Premiere: Upcycled Records & The Folkatron Sessions - My Son John

It seems a long time ago now that we praised the genre-bending offerings of the Folkatron Sessions and their EP “Mais c’est quoi maman?” which we clearly couldn’t get enough of as we featured tracks from the EP over the course of four shows! The good news is that they are back with a new album this month titled Skiver which is out on October 2nd 2020.

A bit of background is necessary: Folkatron Sessions is a band formed from the pilot Upcycled Sounds Folkatron residency where folk, jazz and electronic musicians produce and release an experimental folk record over a week. Since this 2017 pilot, the Folkatron residencies have since continued with different musicians, but this first group decided to keep playing together under the name Folkatron Sessions. They met again in 2019 to work on a second release together, Skiver, using the same residency format. An intense week was spent choosing trad tunes and songs, arranging, performing and recording them. The recording and production of each track was led by two musicians from the group. With 4 makeshift recording studios to work from, they created a total of 8 tracks and a live session.

The tunes and songs in Skiver were chosen from collaborations, travels and compositions of each musician. The album explores traditional music from Sweden to Estonia to Ireland, as well as contemporary numbers, some written by band members. As well as music, the group also exchanged techniques, with some learning production and recordings skills for the first time and others pushing their skills to experimental levels, such as using DIY hydrophone mics or recording drums through 50 metres of rubber tubing.

The result is an album with its own unique sound world, refracting trad folk through electronic, jazz, ambient, sound art and prog rock lenses.

Here they are with album track and first single My Son John sounding as great as ever.

‘My Son John’ is an Irish folk song first published in 1876, about the thousands of young Irishmen who became cannon fodder in the Napoleonic Wars. There are many versions of this song, including as a marching song for Irish Volunteers in World War I and a protest song against injured soldiers being cheated out of their benefits. The arrangement interprets this traditional song with a close pairing of string, electric guitar and synth textures.