Reviews - Strange News Has Come To Town

 Album - Naomi Bedford & Paul Simmonds - Strange News Has Come to Town review - A long time coming - but well worth the wait (theartsdesk.com) 

Almost exactly five years ago, I was transported by Singing It All Back Home, the third album from Naomi Bedford and Paul Simmonds. I gave it four stars, which in retrospect was perhaps a little ungenerous. Now at last comes a new opus from the duo, Strange News Has Come to Town, the making of which was “a long march across hard ground”, obstacles including the pandemic, as well as personal health and money issues.

The self-drive of 21st century music-making makes “entry” into the world seem superficially easy but recording is only the first tiny step. Getting the music out there, reaching the ears and the hands of people who might actually buy it – and preferably not via a miserly streaming service – is another matter entirely. The “hard travelling” of the children of Woody and Pete was just a metaphor – now the road is tough once more and it requires not only dedication but skilful navigation. But as Bedford sings on the opening track, “I try to be an optimist.”

Bedford and Simmonds don’t disappoint, for the album is full of splendid songs and gorgeous harmonies, Bedford’s voice always well to the fore, and fine instrumental work, including Simmonds’ guitar and mandolin, Beford’s Appalachian dulcimer, and Scott Smith’s harmonica and banjo. There are hints of the McGarrigles, and of Roses in the Snow-era Emmylou Harris, and of the two Trio albums Harris recorded with Dolly Parton and Linda Ronstadt (if you don’t have them, seek them out). Simmonds is a wonderful writer, his work running the gamut from narrative songs drawn from the headlines to surrealist visions – and occasionally both, as in the Covid-induced “I’ve Got a Fever”.

Indeed, to me this is an album that sounds as if it has come out of America, even though Bedford herself sounds very English and several of the songs have specifically English references – “Haunted River” the Medway and the Temeraire for example. That doubtless reflects my predilection (from my earliest excursions into folk music) for American musicians over Britain’s own, and also the duo’s own immersion in the sounds of Appalachia. In any event, I’m sure they’d be welcome on many a US festival stage.

It's a beautifully paced album, the exquisitely mournful “Haunted River” giving way to “Lewiston Country Girls”, light and upbeat as a factory worker prepares to return to her native north-west Canada. That traditional number is followed by “Asylum”, a Simmonds original which begins on the beaches of Normandy, once celebrated as the start of liberation and here as the beginning of a journey to death (“Three got to sink so one can float”), or in this case to Napier Barracks in Kent. It’s an understated yet powerful song, up there with Richard Shindell’s “Fishing” about the hapless Mexican migrants in California, or David Massengill’s “Great American Dream”, a magnificent song about the universality of those seeking a better life. 

It's a line from “A Blacksmith Courted Me” that gives the album its title. Collected in Herefordshire by Vaughan-Williams early last century, the ballad is in the celebrated Roud Folk Song Index, so we are here deep into English folk music. Over the years it’s been covered by Planxty and Steeleye Span, as well as Shirley Collins (a great cheerleader for Bedford and Simmonds) and Barbara Dickson. Bedford’s keening voice rings out over a strummed guitar behind which an electric guitar echoes and wails. A performance that gets right under your skin.

“The Lapwing’s Call”, a Bedford-Simmonds song, brings the album to a glorious and serene conclusion and an acknowledgment that however tough the times there’s always something to raise the spirits.

Liz Thomson  Wednesday, 19 June 2024 

Fourth Album From Spirited Folk-Roots Country Duo

Following 2020's Appalachian celebration Singing It All Back Home, Naomi Bedford and long-term partner/collaborator Paul Simmonds (from The Men They Couldn't Hang) have created a rich, resonant, and more personal album. The pair explore themes of anxiety, love and resilience in new songs like Optimist and I Love You Too (co-written with Del Amitri frontman Justin Currie). Teaming up with producer/multi-instrumentalist Ben Walker, they also update the political folk song with the scathing lyrics and wah-wah guitar of Opposite Day, and Asylum, a dark tale about three cross-Channel migrants. But most affecting of all is the centrepiece - the traditional song A Blacksmith Courted Me. Bedford has a way with betrayal and murder ballads and women scorned, and she turns this into an eerie, scorching tour de force.

Lucy O'Brien

 Naomi Bedford & Paul Simmonds: Strange News Has Come to Town - album review (louderthanwar.com) 

New album from Naomi Bedford and Paul Simmonds and ‘a British Folk Triumph’ and possible album of the year in it’s genre and beyond. Richard David  pens the first review anywhere ahead of its release.

The fourth creative collaboration between British Folk singer Naomi Bedford and Paul Simmonds is entitled ”Strange News Has Come To Town”, an apt moniker in an era when we are all constantly bombarded with evermore baffling and disturbing news reports. In a world dominated by war, violence, political oppression – and an increasing level of de-humanisation via the energies of technology – the importance of roots music of the type on display here, cannot be overestimated. This is a definitively human album, embodying exquisite musicianship, finely crafted song-writing and a deep underlying sense of
creative purpose.

With his work over many decades in The Men They Couldn't Hang, Simmonds undoubtedly stands as one of Britain’s finest living songwriters. His vast canon delves into a kaleidoscope of historical and socio-political references, a poetic penchant he once again brings into play here with great effect. A fine backing band ensures that the songs roll into each other with a sense of deceptive ease, one sometimes concealing their musical depth and rich tapestry of composition.

