Post by vikingblues on Jan 12, 2018 23:37:02 GMT
Just 23 when she made the album Lucy Ward proves to already be a wonderfully mature and thoughtful singer-songwriter.
She is categorised as folk but her albums are more than that.
There is a strong contemporary aspect to her work and a gritty realism far removed from the majority of what is normally output by female folk artists.
This, her 2nd album, has a wide range - sometimes brooding, sometimes fun, sometimes playful, sometimes angry about politics and personal tragedy.
Although the essence of the album is acoustic, there are different textures and treatments, with electric guitars, drums and strings. But added to serve the music.
Musicians brought in to help on the album do not include big names but they make a really big contribution by making the whole arrangements work so well.
Produced by Stu Hannah, the collaboration between him and Lucy has resulted in an album with exceptional musical scope and feel.
The melodies and arrangements are often very haunting and musically rich. No fancy, clever stuff, just music.
Above everything is Lucy Wards voice. I've seen it said she considers it to be her main instrument and in my view it is a very high quality instrument indeed.
Sections of unaccompanied singing and unaccompanied harmonies really highlight the richness of the voice and it's Derby accent.
There are 12 songs on the CD, and two are traditional, one of which has had a new tune created for it by Lucy and Stu. All the others are written by Lucy Ward.
Comments on some of the tracks:-
"I Cannot Say I Will Not Speak" - starts the album and calls on the golden generation of 60’s folk singers and the idealism that believed "A Change Is Going Come", and questions why nothing ever really did change.
"The Last Pirouette" - great use of metaphor - the fading washed-up prima ballerina is a metaphor for the end of the world. This track is particularly haunting and it grows on me with repeat listening. Just solo voice for the opening 45 seconds shows the great quality of the voice. The accompaniment that then kicks in is very, very moody. As it needs to be for the subject matter. One of the many tracks on the album that get better with each repeated listen.
"Velvet Sky" - with it's sweeping arrangements this is about love and it's a joyful experience. Some rather lovely chord and harmonic progressions fit the mood perfectly.
"The Consequence" is acappella and arranged for multiple voices in lovely harmony. I believe this song is about domestic violence and an "honour" killing. Tough subject matter again.
"Lord I don't Want to Die in the Storm" - trad and the closest the album gets in sound to a trad folk song. Sung with feeling and it has an arrangement that's very satisfying.
"For The Dead Men" - with sombre beat, dramatically effective pauses in the vocal delivery and a moody and melancholic minor key. A lament for now, a requiem for those in the past who have made a difference and scorn for those too stupid and complacent to realise a fight is still needed. A song about campaigners, the victims of injustice and the bystanders who do nothing – all dead - either morally or through their passivity.
"Marching Through The Green Grass" - the other of the two traditional tracks. An up beat adaptation of an Appalachian Mountain Song. This was the track that jumped out of a Mike Harding podcast at me and made me so interested in hearing more. It's just so insistently jaunty and worms it's way into your head so you find yourself humming it the rest of the evening.
In "Ink" she manages to bring real tenderness, without sounding fragile, to a song based on the life of a very unfortunate soul born disabled into a dysfunctional and impoverished family. He suffered years of abuse at the hands of his older brother and then from a notorious paedophile, whilst supposedly living in care. Drifting into crime and violence and prison, he was eventually rescued from homelessness and became an activist campaigning for those who suffered a similar fate, until a young and probably self inflicted death. Very tough subject matter.
One of the great things about this album is that it is intelligent, but intelligent musically rather than in an intellectual clever way.
It seems that mood and feel and heart is at the centre of the project in the lyrics, voice, instruments and arrangements.
Billy Bragg picked up on Lucy Wards work and his published comments resulted in Lucy Ward being commissioned for a film soundtrack. I can see how that would work - there were quite a few times on my first listen through the tracks that I thought this would be great music as part of a film soundtrack.
I'm more taken with this album than any I've listened to in the last 5 years.
