow and Edinburgh, Scotland’s history and character are as tied to industrialisation, living conditions, and education, as they are to its famous mountains, lochs, and wildlife (real or mythic).  While Scottish music may still be widely considered to stem from rural and Highland traditions, and most commonly encountered at ceilidhs, Scotland has a more recent but equally important musical identity.  Bands like Belle and Sebastian, Arab Strap, and Mogwai have created a new urban “folk” music that, inadvertently or otherwise, draws on tradition but actively engages with the urban existence of Scotland’s contemporary population.  For me, John Knox Sex Club does this better than anyone.  Even their name pulls on Scotland’s history and drags it in to the red-tinged light of modern, urban Scotland.  Filled with traditional instrumentation juxtaposed with amplified guitars, crashing percussion, and honest vocals with native accents, theirs is an openly folk approach to post-rock-influenced indie.

To describe John Knox Sex Club simply as indie denies them the full impact of their epic visions and immense musical power.  It’s a music that should only be played in the cavernous and echoing halls of grand castles and cathedrals.  Fittingly, the vocals are delivered with the worryingly addictive vehemence of a preacher sermonising on your sins, while the orchestral strings clash with the rhythm section like the forces of heaven battling the demons of hell.  This is epic indie with unbound scope and musical ambition.  Opening track, and 13-minute behemoth, “Kiss the Dirt” does all of this and more with its cold, foggy, Scottish morning opening gently strummed and lyricised, and its powerfully cathartic peaks packed with Mogwai-like progressive dynamics.  The heartfelt and beautiful vocals work alongside the violins to cut through the intensity of the instrumentation and provide a moving poetic exploration of modern civilisation.  The lyrics are an epic poem of human history, mythology, politics, fate, love and more that anchors itself to modern urban life:

Link arms across

High rise flats

Or watch as our lives drop

Like dripping taps

In forgotten rooms

It is an unfathomably good song; uplifting yet honest, musically epic but never complex, “Kiss the Dirt” is an astounding way to open an album.  The only problem being that it’s impossible for the album to maintain this standard.

“Above Us the Waves” is a beautiful song of longing that replaces the immensity of “Kiss…” with lyrical and musical subtlety.  Passion is still a driving force here, but John Knox… ask us now to take pleasure in quiet moments, gentle melodies, self-effacing hooks, and minute domestic observations meeting grand nature similes.  It’s a comedown of sorts, but one that rewards repeat listens.  From there an instrumental track leads us from “…Waves” to the more outwardly post-rock slow build to powerful release of “The Neighbours” and its memories of family strife in urban settings.  A memorable chorus is supported by a twisted bass line that winds itself around the gliding strings and escalating wails of both vocalists, before ominously leaving us with the permanent and unresolved danger of the line “like footsteps in the hall”.  It’s another impassioned poem of urban life that leaves the listener in awe.  “Katie Cruel” is a reworking of a traditional song that further develops the idea of a new folk music in Scotland.  The sparse, gloomy atmosphere combined with the underlying distorted guitar sounds give this traditional song a modern twist without overwhelming the strings and the original lyrics.  Where hints of Harvestman peek through on “Katie Cruel”, the final track has a more accessible Crippled Black Phoenix quality to it.  A noticeably warmer verse and guitar sound in “The Thaw” is interrupted by the experimental, part spoken word, mid-section that layers light sounds in a dizzying manner.  John Knox… then find their way gently to the uplifting and hopeful repetition of the album’s final line:

The grass grows beneath the ice and snow

Produced in small batches and packaged by hand by the band themselves, Raise Ravens is a unique view on modern life in Scotland produced by a truly independent band.  Never disavowing the past, never judging the present, and finally pointing to the future, John Knox… have produced an album that touches on all parts of life in Scotland.  While the lack of record company backing may have contributed to multiple hiatuses, it is their independence that allowed John Knox… to truly express themselves and deliver the beauty of this album to anyone who wishes to listen.