There are highly refined production values apparent here which combine to create a fascinating, sometimes sombre but ultimately delightful listening experience. On a personal level – and even when addressing troublesome subject matter – I believe that the most important music should lift our spirits. This album most certainly lifted mine.

Adjoined to the strength of songwriting and musical aplomb, the ‘jewel in the crown’ is Bedford’s voice, a vessel which drifts most enticingly between the boundaries of Folk and Country. Ably complimented by longtime fellow songbird Donna Edmead and Xan Tyler, Bedford combines wonderful essences of both resilience and fragility, these framed in highly accomplished phrasing and delivery. If she’d been born in Nashville, I believe this woman would have been a major country star, but that’s America’s loss. In these isles, Bedford possesses one of our greatest female voices and it’s deployed marvellously on this album.

On the opening track ”Optimist”, which will also be the first single, things commence with a flourish of strings and mandolins, before the pair combine on a harmonised ode to positivity in dark times. Simmonds deep timbre sits comfortably beneath Bedford’s overtones, with some splendid fiddle work providing a vivacious backdrop. It’s an upbeat opening with an important message for us all right now. ”Even in a time like this, I find a reason to resist.” Precisely.

”Happiness is A Way of Travelling” finds Bedford in almost ethereal country mode on a story of self-examination, marked out by a striking hook line ”Love, your own true power becomes a revolution inside your head”. The dynamics are superb, with flowing counter melodies and harmonies never overwhelming the delicate spirit of what is a beautiful song, setting the tone for the rest of the ”Strange News” journey.

In a well judged change of feel, ”Haunted River” opens in quite stark fashion with Bedford’s voice set against sparse, contemplative mandolin picking. There are some lovely chord changes with Tyler providing subtle, moody backing harmonies along with ghostly fiddle passages from somewhere in the metaphorical fog. A song oozing brooding atmospherics and encapsulating the creative chemistry between the duo.

”I Love You Too” – co penned by Justin Currie – takes us firmly back into Nashville territory. Against a swirling canvas of country guitar and gentle piano tinkling, Bedford drops a gorgeous lead vocal, again augmented with understated harmonies, these adding notably to the song’s texture. It’s a track ultimately defined by its sublime melody and the seductive authenticity of Bedford’s voice. Simply delicious stuff with truly memorable chord sequences.

”Lewiston Factory Girls” is a jaunty, mid-tempo jig imploring the female employees of the famous Maine factory to join Bedford as she heads back home to Canada, where she promises to feed them decent home-cooked food. This as opposed to the ”half cooked baked beans which I swear are killing me dead.” It’s a lament chronicling the perpetual labour exploitation of the working classes over three industrialised centuries, something which of course – with the advent of aspects such as ‘zero-contract’ hours – continues to exist graphically until this very day.

The overall standard of songs is so high here, it’s hard to pick out a standout track, but if pushed, for me it would be the next song ”Asylum”, a mournful, dark meditation on one of the great issues of our times, the plight of refugees attempting to flee the often life threatening bondage of their homelands.

It’s a profound, potent example of the powers of Simmonds as a songsmith, laced with evocative lyricism, bittersweet melody and irony as in Bedford’s wistful reflection that ”The Red Cross ain’t what it used to be.” Musically, again, distant country flavoured guitar provides an appropriately sobering ambience, with some very nice fiddle passages also making their presence felt. Probably the best song I’ve heard on this subject for a good number of years and one which – if I had my way – would be injected into teaching curriculums for schoolchildren.

Next up, a total change of mood as we encounter Simmonds taking lead on ”I’ve Got A Fever”, complete with spoken word samples and delectable backing from Bedford and Tyler. It’s a strong, Dylanesque groove with really impressive musical drop-outs, meandering ‘Desire’-style fiddle and a so-clever ”Fever!” vocal hook which summons up echoes of a steam train, blasting its horn across forlorn hinterlands. On an album simply abounding with lyrical nuggets, it contains my favourite single line ”let’s play chess, you be the East and I’ll be the West.” Seemingly simple Simmonds wordplay that conjures up all sorts of ‘Cold War’ imagery from our youth.

On ”Dark Rolling Road”, Bedford’s off on her travels again, stopping to pick up a silent, hitch-hiking stranger on their way to ”the river of dawn”. It’s a faultless example of lonesome Americana, one made all the more remarkable via the thousands of miles which separate Bedford and Simmonds from the Hudson shoreline. In my view, there’s not another British act which could attempt musical exercises like this, with such validity.

Vocally, ”A Blacksmith Courted Me” resides in more traditional British Folk waters, with Bedford transposing the creative boundaries effortlessly. The album’s title manifests within the opening lines and the chorus hook, against a mainly strummed acoustic backing, with subtle applications of the aforementioned country guitar flavours.

Simmonds steps up again on ”Opposite Days”, another rhythmic workout, this time utilising wah-wah Funk guitar against a tub-box style beat driving a bluesy melody. Musically, it’s the most innovative track on the album, with sampled wailing sirens and sitar-like guitar picking adding to the mix. Its inclusion adds considerable breadth to the duo’s already broad musical horizons, but Simmonds has never been afraid to explore new ground. With each listen, more components become apparent, not least some very tasteful and sparingly rationed Ry Cooder-style guitar licks and gently soulful backing vocals. The canvas here is so wide, I could almost imagine a rap or Coltrane-like sax wail manifesting during an instrumental break. Swamp Funk meets Zimmerman at the crossroads of British Orwellian desolation. Ace track.

