Young Folk

Yay!!! i won Rob Da Bank's awesome compilation Folk Off! the other day from our student magazine, Impact, (check it out, my wonderful friend James runs the website). Its a real varied mix of a collection, some good, some bad, some traditional, some experimental but all the tracks have a very earthy sound to them.

There's been a bit of a folk revival recently, many bands seem to be going back to traditional(-ish) roots to gain inspire for their work. For me, the main crux of it coming from the anti-folk scene. I know that sounds strange but i think anti-folk still holds some folk principles true. Artists like Jeffrey Lewis, Diane Cluck, Kimya Dawson and Emmy The Great are still playing acoustic guitars and singing about the world and times we live in, which i think is the essence of folk music, or nu-folk as they called it. These guys just see the world differently, in a more illuminated or transparent way, to most people, but don't want to be restrained by the limitations of folk music, they want to experiment with it. There's also amazing, more traditional kinda stuff going on, with the likes of Rachael Dadd, This Is The Kit and Eighteenth Day Of May over here and Micah P Hinson and Mi & L'Au over in the States. The recent folk festival at London's Spitz venue shows how much of a resurgence folk has had, with popular acts such as Tunng, Fionn Regan and The Broken Family Band playing there.

The Folk Off! compilation has some great tracks on it from some really special artists, so i thought, see as i got it for free, that i might as well share some of it with you for nothing, so here's a few tracks off it from both sides of the atlantic.

Homegrown talent:
This Is The Kit - Two Wooden Spoons
James Yorkston & Reporter - Woozy With Cider
And from across the pond:
Micah P Hinson - Yard Of Blonde Girls
Jack Lewis - The Day Neil Young Died

I saw the video for the Micah P Hinson song a while ago, here it is. Its very odd but really cool. Also if you want to vote for the Friday Face-Off, do it soon as i think voting will probably stop tomorrow some time. Check a few post back for all the details.