52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #44

Steve Von Till – If I Should Fall to the Field

(Neurot Recordings, 2002)

Buy the album here

Steve Von Till is a teacher, a father, and a musician. In listening to his second solo album, If I Should Fall to the Field, it is important to recognise his place in the world, in his family, and in his art. For his folk songs express not only his reverence for art and music, but also the concept of lineage, both cultural and familial. Von Till ponders, in his writing, in the choices of songs he covers, and in the tone and imagery he employs, how he has received these musical traditions, but also his standing in his family history, and what he may leave for coming generations. As a guitarist and vocalist of Neurosis, he has become one of the most influential artists in the hardcore, post-rock, and post-metal sub-genres, releasing more than ten crucial albums for fans of this music since 1990. However, it is in his solo work that we come to know the heart of the man, the passions that drive him, and the things he holds dear. It is a moving piece of music: a family heirloom, an ode to generations past, and an expression of nature, life, and death all found in the human body.

“To The Field” beautifully encapsulates this permanence of human life through a connection to nature and the food it provides us: “On my sustaining life,/I will be as yew, with the grain.” It's a message that Von Till seeks to convey with quiet and almost imperceptibly building instrumentation. The gentle acoustic guitar introduction is joined by his sonorous voice, before electric guitars, organ, and drums gather to burst into life with the album's most dramatic crescendo. Warmth and contemplation in his voice are replaced in this moment with an anguished, wordless wailing that feel as if carried on the changing winds mentioned in the opening of the song. It's a song that contemplates human death feeding the earth, and in that way finding eternal life. This sentiment finds its partner in “This River” where “dreams were washed out to sea”, and “blood like fuel is fed to the fire”; and a similar wordless outro carries us on waters that flow to “the edge of the earth”. In these songs human life seeps in to the earth and in to the waters, feeding nature and finding permanence and renewal. The untempered expressiveness shown in these crescendoes is rare on an album that otherwise exercises restraint, preferring to allow the simple instrumentation, rich vocals, and dark, poetic lyrics pull us in to its contemplative atmosphere.

Von Till is clearly contemplating his place in the folk tradition. For hundreds of years folk songs have been passed from generation to generation through performance, re-writing, and re-recording. The authors of many of these songs remain unknown, but respect is shown to the traditions of folk music by artists who find new ways to perform old songs, or old songs to convey new thoughts. By including a beautiful cover of Neil Young's “Running Dry” and a fiddle-heavy rendition of traditional folk song “Am I Born To Die”, he inserts himself in to a folk tradition that is simultaneously looking back for inspiration, grounding, and belonging and reaching forward to the next generation, offering them this rich history. Von Till's “Am I Born To Die” carries with it, in his tortured and strained voice, the weight of the history it has seen, and for some reason has always reminded me of “America the Beautiful”.

At its heart, the history this album presents is one of family, of belonging, and of acknowledging the sacrifices of previous generations. As such, “Hallowed Ground” and “The Harpy” are its emotional core, portraying Von Till's admiration for both nature and his forefathers. The two seem inextricable on this album, and “Hallowed Ground” is its high point. The beautiful atmospherics reach new heights on this song built around stark imagery, gently repeating acoustic strumming, and punctuating electric guitar. Von Till's deep voice is bold and portentous, filling the song with a sense of impending doom. But it is revealed that this doom is perhaps in the past:

Grandfather's hands bled for us here

Hallowed ground forever.

His admiration for his forefathers has led him to include a recording of his grandfather reading “The Harpy” that was made by his father in 1961. A poem originally written by Robert W. Service in the early twentieth century is read here with the old time, rural feel that has informed the sound of the entire album. While the backing music is almost inaudible, the coming together of three generations of Von Tills is a fitting end to an album that interacts with its traditions, both of folk music and family. The serious, contemplative music of If I Should Fall to the Field inspires a desire to connect with nature, with music history, with other generations of our families, and ultimately to Steve Von Till himself. A teacher, a father, and an incredible musician.