RM Hubbert released his second album on Monday
An album packed with guest collaborators can be a dangerous career path to walk down.
How do you keep a cohesive sound, ambience or consistent thread when so many different voices are offering their opinions? What if the pull of one of the other guests at your party detracts focus from your own plans as host? How do you stop the project from being about the cast rather than the character?
In popular music there are, of course, notable exceptions. The career of Massive Attack has been both plagued and blessed by their choice of collaborators; Jurassic 5 made the guest appearance something of an art form; UNKLE’s Psyence Fiction remains a high-water mark in indie/dance/hip-hop crossover; Edwyn Collins’ exceptional Losing Sleep is a more recent Scottish example. However, the past decade has been littered with “featuring” credits which are, at best, “brand widening exercises” and at worst tacked on detractors from the song.
If you want further proof, try to remember any part of Redman's impact on Christina Aguilera’s Dirrty, or RedOne’s interlude had on Lady Gaga’s Let’s Dance, Busta Rhymes on Don’t Cha or even Aguilera’s interjection into that god-awful Maroon 5 song. You know, the one with the whistling and the soul-draining and the lyrics about wanting to dance like a 68-year-old Tina Turner rip-off. Would these huge hits have been any different without the added extras?
And breathe.
RM Hubbert has decided to walk the pot-holed road of collaboration with his new album, Thirteen Lost & Found. As if to mock all the outrage poured into the previous paragraphs, it’s an absolute masterpiece, conceived with the sort of unforced cross-pollination that you only get with a genuine affection between guest and visitor. Alex Kapranos, Aidan Moffat, Emma Pollock, Luke Sutherland and Hanna Tuulikki may be guest speakers, but it is Hubbert holding conference.
Sunbeam Melts the Hour manages the quite unique trick of recalling both Ry Cooder’s vast Americana and the Orient, and perhaps even a little of Mark Lindsay’s superb soundtrack to Shogun Assasin. Moffat brings his trademark desert-dry wit to Car Song, while the unaccompanied guitar in For Joe shows a gravity and weight that acts as the album’s centrepiece. Thirteen Lost & Found was released on Monday on Chemikal Underground.
Mull Historical Society return to the stage this week in promotion of their new album, City Awakenings. Colin McIntyre has returned to his alias after two albums under his own name, and the band will play the ABC in Glasgow on the 3rd of February as part of Celtic Connections. McIntyre had made no secret of the fact his latest creation was inspired by Glasgow, and so the prospect of him returning it to the scene of its inception should prove inspired for anyone in need of an optimism overdose.
They may very well have once recalled Strange Times, but the Black Keys cannot have envisaged the way in which their largely authentic Blues-rock would be embraced. Five years ago the band were releasing a hugely faithful reproduction of the music of Junior Kimbrough, this year’s El Camino was co-produced by Dangermouse and debuted at number 2 in the US Billboard charts. The band have seemingly made the transition from blues revivalists to full-blown rockstar-dom without losing credibility or authenticity. Next time round it’ll be stadiums, so it’ll be worth catching them at the Corn Exchange in Edinburgh on the 4th February.
Throughout the weekend venues across Edinburgh will be hosting the Wee Dub Festival, with Mad Professor (aka Neil Fraser) headlining. The Guyana native has been responsible for some of the great leaps in South American and Caribbean music in the last three decades, and has worked with artists of numerous genres and backgrounds. As if his own live set weren’t temptation enough, he also promises to do a Dub Workshop…
Finally, if you like your rock with at least four r’s at the front, drenched in sweat and sporting more facial tattoos than a Maori prison (and you should do) then the Barrowlands on Tuesday 7th is the place to be. As if the thought of Mastodon’s behemoth, gods-shaking sound wasn’t enough, they’ll be supported by Dillinger Escape Plan. If you don’t have tinnitus on Wednesday then you weren’t really there.