The album closes with Bedford enthusing about the sense of escape to be found within nature, this apparently following the gruesome restrictions of Covid. ”The Lapwing’s Call” features melodic minor chords, trademark gentle harmonies and some really effective instrumental timing elements. Maintaining the high bar quality-wise, it’s a radiant closure to a stunning set of songs constituting a veritable labyrinth of musical dexterity and exploration.

”Strange News Has Come To Town” is a long-awaited album, which took several years to complete, with Bedford and Simmonds – like many of us – dogged by the impact of the pandemic, personal health issues and accompanying financial difficulties.

The wait was well worth it and Naomi and Paul have delivered bigtime. It’s a fabulous album which perfectly showcases their individual and combined talents, whilst marking out a creatively authoritative line in the sand, to all other would-be British Folk female/male duos. When it comes to this genre, Bedford and Simmonds are the undisputable British ‘Guvernors’, something that ”Strange News Has Come To Town” underlines most powerfully.

Richard David

Album Review: Naomi Bedford and Paul Simmonds – Strange News Has Come To Town - KLOF Mag 

As demonstrated on their long-awaited fifth album, Strange News Has Come To Town, Naomi Bedford and Paul Simmonds remain as vital a musical force as ever.

Beleaguered by the pandemic, poor health and financial collapse, there’s no surprise that, produced by Ben Walker, Naomi Bedford and Paul Simmonds‘ fifth album, Strange News Has Come To Town, places personal issues front and foremost. The album opens with the rousing mission statement of the Appalachian goodtime fiddle and banjo bounce of the Simmonds-penned Optimist, where despite “fire in the fields and poison in the rain” and not being able to afford a mortgage, a car or even shoe repairs “even in a time like this/I find a reason to resist”.

With Walker on mandolin and Loz Bridge at the piano,  Bedford’s DeMent-meets-the-McGarrigles Happiness Is A Way Of Traveling is described as a homage to anxiety as she sings, “Blue lights flashing make me think, they’re coming to put me in the clink/Red lights flashing mean problems I can’t afford to fix/Brown letters mean debts I can’t afford to pay, I always expect a rainy day”, resolving that “success is a state of mind”.

A mountain music equivalent of a shanty, the Sea Folk Sing Workshop collective assisting Simmons with the lyrics with Jason Kalidas on bansari (an Indian bamboo flute) and Bedford on lead, Haunted River is a ghost ship tale that takes its cue from the rotting hulks abandoned on Whitewall Creek on the River Medway and references The Temeraire, the Royal Navy gunship that was broken up in 1838 as the track itself ebbs away into the ambient fog.

A Bedford co-write with Justin Currie, I Love You Too features Dave Rothan on yearning pedal steel with banjo and tinkled piano and Richie Leo and Xan Tyler providing harmonies,  bringing a moody backwoods Americana blues feel to proceedings.

Bedford on Appalachian dulcimer and Walker on mandolin, it shifts to an English folksy jauntiness with hints of the Watersons and Carthys on Simmonds’s simply arranged take on the traditional Lewiston Factory Girls, the second half opening with Ben Paley on fiddle for the slow walking rhythm dark folk allegory of Asylum which recounts the fate of three would-be migrants brothers setting out to sea from the Normandy beaches and meeting the watery fate of so many, its narrator the only survivor, locked up at Napier Barracks, the Kent detention centre for asylum seekers, the line  “red blood, red cross, white flag for us/Red blood, red cross, white sheet, white cross” the haunting refrain. 

With Bedford accompanying on shruti, Simmons takes the lead on I’ve Got A Fever. The spoken intro leads into a five-minute rambling and surreal folk blues pandemic horror movie (“There’s a strangler in the mist prowling through the lands…Cover your mouth, better stand still/If the germ don’t get you then the government will”).

Sounding a similar mortality note but more breezily front porch Appalachian spiritual folk with just guitar and mandolin accompanying Bedford, Dark Rolling Road is firmly in the death-comes-a-calling tradition, here in the figure of a hitchhiker and the final stop a churchyard with the driver’s name on a gravestone.

Returning to the traditional, Bedford accompanied by just guitar and pedal steel, A Blacksmith Courted Me, from whence comes the album title, was collected by Vaughn Williams in 1909 and is a familiar tale of an unfaithful lover, though Bedford gives it a darker, more brooding setting than the usual To Be A Pilgrim tune.

Simmonds is back in a surreal mood for the itchy bluesy rhythm Opposite Day, which, with its congas and wah-wah guitar, is a fair maiden’s dystopian quest odyssey through a post-truth Britain, riding an Audi 5 rather than a steed, to find what man desires, the inverted lyrics having the rich begging from the poor and police ensuring you break the law while also referencing nursery rhymes, and of course coming to the conclusion that man has no idea what he actually wants. It ends with the sole co-write, The Lapwing’s Call, Walker on both mandolin and slide, Bridge accompanying Bedford on piano for a cascading-notes-strummed rural ballad set at the returning Spring and the end of lockdown. 

It’s been a long five years since their full-length album, but they remain as vital a musical force as ever, this is news that should be spread far and wide.

Mike Davies

 Started before lockdown this fourth album by Naomi Bedford and Paul Simmonds of The Men They Couldn’t Hang takes us on a journey through that period and some of the other tribulations of the world we currently inhabit.

The opening track Optimist does indeed give a message of hope despite the dark times and this is followed by Happiness is a Way of Travelling with an upbeat tone. But there are also lockdown-based themes in I’ve Got a Fever and Opposite Day which takes us on an odyssey through “post-truth” Britain.

