Get the Blessing were one of my favourite finds of last year. Now they're back with a great new album. A review is forthcoming, but for now here's all the important information.
GET THE BLESSING
‘Lope & Antilope’
Release Date: 20 January 2014
Label: Naim Jazz Records naimcd199
CD, Digital + 180gm vinyl
UK tour in March 2014
Bassist Jim Barr once remarked that Get The Blessing were “total outsiders” and “the punk entry” when they won the 2008 BBC Jazz Award for Best Album with ‘All Is Yes’. Almost six years later and four albums down the line, the same could still be said to hold true, albeit with a little more age and wisdom at their disposal. Lope & Antilope is the band’s fourth album (second for Naim Jazz) and whilst to some degree the thrashing rhythms of previous albums have advanced into more mellow territory, the irreverent and mischievous attitude is still very much in evidence: with a fixation for words that end in ‘ope’ Get The Blessing return with their most sophisticated album to date and UK tour to follow.
Formed in 2000 to share a fascination with the improvisation and monophonic nature of Ornette Coleman’s earlier works, the Bristol-based four-piece can now boast a truly international fan base and the last two years have seen them take their cellophane masks half way round the world and back (it was the rhythm of movement and travel experienced on the road that gave way to the new album and inspired the title). Throughout this time, the line-up has remained the same with Portishead rhythm masters Jim Barrand Clive Deamer on bass and drums respectively, Pete Judge on trumpet and Jake McMurchie on saxophone. And all this despite other commitments for everyone, not least Deamer’s recruitment as Radiohead’s second live drummer in 2012. The band’s old friend and collaborator – and Portishead guitarist - Adrian Utley also returns to make a guest appearance with Bat for Lashes guitarist Tim Allenbrought in to engineer the recording sessions.
Conceptually Lope & Antilope is different from previous albums as it makes use of sounds collected whilst on the road but crucially, is almost all improvised. With the urge to leave their comfort zone and break some of their recording habits, the album was recorded in an empty pottery in Pembrokeshire. With nothing written, everything on the album came out of four days of improvising. The starting point was often experimentation with sound effects, both acoustic and electric, to which a groove would be added, then a tune, or a solo and so forth. As the band put it, it’s “the culmination of 4 days of recording, 3 years of gigging and 12 years of drinking tea and gin.”
The use of guitar effects pedals and other electronic gizmos had become a big part of what the band do live, but until now had never been fully integrated into the recording process. As well as extensive use of delay by the horns, the rockiest track on the album, ‘Little Ease’ also features the trumpet routed through a distortion pedal, bought for a song on the way to the first day of recording (it also features on ‘Trope’). The saxophone is treated in a similar way, producing the Theremin-like pitch bends that can be heard on ‘Quiet’. This could lead you to think that Lope & Antilopeis an effects heavy, raucous album, but in fact the opposite would be more accurate. Lope & Antilope is more textured than previous work, shifting from the atmospheric ambience of ‘Luposcope’ to the pulsing, almost Nordic menace of ’Viking Death Moped’ – but all the way through maintaining the trademark bass riffs that carry the album through giving it that quintessential Get The Blessing Sound.
Get The Blessing live dates 2014:
2 Mar Capstone Theatre, LIVERPOOL
5 Mar XOYO, LONDON
6 Mar Hare & Hounds, BIRMINGHAM
9 Mar Jazz Festival, BRISTOL
10 Mar Arts Centre, WARWICK
27 Mar Sheffield University SU, SHEFFIELD
29 Mar Clitheroe Grand, CLITHEROE
Naim Jazz Records was founded in 2008 in order to provide a platform for deserving British jazz talent. In dedicating itself to artistic freedom and superb technical and creative quality, Naim Jazz has built a diverse and exciting roster including Neil Cowley Trio, Empirical, Kairos 4tet, Get The Blessing, trioVD, Stuart McCallum and Sons Of Kemet.
Naim Hi Definition: Listen to this album as the artist intended, by downloading it in 24bit 48khz WAV, FLAC and Apple Lossless from the Naim Hi Def Download Store, one of the world’s first independent label websites to sell fully uncompressed music. www.naimlabel.com
