Pictured: Cover Artwork for ‘Pompeii’ (LP) (Available on 4th February, 2022) (via Mexican Summer)
Good Morning to you! You are reading the words of Jacob Braybrooke, and the time has come for yet another daily track on the blog to get brought to your attention, because its always been my day-to-day pleasure to write up about a different piece of music every day! Known for her subversive spin on vintage guitar rock music, the Carmarthenshire-born Welsh alternative folk singer songwriter Cate Le Bon is a woman of many talents and she can perform her music fluently in both English and classical Welsh. She has also toured across the globe with artists like St. Vincent, John Grant and Perfume Genius, and she has production credits on albums by Deerhunter, Josiah Steinbrick and Tim Presley. Jeff Tweedy – of the popular Alternative Rock band Wilco – has even named Cate Le Bon as one of his personal favourite musicians of the moment. She has released three EP’s and multiple singles, and Le Bon is now six solo albums into her dynamic career. In fact, we previously covered her track ‘Mother’s Mother’s Magazines’ on the blog for one of my daily posts back in the late half of 2019. It was a long time ago, so you would be forgiven for struggling to remember reading it. However, it is a good time to try and delve into her material again since her sixth full-length album, ‘Pompeii’, is on the way, and the playful songstress has set it up for a release date of February 4th, 2022 via Mexican Summer. The follow-up to her 2019 Mercury Prize-nominated record, ‘Reward’, Le Bon says that “Pompeii was written and recorded in a quagmire of unease. Solo. In a time warp. In a house I had a life in 15 years ago”, adding, “I grappled with existence, resignation and faith. I felt culpable for the mess but it smacked hard of the collective guilt imposed by religion and original sin”, as she explained in a press statement. The first single to be taken off the new LP, ‘Running Away’ is your first taste of the record. Le Bon played every instrument on the new record, and she was joined by her regular collaborator Samur Khoja for recording studio sessions in Cardiff for a pair of tracks. Let’s give ‘Running Away’ a listen below.
Speaking of her new single, ‘Running Away’, the Welsh folk crooner describes, “The world is on fire but the bins must go out on a Tuesday night. Political dissonance meets beauty regimes. I put a groove behind it for something to hold on to. The grief is in the Saxophones”, in her press notes. An enforced period of lockdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic has, according to the Penboyr-born vocalist, also resulted in a “more extreme version” of Le Bon’s studio process, making way for a collection of more “Playful, satirical and surrealist” songs than what may have come from Cate before. These themes become clear in ‘Running Away’, which is of no resemblance to the 70’s Sly & The Family Stone Psych Funk classic of the same title. Another wayward progression of her complex instrumentation style, the track immediately feels mid-tempo, yet buoyant, with some ghostly guitar strums mixing with a softly Funk-inflicted backdrop in a strange way. Observational lyrics like “It’s the sweetest thing/That you never had” and “You can’t put your arms around it/It’s not there anymore” are wise to keep their distance because, although Cate Le Bon refuses to give us many specifics within the lyrics, as you would probably expect given her experimental nature, it feels clear that all-encompassing emotions of longing and reminiscence are placed at the center of her core. The vocals in the chorus are obscure in tone, but tinged with a feeling of lethargy, with drowsy guitar melodies that slightly evoke a 00’s ‘Slacker Rock’ feel akin to Terry Presume or Mac DeMarco, and a bubbling amount of weariness in the lovesick croons of her voice. The usual trademarks of Cate Le Bon are here, but the production feels more refined with an air of Kate Bush about it. The regal blasts of Saxophone melodies and the ambient washings of the Synths are sparse enough to reveal little, but light elements of Prog-Rock and Ambient Jazz get scattered through the verses. Together, the different elements of the song feel relatively sparse and unidentifiable on paper but they are neatly buried and they place Cate Le Bon at the center of her work, as she uses surreal songwriting with great patience and sculptures enigmatic vocals on remaining unsure about whether she should seek some things that sound lost to her. In conclusion, ‘Running Away’ is a solid evolution of Le Bon’s style because it encourages her to pale back the layers of her common material. It feels slow, but never filler, ramping up her sound by shaping something so tidy and intricate, but suitably vague and mysterious.
Pictured: Cate Le Bon in a still from the ‘Wonderful’ music video (2016) (Photo via Colorising.com)
As I’ve mentioned, we previously covered Cate Le Bon’s track ‘Mother’s Mother’s Magazines’ on the blog a long while ago. If you’d like to remind yourself of that post, feel free to check it out here: https://onetrackatatime.home.blog/2019/09/30/todays-track-cate-le-bon-mothers-mothers-magazines/
Pictured: Cate Le Bon in promotional art work for ‘Reward’ (2019) (Photo by Huw Gwynfryn Evans)
I have completed my task for another day, and, on that note, I thank you for coming along on the ride. I’ll be back tomorrow for a new edition of ‘Way Back Wednesdays’ where we’re looking back at a well-known 1972 hit that was associated with a film of the same title. It comes from a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame-inducted Ska, Reggae, Rocksteady and Prog-Soul multi-instrumentalist who is the only living Jamaican musician to be awarded the Order Of Merit, the highest honour that can be granted by his government for services in Arts, as he helped to popularize Reggae music globally.
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