A blend of folk, country and Americana, the traditional A Blacksmith Courted Me sits alongside Asylum telling the tragic tale of three would-be migrants, and Lewiston Factory Girls deals eloquently with workers’ exploitation.

But the album ends on a hopeful note with the rural ballad The Lapwing’s Call signifying, perhaps, the start of Spring at the end of lockdown.

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/may/31/naomi-bedford-and-paul-simmonds-singing-it-all-back-home-review?fbclid=IwAR0nfjqMvMHwHFurlY1lCE-hRKPcEpqOIoZVWFOI3l7IPmBIJETsny_uLU8

Folk is fixed, staid and fusty, stuck in its ways. This reputation lingers, so shake it: the best of it has survived by being remixed and reborn. Take the work of Naomi Bedford (aone-time singer with Orbital) and Paul Simmons (of folk punks The Men They Couldn't Hang). Now on theirthird album together, they are resolutely DIY, self-releasing and self-promoting, but their results are beautifully polished, what mainstream labels should be releasing: spirited revisions of traditional songs, rather than anodyne collections of aural chloroform.

This album fires up ballads that Maud Karpeles and Cecil Sharp collected in the Appalachian mountains during the first world war. The sound is resolutely American in style and in sound. Bedford’s vocals recall the exquisite shiver ofEmmylou Harris with extra boom, while Simmonds has more Englishness hovering around his American twang. The authenticity mob might twitch at such transatlantic heresy, but let’s remember Ewan MacColl’s name and persona was an invention, and that “realness” is bunk. This pair also inhabit these songs so joyfully and effortlessly that anyone begrudging them is to be pitied.

Proper life crackles here. In I Must And Will Be Married, Bedford conveys the rebellious charge of teenage desire and an edge of fear perfectly (the brilliant Lisa Knapp joins on dulcimer). Hangman (a duet with Simmonds) is all bluesy Janis Joplin stomp, while The Foggy Dew becomes an audacious a cappella, regret and pride hanging around the tale of a maid the protagonist gets pregnant. The best reinvention here is of Matty Groves, in a different lyrical version to the Fairport Convention classic, which injects rhythm, sunshine and joy into the song that begins with a “bright summer’s morning”. This is a direct record to bathe in, full of vivid light and air.

Jude Rogers

https://www.spiralearth.co.uk/singing-it-all-back-home-naomi-bedford-and-paul-simmonds/?fbclid=IwAR1n-oKlasc82Llo7opggGwZrEC2O_6OvQWkJZlwesIm4ilM82FRzFWuLo8

An album of ‘Appalachian ballads of English and Scottish origin’.

I’ve been to the Appalachian mountains just once, the White Mountains in New Hampshire. And it’s easy to see how these green horizons must have welcomed settlers from the British Isles centuries ago. Strangers in a strange, yet familiar, land – and what a land. Hills and valleys that stretch farther than the eye and mind can comprehend, trees that make our woods and forests seem like mere attempts at what a forest should be. A climate that echoes ours yet does everything to another level, continent crossing winds with unearthly energy, rains that explode rather than fall. Yet sweet sunshine teases the trees into a pointillist palette of rusts, ochres and blood red every fall. Wild flowers astonish with their vivacity wherever the sun hits a gap in the canopy. Eagles fly overhead and chipmunks dart about as if they are late for something more important.

Music that travels in the heart of settlers inevitably adapts to new surroundings. The songs they sang in the old country became a different branch and a new tradition is formed. We harp on about ‘tradition’ an awful lot in the folk world don’t we? our understanding of it is generally framed by the likes of Cecil Sharp, collectors, curators and more often than not editors of what the ‘peasants’ were singing. In reality there were many things more important than music in people’s lives, getting food on the table and not being eaten by bears or wolves probably weighed on minds more than how a particular tune went.

More than likely any sense of tradition only went back a generation or two, if you heard your grandparents whistling a tune you would remember it and they would correct you when you got it wrong. The settlers who moved to a new land brought what they could carry and a few pennies in their pocket, Gran and Grandad were left behind. So what we ended up with was a speeded up process of change, without the older generation around to say how a tune should be played people were freed up to experiment. Plus, those Appalachian experiments existed in a neat geographical bubble, so pretty quickly a new tradition was formed. Traditions eh? just call something one and it is.

Interestingly in the sleeve notes Paul Simmonds hopes that where they have added their own interpretation, that they have done so within the folk tradition. Rest easy Paul because you have done it perfectly within and without of the ‘tradition’.

What a fertile breeding ground for experimentation and adaptation those Appalachian hills were, in an esoteric sense one wonders if the new climate affected the timbre of the instruments they played, undoubtedly playing outdoors and hearing the music carried across valleys must have done. This is where Naomi and Paul have created such a brilliant teasing out of that unwritten world that underpins these songs. Getting a feel for those lives that created the music is crucial to making music with vibrancy. The pair mined the archives at Cecil Sharp house for the songs collected by Sharp, Shirley Collins leant her knowledge and encouragement. But ultimately they have captured and created something that cannot be held in words and musical notation.

They capture that sunlight that turns grains of pollen to fireflies in the late evening, when the air changes from a dry warmth to a hint of the dew to come. You can feel what those Appalachian settlers must have held in their hearts, what they hoped for and the memories of home that drifted into their dreams. It’s an evocation and a celebration, plus it’s just damned good fun.

