lammas and the anniversary of the release of the fourth musicians of bremen album

'me and ---------------- listened to yr album stoned the other night, flipping great. I’m going up the loft to find the previous one later. do u have any copies of the early ones left?'

- an anonymous review (by a certain comix enthusiast).

august 1st. lammas. and the anniversary of the release of the fourth musicians of bremen album. 

horsemouth can offer you one other review: 

'like travelling on a soundwave that started with forest swords had flashes of john fahey and ended with an early floyd mashup.' - martin (of martin and angela)

in honour of the  day horsemouth is playing musicians of bremen volume four as we speak as it were. 

the vocals on amarach have just hit. howard had the ukulele and the vocals. horsemouth brought the guitar parts and proposed the keyboard under the vocals. it's curious how well it came together (seeing as by that point the pandemic had hit and horsemouth was reduced to emailing in suggestions). it ends with birdsong, joggers, cyclists and overheard conversations about lady gaga.

there is (of course) an element of pink floyd envy there. horsemouth's favourite track on the album (and probably favourite track by musicians). 

ok next up (courtesy of shuffle) dark was the day.  almost entirely howard. a perfect short pop song (with an incredible string band homage). horsemouth added the bass (which is just root notes really but. like the dude's rug, seems to pull the room together nicely). 

blindspot. really the album is an album of pop songs by howard. again horsemouth adds a bass part (but this time more in a NY style) and some guitar. 

broadbury down howard had made the instrumental (giant distorted organs that he wanted to take in a more mbv direction). horsemouth dug up a poem by folksong collector the reverend sabine baring-gould and sings it with howard's backing. he liked the little organ parts (again very pink floyd again he thinks) and is pleased with his slide guitar part. howard takes over towards the end and horsemouth's guitar starts impersonating sequencers. kids yell. 

fallen snow. starts with ghazal's voice and howards 8 string ukulele and then it's time for the synthesized string sections. at the end howard kind of takes it hip-hop (most strange).  this is the re-discovery of this listening session. 

I will not go. so this is howard on guitar (recorded on his phone if horsemouth remembers correctly) and lots of backing vocals and melodica. again it reprises into some varispeeded fingerpicking by howard (with more of that late fahey feel). horsemouth thinks of these last two tracks as a pair. 

sandstorm. so this one seems to owe more to gary numan, early human league, jean-michel jarre, all that sort of stuff and probably it follows, horsemouth and howard were imagining soundtracking a horror movie. horsemouth really struggled with the guitar part for this. eventually he managed to get a decent take of  a follow along part on the resonator.  

wonky. this is howard in its entirety. as if late era john fahey was from manchester, as if it were psych. it kind of should have come straight after amarach horsemouth thinks (fucking birds). perhaps his second favourite track on the album.  

am I born to die? the old wesleyan hymn as sung by doc watson, here with horsemouth and with howard joining in. horsemouth on guitars and organ (open G tunings all round) going for a droney feel. 

pagodas. a horsemouth guitar instrumental. lifted from parts of debussy's pagodes trying to channel peter green. horsemouth had great fun with the crash cymbal he'd found in a bin. 

interesting to end it there. 

really the album is, at its heart,  an album of pop songs by howard (dark was the day, blindspot, fallen snow, I will not go). but it is  dragged off course by horsemouth's folky leanings (am I born to die? pagodas, broadbury down). it shows the strength of howard's ability to arrange things in the studio. amarach and wonky stand out for horsemouth, blindspot is the one that he feels has been neglected.  

one final thing. horsemouth loves howard's cover art. it's colourful (but excellently mashed up).

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horsemouth is back at the homestead. he missed two possible events to go to yesterday (he was busy tidying out the living room in an attempt to bring it back into into use. horsemouth damned and blasted (and cursed and vituperated) and shifted heavy loads. he also unblocked the corridor. 

yesterday (earlier) howard called round dropping back the bass drum (from pagodas) and the spare, i.e. less used keyboard (the casio CTK1150 - another street find). they got the guitars out and had a play and sing along through the new material and after pizza and tea they had a bottle of beer.   

today (maybe) a tidy up in the kitchen (to discourage mice). reading and farting about. maybe a walk up onto the marshes to look at the lammas fields. 

it is lammas, the festival of the 3 faced god lug and the baking of the bread with the new harvest of wheat (blessed be the bakers). the rough mid point between the summer solstice and the autumn equinox - there is still time in the sunshine to be had.