The other two albums she has made are currently on the way to me.
Here's a few links of some of the albums tracks on YouTube:-
She is categorised as folk but her albums are more than that.
There is a strong contemporary aspect to her work and a gritty realism far removed from the majority of what is normally output by female folk artists.
This, her 2nd album, has a wide range - sometimes brooding, sometimes fun, sometimes playful, sometimes angry about politics and personal tragedy.
Although the essence of the album is acoustic, there are different textures and treatments, with electric guitars, drums and strings. But added to serve the music.
Musicians brought in to help on the album do not include big names but they make a really big contribution by making the whole arrangements work so well.
Produced by Stu Hannah, the collaboration between him and Lucy has resulted in an album with exceptional musical scope and feel.
The melodies and arrangements are often very haunting and musically rich. No fancy, clever stuff, just music.
Above everything is Lucy Wards voice. I've seen it said she considers it to be her main instrument and in my view it is a very high quality instrument indeed.
Sections of unaccompanied singing and unaccompanied harmonies really highlight the richness of the voice and it's Derby accent.
There are 12 songs on the CD, and two are traditional, one of which has had a new tune created for it by Lucy and Stu. All the others are written by Lucy Ward.
Comments on some of the tracks:-
"I Cannot Say I Will Not Speak" - starts the album and calls on the golden generation of 60’s folk singers and the idealism that believed "A Change Is Going Come", and questions why nothing ever really did change.
"The Last Pirouette" - great use of metaphor - the fading washed-up prima ballerina is a metaphor for the end of the world. This track is particularly haunting and it grows on me with repeat listening. Just solo voice for the opening 45 seconds shows the great quality of the voice. The accompaniment that then kicks in is very, very moody. As it needs to be for the subject matter. One of the many tracks on the album that get better with each repeated listen.
"Velvet Sky" - with it's sweeping arrangements this is about love and it's a joyful experience. Some rather lovely chord and harmonic progressions fit the mood perfectly.
"The Consequence" is acappella and arranged for multiple voices in lovely harmony. I believe this song is about domestic violence and an "honour" killing. Tough subject matter again.
"Lord I don't Want to Die in the Storm" - trad and the closest the album gets in sound to a trad folk song. Sung with feeling and it has an arrangement that's very satisfying.
"For The Dead Men" - with sombre beat, dramatically effective pauses in the vocal delivery and a moody and melancholic minor key. A lament for now, a requiem for those in the past who have made a difference and scorn for those too stupid and complacent to realise a fight is still needed. A song about campaigners, the victims of injustice and the bystanders who do nothing – all dead - either morally or through their passivity.
"Marching Through The Green Grass" - the other of the two traditional tracks. An up beat adaptation of an Appalachian Mountain Song. This was the track that jumped out of a Mike Harding podcast at me and made me so interested in hearing more. It's just so insistently jaunty and worms it's way into your head so you find yourself humming it the rest of the evening.
In "Ink" she manages to bring real tenderness, without sounding fragile, to a song based on the life of a very unfortunate soul born disabled into a dysfunctional and impoverished family. He suffered years of abuse at the hands of his older brother and then from a notorious paedophile, whilst supposedly living in care. Drifting into crime and violence and prison, he was eventually rescued from homelessness and became an activist campaigning for those who suffered a similar fate, until a young and probably self inflicted death. Very tough subject matter.
One of the great things about this album is that it is intelligent, but intelligent musically rather than in an intellectual clever way.
It seems that mood and feel and heart is at the centre of the project in the lyrics, voice, instruments and arrangements.
Billy Bragg picked up on Lucy Wards work and his published comments resulted in Lucy Ward being commissioned for a film soundtrack. I can see how that would work - there were quite a few times on my first listen through the tracks that I thought this would be great music as part of a film soundtrack.
I'm more taken with this album than any I've listened to in the last 5 years. The other two albums she has made are currently on the way to me.
Here's a few links of some of the albums tracks on YouTube:-
Jo whoever he is.