Iain Hazlewood

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/c/folk-album-reviews-with-steve-johnson?fbclid=IwAR2sJEtWsWDmSgMj-7bvj954m6dFOTzgggzCqQUHAIJdIgVKAny3VKmGJW4

The Music of the Appalachian mountains has its origins in many old English and Scottish folk songs which found their way across the Atlantic as a result of migration and this album, a  collaboration between Naomi Bedford and Paul Simmonds of The Men They Couldn’t Hang, pays fitting tribute to that legacy.

Traditional opener I Must and Will Be Married is followed by new interpretations of classic folk songs like  Hangman and Foggy Dew. But the highlight is the version of the tragic ballad Matty Groves,  a near-perfect example of the art of storytelling in song with its tale of doomed love across the class divide. 

For anyone interested in the influence of British folk song on US roots music this album is a must, with Bedford and Simmonds’s innovative recordings reinterpreting the songs while remaining true to their legacy.

Worth catching on tour including at Cecil Sharpe House in London on June 5 at the official album launch.

http://www.fatea-records.co.uk/magazine/reviews/NaomiBedford/?fbclid=IwAR0U1V0L8T5NuovCGWkXisykxQFvEK1Fh7UZqVSO1yTnB2u_Dw2XPkDJOoo

Naomi Bedford and Paul Simmonds
Album:  Singing It All Back Home: Appalachian Songs of English and Scottish Origin
Label: Dusty Willow
Tracks: 10

Sometimes the journey matters. Linie, for example, the world's oldest aquavit makes a journey around the world, twice over the equator in barrels, to mature into an exceptional spirit. 

Similarly the spirit of Appalachia is captured here by Naomi Bedford and Paul Simmonds as they collect traditional songs which have travelled from their British origins to the Appalachians and now back. In doing so they are refreshed and reinterpreted, keeping folk music alive, exciting and vibrant.

It's always a pleasure to listen to Naomi's wonderful and distinct voice, here it sounds as authentic as mountain moonshine, you could be forgiven for closing your eyes and feeling transported across the Atlantic.

Closing your eyes you try to remember other versions of the songs captured. 

The opener "I Must and Will Be Married" is perhaps more widely known as "The Fit's Come On Me Now" or the Celtic "The Humours On Me Now", yet as you rack your brain to think who recorded it and when, it quickly dawns on you that it doesn't matter.

You realise that here in your hands you have versions that have a life of their own with verses and tunes that have adapted and changed through generations. You warm to the mandolin and banjo of Ben Walker, the country style fiddle of Ben Paley.

Paul Simmonds adds vocals and guitar. Indeed the track "The Fateful Blow" has more than a passing nod to an acoustic Men They Couldn't Hang interlude.

"Rebel Soldier" is pushed along with a rhythm section of Rhys Lovell on bass and Billy Abbot on drums. Other guests include Rory McLeod on harmonicas and Lisa Knapp on hammered dulcimer, all of which enhance the songs on offer.

Many of us of from the older generation will be familiar with Fairport Convention's version of "Matty Groves".   it's stripped back to clear and pure vocal, supported by guitar and mandolin. The song has a distinctive American feel that works exceptionally well.

As does the "Sheffield Apprentice" a tale of love unrequited, of being faithful and paying the ultimate price, whilst an accapella version of the "Foggy Dew" extols the virtue of doing the right thing no matter what.

To conclude, "Singing It All Back Home", endorsed and assisted by the elder stateswoman of folk, Shirley Collins, is an absolute joy of an album which improves with every play.

Ian Cripps

https://www.folkradio.co.uk/2019/04/naomi-bedford-paul-simmonds-singing-it-all-back-home/?fbclid=IwAR1XtJNr4Pia6-XP5JTh0ZwCXvhu1oxzQJ-y2fY-8bEDiw24sKqhyqmz4oE

Naomi Bedford & Paul Simmonds – Singing It All Back Home: Appalachian Songs of English and Scottish Origin

Dusty Willow Records – 17 May 2019

It’s abundantly clear, from Naomi Bedford‘s albums to date, that the traditional ballad has had a significant influence on her work. What sets Naomi apart from other singer/songwriters on the UK scene (in addition to her spell-binding voice) is her totally natural, seemingly effortless, fusion of traditional English song, with American and contemporary styles. At the forefront of those transatlantic influences is the Appalachian music that has evolved from the songs British settlers took to the remote regions of Eastern United States from the 17th Century onwards. For Singing It All Back Home, their third album as a duet, Naomi Bedford and partner Paul Simmonds (The Men They Couldn’t Hang) have lovingly explored the collection of over 1600 songs Cecil Sharp collected in the region between 1916 and 1918, and carefully crafted new, contemporary arrangements for ten of those songs I Must And Will Be Married opens the album with guitars, Lisa Knapp‘s hammered dulcimer, and layers of dreamy vocal; before Naomi’s plaintive, unmistakeable vocal commands the performance. The story was always the very essence of these songs, and as the story of this Mother/Daughter conversation on marriage develops, atmospheric slide guitar and cymbals pair perfectly with Donna Edmead‘s harmonies to provide a perfectly a balanced blend of traditional and modern sounds.

