On 6th August, Alt-folk songwriter and guitarist Chris Cleverley releases Live From The Glass Isle, an album that was recorded not that far from Folk Radio HQ on the Somerset Levels. The Glass Isle is one of the earliest names given to Glastonbury Tor before the area was drained. It’s an area steeped in history and Arthurian mythology and has great religious significance for neo-Pagans and modern Druids.
The project was recorded a stone’s throw from the foot of Glastonbury Tor, Somerset, on 1st August 2020, the pagan festival of Lughnasadh. At dawn that morning, Cleverley walked the spiral path of the Tor’s labyrinthine perimeter, ascending to the summit beneath a cleansing sunrise:
“This old pagan rite of passage, commencing the harvest season, is so symbolic of facing a period of doubt and inconstancy with hope and conviction. It carried immense meaning for me as we waded, knee-deep, through the mind-spinning uncertainty of the pandemic. It offered the perfect clarity & headspace to make these recordings.”
Today, we have a beautiful song and video (by Abbie Barton & Ollie Dixon at The Runaway Sessions) to share with you from Chris and some well-considered thoughts about the song and the symbolism that the place came to represent.
Chris Cleverly on The Scarlet Letter
“This version of The Scarlet Letter finally gives a glimpse of how the song sounded originally when it was first written. Listeners may recognise it from the ambient, full-band version that appeared on ‘We Sat Back and Watched it Unfold‘, but a big part of this new record was about stripping some of those songs back to their purest form and pointing a microscope at the guitar fingerstyles at their core. I was drawing on the energy of records like ‘The Guitar of John Renbourn’ and ‘The Black Swan’ by Bert Jansch, just one person and a guitar – wild and unbridled – letting the techniques and the melodies speak for themselves. The symbolism of recording at Glastonbury on the pagan festival of Lughnasadh fed into this record hugely. I took a spiral path up the Tor at dawn that morning, connecting deeply with the energy of that old rite of passage; the idea of facing a turbulent period with hope and conviction. For them, it was the harvest season. For me, it was the arid creative and emotional landscapes of the pandemic. It summed up the album. Making art with the limited resources I had at my disposal and sending it out into an uncertain world to flourish as best it could. It’s a timepiece. A diary entry of this unreal, dreamlike and utterly beguiling age we find ourselves in.”
Some musicians really do shine in an unvarnished setting. Recorded with just two microphones and a Fylde Falstaff acoustic guitar, Chris is definitely one of those. There’s a natural and honest intimacy to his music that suits this setting and appears to be one in which he feels entirely at home in, as he deconstructs and reassembles songs that fans have become familiar with. It’s an album we encourage you all to explore.
Chris was born under a solstice moon, in an aura of honeysuckle mysticism…so maybe there’s some old magic at play here as well…
Chris Cleverley Tour Dates
30.07 – B Bar, Plymouth (Devon)
31.07 – Parish Church, Kingskerswell (Devon) – with Dan Whitehouse
01.08 – Schtumm, Box (Wiltshire)
05.08 – The Dark Horse, Moseley (Birmingham) – ALBUM LAUNCH PARTY
08.08 – Green Note, Camden (London) – with Tobias Ben Jacob
Live from The Glass Isle is out on 6 August 2021. It will be available as a very limited run of special edition CDs as well as a digital download. Keep an eye on his website below and his Bandcamp page for updates. The cover (see below), which Elly Lucas designed, captures something of the magic of the area and moment as well as the simplicity within which this music is presented.
For more info and ticket links, visit https://www.chriscleverley.com/
Photo credit: Abbie Barton