Mishra – The Loft Tapes
Hudson Records – 7th December 2019
With the official charts at this time of year filling up with compilations and greatest hit collections is it any wonder that established acts rarely release brand new material in mid-December. Getting airplay for new songs is a nightmare before Christmas (well, so says Tim Burton), and the critics’ nominations for ‘Best of 2019’ awards have already been decided and submitted. Which is a tragedy for artists like Mishra, with a wonderfully adventurous and innovative debut that would almost certainly have merited a mention in dispatches, if not an actual award, had it seen the light of day a little earlier in the year.
Recorded onto analogue tape in a recording studio in rural Gloucestershire, The Loft Tapes is the first release to emerge from this Sheffield-based folk collective. Formed initially by west country singer and virtuoso banjo player Kate Griffin and multi-instrumentalist Ford Collier, the pair were joined by Joss Mann-Hazell on double bass and tabla player John Ball, a musician in residence at Sheffield University, where both Griffin and Collier studied. The recording sessions were part crowd-funded but substantively enabled by prize money received as winners of the Christian Raphael Prize at last year’s Cambridge Folk Festival. Whilst each of the eleven tracks sets out to represent a snapshot of a different time and place, the warmth and ‘live-in-the-room’ feel of the whole album exudes a collaborative semblance that is undeniably spellbinding.
The Loft Tapes contains a fascinating fusion of influences and styles beginning with an improvisation on a classical Indian Raag Jog and concluding with Morphology, an escalating instrumental that brings together clawhammer banjo playing with both tabla and whistle. The origin of the band’s name remains unclear, but is it more than mere coincidence that Morphology of Fungi is a standard textbook on edible mushrooms, written by a Dr Shubhrata R Mishra?
The majority of the eleven tracks are self-penned, each one bristling with textures and rhythms from around the world, and assuming the sound of some kind of wonderful musical gazetteer. Room, though, is still found for Angeline The Baker, a traditional Appalachian folk song dating back to 1850, and also for a cover of Gillian Welch’s Scarlet Town, a dark tale of immoral deeds in the Deep South. Each song is delivered with Griffin’s banjo and vocals to the fore, whilst additional instruments abound in the shape of guitar, bass, Irish whistle, Indian tabla and African calabash that underpin the obvious elements of Americana with Mishra’s uniquely rich infusion of Indian classical, bluegrass, folk and even jazz influences. It is a powerful and heady cocktail, yet at times almost mystical as well, bringing together the flavours and ingredients of four different continents, and producing a sumptuous feast for the ears.
Even though it is so late in the year, The Loft Tapes has undeniably forced its way into my top ten albums of 2019.
The Loft Tapes is out on 6 December. Order via Amazon
For upcoming tour dates visit: https://www.mishramusic.co.uk/
You can also hear Mishra on our Folk Show, Episode 66 which reached No 1 on Mixclouds global acoustic chart.