The distinction in the album’s tag-line is an important one – that Paul & Naomi have collected Appalachian Ballads of English and Scottish Origin. All too often the music that emigrated to the southern United States is regarded as being only Scottish or Irish in origin. The ‘Ulster Scots’ who fled religious, political and economic persecution in Ireland, were the same families who, over the preceding century, had been the subjects of King James 1st’s organised colonisation (Plantation) of Ulster, and they were followed by many more directly from northern England. Those emigrants came from both sides of the war-torn Scottish/English border, and in addition to their religion and politics, they also brought with them their songs and stories. Both were nurtured in the vast expanse of the Ozark and Appalachian Mountains. It is, perhaps, Paul’s arrangement for Rebel Soldier that gives the strongest sense of the 300-year evolution the music has undergone. It’s a gorgeous vocal duet from Paul and Naomi, set off perfectly by Donna’s harmonies in the stomping chorus; bass, drums, mandolin (from the album’s producer Ben Walker) and Ben Paley‘s old-timey fiddle. There’s a legitimacy about the arrangement that’s echoed as Paul sings The Fateful Blow. The combination of Ben Walker’s banjo and Ben Paley’s fiddle comes across as an authentic voice from the past, even more impressive, not to mention immensely enjoyable) with Rory McLeod‘s spoons and Rhys Lovell‘s bass. Paul and Naomi have expressed gratitude to Shirley Collins for her encouragement, support and knowledge on this project, and A Rich Irish Lady shines as the clearest example of her contribution. Opening with just Naomi’s vocal and guitar, the song also features their friend and constant contributor Justin Currie – always a fine match for Naomi’s voice. There must surely be some of Shirley’s influence in the album’s best-known track, though. When you do Matty Groves, you either nail it in some fascinating new approach that’s compelling and satisfying, or you pay tribute to another’s interpretation of the song. Naomi’s peerless ability to explore anew even the best known and most familiar traditional songs set this Matty Groves apart from any other that’s been recorded. Not for the first time with Naomi and Paul’s music I’m reminded of Tim Buckley and Greenwich Village. At nigh-on eight minutes, the song still passes too soon – a song you never want to leave. The Sheffield Apprentice has a similar lightness of touch, featuring just Naomi’s vocal and an unspecified selection of guitars and percussion from Andy Bramley, who recorded both tracks. On a more lively note, Hangman stomps every bit as effectively as Led Zepplin’s Gallow’s Pole did, with Rory’s bass harmonica and Ben’s electric guitar setting a raucous tone. Hangman has a perfect match with Hands On The Plough, a country rock treatment for an enduring spiritual, where Rory’s harmonica brilliantly takes on the role of fiddle. As if to form a trilogy – Who’s That Knocking is rousing, earthy and will send tingles all the way up your spine. Speaking of spine tingles, The Foggy Dew closes the album with a brief, unaccompanied solo performance from Naomi that speaks entirely for itself, and simply leaves you with the notion that the only sensible thing to do, would be to start the album again. Whenever I get my eager hands on a new album from Naomi Bedford & Paul Simmonds, I can be sure of superb music and song, delivered with passion, honesty and skill. Why then, I wonder, am I still taken aback by the sheer quality of what follows? As a follow-up to 2017’s exceptional Songs My Ruiner Gave To Me, there are a number of bold changes here. Most importantly, these are all traditional songs. Anyone who has seen Paul & Naomi play live will be well aware there’s no shortage of new material, so to immerse themselves so completely in this project is no small matter. Singing It All Back Home has all the passion and history of the characters that populate these stories; Naomi Bedford & Paul Simmonds paint them in a fascinating new light, while holding fast to their enduring heritage in an outstanding album.

Neil McFadyen

https://theartsdesk.com/new-music/cd-naomi-bedford-paul-simmonds-singing-it-all-back-home-appalachian-ballads-english-and

Outside the Palladium a couple of months back for Joan Baez’s farewell, I was given a flyer for this album – by Naomi Bedford herself it turns out. We had a brief chat which left me with a good feeling about the project and I was disappointed to see I’d be away for the London concert marking the launch of Singing It All Back Home: Appalachian Ballads of English and Scottish Origin. 

My intuition was correct for this, the fourth outing from Bedford and Simmonds and a talented group of confrères, among them Ben Walker on banjo, Rhys Lovell on bass and Ben Paley (son of the late and legendary Tom Paley, who worked with Woody Guthrie and various Seeger family members) on fiddle is a keeper and it’s sent me back to the three CDs I missed: in order, Dark They Were and Golden-Eyed, Tales of the Weeping Willow, and Songs My Ruiner Gave to Me, the latter featuring ballads of “Madness, Love and Obsession”. 

Each is beautifully curated and Bedford’s work has quite deservedly caught the attention of Jools Holland and the legendary Shirley Collins “who generously donated her time, encouragement and research materials” to this new album. Bedford has also been a BBC Folk Award 2015 nominee – and let’s hope soon a winner.  

To be sure, Bedford sounds English but her voice and style could easily have come straight from Appalachia, or further south – there were moments when I was reminded of Dolly Parton’s silvery-rain voice, so it’s no surprise to discover that Bedford had recorded “Jolene”, which suits her well. 

The “special relationship” that binds these islands with America is folk music: the songs that left England with the Pilgrim Fathers, Scotland with the Highland clearances, and Ireland with the famine, and which travelled across the States, appearing in different versions that were identified and collected by such figures as Cecil Sharp, Alan Lomax and Shirley Collins, and Jean Ritchie, and then traced back to the British  Isles. On both sides of the Atlantic, the folk revival brought them to a general audience – and of course in the 1960s, folk went electric, folk-rock sent "home" from the US to Britain.

