“Tall Tales from a Low County” – Phil Burdett

0

Not so much of an album review as a dispatch from the front lines. Since his serious health difficulties five years ago, Phil Burdett’s become the prolific polymath of the Thames Estuary. He’s always been a singer-songwriter of the highest calibre as a live and recorded artist, but he’s broken out of those shackles since with 2016 by publishing and performing poetry, writing prose, directing film and doing some painting as well. The latest news is that he’s released “Tall Tales from a Low County”, a companion piece to last year’s “Folkmares” album with a similar theme of the East End Essex diaspora, the demographic transition from London’s dockland to the estuarial towns, old and new.

“Tall Tales from a Low County” features two long-term Phil Burdett collaborators, Steve Stott (playing fiddle, mandolin, banjo and ‘weird guitar’) and Colleen McCarthy (piano and vocals). Alongside Phil’s contributions on guitar (including, unusually, a bit of electric), programmed percussion, organ, accordion and some digital orchestration, they create soundscapes that match the meandering progress of the Thames and various points along its course. And you’re never too far away from some birdsong (or even seagulls) and tidal susurration along the way.

As with all of Phil Burdett’s albums, you can listen on a superficial level and thoroughly enjoy the experience, but the deeper you dig into the lyrics, the more satisfying it becomes. Phil puts the time into researching his themes; if you do the same you’ll enhance your experience of the entire piece, pulling together history, sociology and geography to tell some of the human stories of the river that made London and the south-east, from its meandering source to its meeting with the North Sea.

“Tall Tales…” opens with an ethereal exploration of London’s lost rivers, “Hush River Blind”, the arrangement conveying the menacing, claustrophobic atmosphere of subterranean rivers in culverts under England’s capital, all ultimately feeding out into the Thames on its journey to the estuary in the same way the songs broaden out to cover the lore of the river and the people that exist in a state of mutual dependence with it. I won’t force-feed you my opinions of every song (just take my word that they’re all good) but I will pick out some of my favourites.

The second song “Lighterman” has more space in its arrangement led by Phil’s chiming acoustic with the accordion (Phil again) and fiddle creating a sea shanty feel emphasised by Colleen and Phil’s layered backing vocals. The slow pace reflects the speed of the job done by the lightermen (now largely vanished), who moved the cargo from ships moored in the Thames to the shore (usually unpowered) before the heyday of the docks and their subsequent decline as a result of container ships. It’s a song in praise of people who did a highly skilled job using mainly the tides until a ‘better’ method evolved.

“Plotland Pioneers” is Phil Burdett at his very best, combining personal memories with social history in a slow country rock  setting with a subtle combination of electric and acoustic guitars capturing a 1979 vibe perfectly, which is used as a narrative framework to timeshift back to the end of the nineteenth century, when land around Laindon that was uneconomical to farm was auctioned off in plots and bought mainly by people from the East End and developed as holiday or retirement homes. The infrastructure was non-existent (and don’t even ask about planning permission), but somehow the pioneers made it work until the area became part of the Basildon New Town project and was demolished from 1949 onwards. There’s even a reference to the companion album, “Folkmares”, slipped in there as well.

“Bow Bells, Shoebury Gun” is in the same mould, combining the progress of the river to the North Sea with a very personal spoken word memoir of childhood days in Basildon. It’s taken at a very leisurely pace as it drifts backward and forward in time and place, creating a haunting feel and a sense of displacement and exile. There might even be a slight nod in the direction of Leonard Cohen with the line: ‘Where are the cracks through which the sunlight shone now everything is gone?’ It’s a tour de force.

Almost everywhere you look on the lyric sheet (oh, the packaging’s superb as well, with stunning photography by Robert Shaw), there’s an interesting reference: Joseph Conrad, William Blake, the Great Dock Strike, the Crow Stone and London Stone (the Thames boundaries of the City of London) and so on. And could the line ‘The union’s gone and the chancer’s beer is tasteless’ be a reference to anyone other than Tim Martin? I do hope so. At a time when curmudgeonly old musicians are making songs in support of the anti-vaccine lobby and COVID deniers, maybe it’s time to listen to a songwriter that still has something interesting to say and an interesting way of saying it.

“Tall Tales from a Low County” is out now and you can show your support for a genuine British original by buying it here. Phil’s playing a gig to launch the album in St Mark the Evangelist Church, Southend on Saturday September 11th and I hope I’ll see you there.

And the rest of the news? Phil’s directorial film debut is ongoing (with cameo appearance from Wilko Johnson as a vicar) and the third album of Phil’s Cornish trilogy is now in pre-production with studio recording coming up fairly soon. He’s not hanging about.

Here’s a video clip for “Lighterman”:

Speak Your Mind

Tell us what you're thinking...
and oh, if you want a pic to show with your comment, go get a gravatar!