Following his tour supporting Jeff Tweedy in back in January, James Elkington returns to the UK shores next month to begin his UK & European Tour.
Elkington released his debut album, Wintres Woma, via Paradise of Bachelors in the summer, the title is taken from the Old English for “the sound of winter,” a phrase that Elkington found appealing when he encountered it in a book about the historical English imagination.
For those wondering – it’s not folk…Elkington: “It’s not folk music. I may use the mechanics of folk music to put across my own ideas at times, but it really doesn’t fall into any specific community or songwriterly tradition. The album’s lyrics do seem to have a preoccupation with unseen powers at work and other dimensions, both of which seem to show up in traditional English music, but it’s based on my own experience and understanding, not anyone else’s.” These lyrics contend particularly with the continuing strangeness of living in a different country: “For the most part it’s very liberating, but England is old, and there is a weird energy that comes from that country, an energy that doesn’t seem to feel the same in America. It took me moving away from home to feel it at all. I was so used to it that I didn’t know I was feeling it until I didn’t feel it anymore.”
It’s a gorgeous album. At times the results conjure Kevin Ayers delivering a Dylan Thomas or Gerard Manley Hopkins poem over a Bert Jansch song, all the while speaking in Elkington’s singular voice, and shot with indelible melodies.
James Elkington UK & European Tour Dates
13/04/18: Sheffield (UK) – Regather
14/04/18: Guildford (UK) – The Keep
15/04/18: London (UK) – The Islington Cafebar
17/04/18: Gent (BE) – Bar Mirwaar
18/04/18: Brussels (BE) – AB Salon
20/04/18: Koeln (DE) – King Georg
21/04/18: Rotterdam (NL) – Motel Mozaique Festival
23/04/18: Berlin (DE) – Monarch Berlin
25/04/18: Lausanne (CH) – Le Bourg
26/04/18: Lyon (FR) – Sonic Lyon
Order Wintres Woma here: http://smarturl.it/PoB-034