Socially and musically, that history matters – and it clearly matters to Bedford and Simmonds as they “sing it back home” on an album that features some quite exquisite arrangements of songs including the great “Matty Groves” (familiar in outline from Baez and Fairport Convention), “I Must and Will Be Married” and “The Foggy Dew”, on which Bedford’s magnificent voice is unaccompanied. “Hands on the Plough”, on which Rory McLeod blows a mean harmonica, bowls along nicely in a manner reminiscent of Cash and Carter. A version of it became a staple of civil rights marches: "Eyes on the Prize".

Singing It All Back Home is a splendid album that deserves to be recognised by all who bestow awards in this arena. This is living folk at its beautiful best. 

Liz Thomson

by Paul Woodgate on 22 August, 2014 - in Album Reviews, Featured Albums

Religious intolerance is not new; it stretches back as far as religion is recorded. In 1620, the Mayflower set sail out of Plymouth harbour bound for the New World. In 1861 seven southern states declared their secession from the US and sparked the American Civil War. In 1932 coal miners in Wilder, Tennessee went on strike after their wages were cut for the third time. A company town, Wilder became the center of a violent uprising and a test case for workers rights.

If I told you that an album due for release on September 8 uses these and more to weave a coherent story of political unrest and the need for equality and compassion, and does it so well you not only feel entertained but informed as a result, you might think it a little far-fetched. Naomi Bedford, however, would take issue with that.

A History Of Insolence – Songs of Freedom, Dissent & Strife, is the second album from Naomi, an award winning English vocalist with an excitingly varied CV that includes work with such diverse acts as Orbital, DJ Mex, Rhythm Nylon Machine and Ron Sexsmith, winning plaudits from REMs Peter Buck and Shirley Collins along the way. Her voice is tailor-made for delivering the brittle pride and despair of the working man and woman, a gorgeous instrument that sticks like velcro and seduces like silk, so much so that it’s not a stretch to see her matching the Wilder coal miners stride for stride or standing on the dock as the Mayflower makes for the horizon. The delivery is traditional and impassioned, humble and feisty, honest and bold. It should be on every school’s history curriculum.

Her own history provides insight into the variety on offer, both of musical styles and stories. Davidson Wilder Blues is a Hedy West roundel that takes no prisoners, and Naomi’s voice veers close to echoes of Joni Mitchell – yes, really.
It’s followed by a dreamy folk ballad you might expect Cara Dillon or Kate Rusby to record, the Lady of the land making away with her Gypsy Davy, abandoning security and social standing for love. ..Davy has a nice harmony line from Justin Currie, a long-standing collaborator with Naomi. The Wild & Charming Energy and The Spider & The Wolf, the former a bubbly number complete with brass and co-written with her Paul Simmonds from The Men They Couldn’t Hang highlights the nuance in Naomi’s vocals, the latter a fable sung with onomatopoeic grace, delicate yet as strong as the web the spider weaves. It’s a delightful opening quartet, but the real beauty of this album unfolds in its second half.

The Currie penned We Are Not The People is a delicious slice of the Del Amitri-man’s minor key folk-pop, written for the album and accompanied by a V for Vendetta style video. The change of pace and sonorous piano acts like a pre-cursor to the album’s core; five songs that would not have sounded out of place on a Seeger or Guthrie release. An ocean going duo are first up, the ballad Overseas is a potted history of the aforementioned religious intolerance from Richard Coeur de Lion to the Twin Towers, Raise The Sails a peek into the inventory and impact of a trip across the Atlantic aided by a superb backing vocal from Donna Edmead. Simmond’s Junktown is a fast-paced run through the wrong side of the tracks that will test your ability to sing along without tripping over your tongue. Fields of Clover is a beautiful exploration of the baby boomers and The Old Abandoned Road – ‘The war was fought, and all for naught’ explores the futility of The American Civil War through the eyes of a soldier.

The Watches Of The Night closes proceedings save for a short instrumental reprise of Fields Of Clover. Together, the songs represent an heartfelt attempt to put the lyric and meaning front and center, backed by acoustic instruments playing warm and memorable melodies. The delivery is traditional and impassioned, humble and feisty, honest and bold. It should be on every school’s history curriculum.

Paul Woodgate

‘Tales from the Weeping Willow’ - a sombre collection of sinister and bleak songs, laments and ‘murder ballads’
 

Naomi Bedford has released her second album: ‘Tales from the Weeping Willow’, a sombre collection of sinister and bleak songs, laments and ‘murder ballads’. And once you listen to Naomi's voice you realise the promise of her first album 'Dark They Were & Golden Eyed' is brought to glorious fruition with 'Tales From The Weeping Willow'.

This collection of dark, shadowy songs, subtitled ‘Songs of Murder, Death and Sorrow’, is a priceless blend of traditional and original American and English folk. Together with Naomi’s writing and vocal talents it embraces the abilities of Paul Heaton, Justin Currie, Alisdair Roberts, Paul Simmonds, Kris Dollimore, Gerry Diver, Lenny Harvey and Dave Rothan among others.

Naomi’s voice engages with a haunting absorbing quality that gives depth and presence to her songs. It’s immediately evident through the uncertain peril of ‘Daddy’s Got a Gun’ – by Paul Simmonds, and the sad confusion of ‘February’ – a Naomi Bedford original. The traditional Appalachian bluegrass murder ballad ‘Willow Garden’ is a cruel tale of murderous love, which Naomi delivers to perfection. The intriguingly titled ‘Roland The Headless Thompson Gunner’ - a Warren Zevon song - tells tale of entanglement in the brutal late-60’s wars in Nigeria and Congo. Although the protagonist gains a fearsome reputation with his Thompson machine gun, he is murdered by a fellow mercenary. This tale of betrayal alone could define the album for its pure brooding menace and ghostly, eerie ending.

