Your Verdict: Quillford Essentials - Week Nine

[Quillford]

With seconds to spare I bring you in shit hot crazy week NINE! Holy crap nine weeks already. Over TWO months?! Where DOES the time go. Well this week we are going to slow it down just a bit with one of my favourite artists. Switching from the normal "rock"ish stuff I have been going with we divert. Divert to FOLK! Pin back your ears and listen up Fortress climbers.
Seth Lakeman is his name and jamming is his game. At 35 he has been active for a somewhat 18 years and alas I have only heard of him in the past five. But that's not surprising as he was only a local lad in Devon until this point. He shot to fame when he supported Jethro Tull (A much loved band of mine) on their 40th anniversary tour in 2008. This got him some well deserved attention. Got him a mercury music prize and went onto to sign to Relentless Records and release his third album the start of some smooth sounding amazing-ness (Thats a word right). ANYWAY, this is where I came in and gobbled his album up like a hungry third world child and locked myself away clawing over his stuff like a total wanker. Brilliant. After a few days I emerged with a few of his riffs burnt into my musically astute mind and was able to emulate some at least partially on my very own strumming guitar! Ok he sings in metaphors and tales of monumental things but I really like it actually. Every song is telling me a story that I am genuinely interested in and for some reason manges to give me an image of TV show "Sharpe". I blame Jon Tamm! Songs I suggest "The Colliers" "White Hare" "King & Country" "Greed & Gold" & "I'll Haunt You". A lot of track but a good half hour of excellence. I even went to see him live after a touch with his stuff and he was pretty good. He was literally a one man band, guitar, harmonica and a drum thing. I was impressed. If you like a bit of folk mixed with some SICK instrumentals - sink your teeth into THIS cornish GOLD.

[The Curmudgeon]

Another day, another time I confuse one of my own Fortress choices, Jens Lekman, for Seth Lekman. Every time I see the names my brain has to separate them.

Anyway, nice enough choice, Quillguy, but a fairly frustrating one. I've heard about this guy before, but never actually heard any of his music, so an instrumental wouldn't be my first way of discovering the guy. He does have music with words, right?

So, uh - yeah. Nice instrumental, sounds like something that would soundtrack a cooler than cool indie movie about a boy discovering himself in a small hick town. But.. anything else from Seth?

[trashcanman]

That dude plays a MEAN acoustic. Nice. So did you replace the instrumental track with a different one at C's behest, Quillguy? I'd never expect to hear our host say something so.....mainstreamish (if you can say amazing-ness, I can say mainstreamish) as to complain about a lack of words. It's called "music", man! It doesn't even need words if you are doing it right. I want to hear that one man acoustic instrumental, damn it.

[The Curmudgeon]

Ha ha, yeah fair point. I just figured if I'm to get an idea of the guy I'd like more than some (admittedly nice) guitar strum. I'll admit it - I have very little time for instrumentals. They're fine as part of an album and they're fine as a piece of music, but it's never something I'm going to listen to more than once. Sigh. I'm such a pop bitch.

Anyway, now I've got MY way(!)...

Nice track. Like the guy's voice and the music is genuinely affecting. Great stuff, Quillguy. Again.