Toby Hay – New Music For The 12 String Guitar
The state51 Conspiracy – 1 November 2019
The red kite has become a kind of totem bird for the environmental movement in the UK, a flagship species for the process that has since become known as rewilding. Its reintroduction to mid-Wales and the Welsh borderlands has been particularly successful, and here it has carved out a place as a kind of living spirit of the area. More than an emblem, it is a visible source of pride, a reason to celebrate a landscape. Guitarist Toby Hay is based in the hills above Rhayader, deep in the Powys stronghold of the red kite, and he has chosen to name his new, custom-built twelve-string guitar after the region’s most famous bird of prey.
And indeed there has always been something of the red kite’s fluid poise and nimbleness of movement about Hay’s guitar playing. His previous two solo albums – 2017’s The Gathering and 2018’s The Longest Day – have combined elements of British acoustic folk music with American primitivism. Unusual tunings and surprising chords are underpinned by compositions that interpret and reflect upon distinct geographical landscapes and the feelings they inspire. The results are often exhilarating, and Hay’s playing has an expressive power that approaches poetry, despite all of his music being purely instrumental.
On New Music For The 12 String Guitar he follows a similar template, but his newly-made instrument, constructed especially to cater for his idiosyncratic and creative tunings, allows for greater sonic variety and more control over the finished tunes. The recording process was entirely organic – each track was recorded live, without overdubs, in the Wood Room of Peter Gabriel’s Real World studios (which has seen everyone from Laura Marling and Eliza Carthy to Van Morrison and Tom Jones pass through its hallowed doors) and captured by Toby’s brother Tim.
An almost raga-like intro ushers in the opening track, Morning Song. It is an elated piece of music, almost transcendental, and suffused with the light of a crisp dawn. It is immediately obvious that the new guitar is no mere gimmick – even to the ears of a non-musician, the tone is breathtaking. Hay’s playing has a crystalline clarity that shines through on even his most formally experimental pieces. Now In A Minute is a playful, lilting composition that disrupts time signatures in a way that is reflected in the idiomatic Welsh-English of its title, and much like the sing-song lilt of a Welsh accent it never feels anything less than tuneful. Merlod Mynydd is a more sober expression of Welshness: short and rhythmic, it celebrates the hardy stoicism of the Welsh mountain pony.
The Bird And The Waterfall is a shimmering miniature, a perfect vignette of a rural scene. It bubbles and sighs, and was inspired by Hay’s meeting with a dipper, the most purposeful and charming of small birds, in the grounds of the studio. The piece was improvised pretty much on the spot, and this provides a valuable insight into Hay’s lively, questing style and uniquely place-sensitive way of working.
He is also capable of creating brooding and atmospheric sound worlds. The Summer Sky Cried For Rain is a longer composition. A fever dream of scorched earth, its component parts join together to paint a picture of a strange land, one that you can’t help but surmise is the product of climate change or global conflict. Its hallucinatory exterior is underpinned by a formal toughness that could indicate hope or desperation. It is followed by the tinkling opening of Cynefin, on which Hay somehow makes his guitar sound like a music box. Cynefin is the Welsh word for habitat, and this open-ended track has a welcoming feel to it, as of a place that is both homely and unrestricted.
Sugarloaf Blues is a tribute to the mountain that overlooks the Green Man festival site in the Brecon Beacons, and was composed by Hay during the festival. It has a suitably laid back ambience – its brisk, loose first half is not unlike some of Jimmy Page’s acoustic compositions that made their way on to the third Led Zeppelin album (and it is perhaps no coincidence that they too were inspired by the Welsh mountains), while its second part is a slow exhalation, the musical equivalent of resting your weary bones by the fireside.
Once again Hay’s playful side is in evidence on Happy As A Sandboy, a tune full of repetitions and subtle musical digressions from a theme. The joy is momentarily tempered by The Last Mountain Hare, a sombre reflection on extinction and a warning about the destruction of our wildernesses. Stylistically, it is a lesson in restraint: here Hay’s expressionistic strokes are broad but muted. It is a perfect example of how to make an important point without shouting (without, of course, using any words at all).
The Falconer’s Knot is perhaps that closest Hay gets to traditional-sounding British folk, but his own distinctive imprint is nonetheless discernible, especially in the transitions between the song’s fast and slow sections. He is able to make this kind of composition seem like the most natural thing in the world. And on Dead Horse Point he reestablishes his predilection for American folk music. This is something he has nurtured by spending a good deal of time in the United States and composing music based on his experiences – indeed, much of his previous album was inspired by his travels in America’s great outdoors. His skill as a guitarist is such that the mixing of British and American influences never feels forced or stilted.
And on the final track, he allows for his most tangible display of human warmth yet. This is a soft and beautiful rendition of Auld Lang Syne – the album’s only traditional tune – and it emanates all the camaraderie, all the feelings of melancholic conclusions and the possibilities of bright new beginnings that the song was originally meant to encapsulate but which have been lost over time. I say it is full of human warmth, but it is also tinged with wildness, and this I think is the beauty of Toby Hay, and of New Music For The 12 String Guitar in particular: he is able to convey multiple different emotions and represent multiple objects or landscapes, often simultaneously, and all with nothing more than a single instrument. This is the sign of a master musician at work, and Hay certainly fits that description. It is only two years since his debut and he is already one of the finest guitarists of his generation.
Order New Music for The 12 String Guitar (CD & Vinyl): https://tobyhay.greedbag.com/buy/new-music-for-the-12-string-guit/
Upcoming Live Dates
9th November – Union Chapel – LONDON
10th November – The Lost Arc – RHAYADER
14th November – The Brunswick – HOVE
20th November – Spillers Records – CARDIFF
21st November – Friendly Records – BRISTOL
23rd November – Drift Records – TOTNES
TBC – BISHOPS CASTLE