Naomi continues to superbly express elaborate narrative songs with Lord Thomas and Fair Ellendor’ - another Appalachian song; from the old Scottish ballad ‘Lord Thomas and Fair Annet’ or ‘The Brown Girl’. Naomi gives this classic tale of marrying for money over love an evocative bitterness as she regails us with the agony of its murder and beheading. To hear Naomi’s voice add expression and feeling to the ‘murder ballad’ theme is a pure pleasure, as she does with Paul Heaton and David Rotheray’s ‘The Ferryboat Inn’ and the yearning sadness of ‘The Clouds of Colwyn Bay’ written by Paul Simmonds. Another defining moment comes with ‘The Death of Queen Jane’ - an English ballad about the death of Jane Seymour, third wife of Henry VIII. Naomi chooses the basic tale of Queen Jane’s difficult labour and death to build the song around her captivating voice adding gentle harmonies and subtle strings to simply make this version precious.

If 'Dark They Were & Golden Eyed' brought Naomi some much-deserved attention then 'Tales From The Weeping Willow' should have an ever-widening audience appreciating her talent.

Album Review from Froots - Ian Anderson

‘'Her voice is so striking......that your attention gets quickly nailed to the floor .... you’re on such a high at the end that you instantly hit play again, several times. It’s easy to get besotted with.'’
 

Crikey, a real grower, this one. You stick it on and your first thought is 'country rock'. You note a strong, hard voice which reminds you a little of early Emmylou and even longer-ago names like Carolyn Hester or Hedy West. But while the style and inflections are American, her accent stays mostly English – she's a Londoner now living in Brighton – and that gets increasingly attractive as the album progresses (not for nothing does she have an endorsement from Shirley Collins). But it takes a few tracks to really get going, during which the reviewer gets distracted by reading a spiky biog ('80s wild child, dad's a pop video editor, Julien Temple & Don Letts in the kitchen, a role in Militant's demos, a top 20 hit with Orbital, a rediscovery of the folk and country records of her childhood years...)Her voice is so striking that I could easily have lived without a rather formulaic duet with Del Amitri's Justin Currie that pops up in third place, but after that your attention gets quickly nailed to the floor by a version of the traditional Willow Garden and then a rivetting take on Warren Zevon's Roland The Headless Thomson Gunner (a song which deserves to be as fêted and covered as anything by Richard Thompson or Eric Bogle, but this one will be hard to beat).

After that the changes and variety come thick and fast: a better Currie collaboration, the traditional Lord Thomas & Fair Ellendor, a rockabilly Railroad Bill, and the disquieting Ferryboat Inn co-written by the Beautiful South's Paul Heaton and David Rotheray, where she duets with the former. Then bringing up the rear, co-producer Paul (The Men They Couldn't Hang) Simmonds' glorious Colwyn Bay and the pièce de résistance, The Death Of Queen Jane, both with Alasdair Roberts.

This very strange sequencing – which may not work to its advantage with those seeking instant gratification – does have one good side effect: you're on such a high at the end that you instantly hit play again, several times. It's easy to get besotted with.

Simmonds' and Gerry Diver's production skills work to good effect. Right now it comes with a note explaining that this early version is pre-mastering so there are a few minor track level variations. Hopefully she will deservedly find a wider release for it to sort out such things; meanwhile, don't wait, it's so good you'll buy it twice.

http://www.frootsmag.com/content/issue/reviews/

Armed with testimonials from Peter Buck and Shirley Collins, a tag (from Del Amitri’s Justin Currie) as an English Emmylou Harris and an old hit single with Orbital on her CV, Naomi Bedford delivers a relentlessly intriguing self-financed album. Bedford’s yearning, no-frills voice brings compelling potency to the “songs of murder, death and sorrow” of the sub-title, her own aching, country-fuelled material blending easily with a couple of trad folk epics and songs by Paul Simmonds, Paul Heaton and – best of all – Warren Zevon’s magnificent Roland The Headless Thompson Gunner. Overseeing tasteful, understated arrangements, Gerry Diver masterminds an offbeat production of My Love Is Deep, a bluesy collaboration with Justin Currie, while Heaton duets on Ferry Boat Inn and Alasdair Roberts pops up on two tracks, including a respectful treatment of the great ballad The Death Of Queen Jane unexpectedly wonderful.

The subtitle to Naomi Bedford's second album, "Songs of Murder, Death and Sorrow", leaves little room for doubt or argument. There are no happy endings here, and scant regard for gentler sensibilities, whether Bedford's telling the gruesome tale of "Lord Thomas and Fair Ellendor" or the sadder, sicker account of the Essex millionaire who, facing ruin, killed his family, in "Daddy's Got a Gun".

Set to banjo and astringent fiddle, it's animated by Bedford's tremulous voice, a striking instrument with skillful touches of vibrato and melisma capable of transforming Warren Zevon's mythopoeic mercenary ballad "Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner" into a trad-folk parable.

Best of all is "My Love Is Deep", a murder duet with Justin Currie set to a hissing loop and ramshackle piano. Brilliant and original, in equal parts.