Goblin Band, a six-piece queer folk group that evolved out of sessions run out of the Hobgoblin Music instrument shop in Central London, play music with purpose, passion and panache, bringing folk songs from the distant past to life. The band are Rowan Gatherer (vocals), Sonny Brazil (vocals, accordion), Gwenna Harman (vocals), Alice Beadle (violin), Paul Gardner (drums) and Piran Casely (mandola).
Come Slack Your Horse! is a fervent and vibrant offering that, across six tracks, sounds both tantalizingly new and centuries-old. The album opens with a brooding instrumental, Black Nag, a tune introduced to them by the band’s part-time tour driver, Mick Brazil (Sonny’s dad) and which they regularly played in the early jam sessions that led to their formation. Fuelled by the ingenious interplay between violin, hurdy-gurdy and drums, it builds to a stunning crescendo; it’s truly thrilling stuff.
Next up is The Prickle Holly Bush (its refrain gives the EP its title), which tells of a desperate soul about to be hung whose hopes of freedom come not from their own family (who come instead to see them hung) but their lover. The Goblin Band injects real drama into the mantra-like verses, and in the accompanying notes, the band reflect “on these timeless themes of estrangement, chosen family, and hope in the face of society’s structures of brutality, through the lens of queer experience in 21st Century England.”
The drama of the story of the titular ‘lad’ forced to steal food for his family because of poverty, is carried by the characterful and commanding vocals on The Brisk Lad. In the sleeve notes, the band reflect on how songs such as these, highlighting poverty and working-class struggle, continue to play out in post-Brexit Britain today.
The 11-minute opus, Birds In The Spring/May Morning Dew, forms the centrepiece of the EP. It’s stunningly arranged and well worth investing the time to listen intently and lose yourself in the story and birdsong soundscape. The band suggests it can be read as a lament for our fading, failing connection to the natural world, highlighting our alienation from nature and ongoing restricted access to land, behind which lies a long history of land enclosure and private ownership that still prevents access to much of Britain today. It’s simply jaw-dropping in its intensity and execution.
May Morning Dew expands upon these themes of displacement, narrating the experience of someone driven from their home, only to return and find it destroyed. As an Irish song, the band draw on the parallel between Ireland’s history of violent occupation and persecution and similar injustices perpetrated globally by colonial Western powers. This is particularly relevant at the time of the album’s release, with the ongoing genocide in Palestine.
Tumut Hoer, is the most upbeat performance on the EP and is “considered the folk anthem of Wiltshire where Rowan spent time growing up”. The song expresses the joy and satisfaction of working the land and has a rousing and unexpected chorus, providing a cheery interlude before the closing track. As well as being the theme for the Wiltshire Regiment of the British Army, the band also reveal how it “is also sung (horribly) from the balcony of the White Hart Hotel in Salisbury after each Parliamentary election by the winning MP, who has for over a hundred years been a Tory.” The song’s inclusion here sees the band reclaiming it, as they say, Rowan and Alice perform it here with intent of clawing it back for the gardeners, from the clutches of those who relentlessly seek to exploit the working classes.
Widecombe Fair is known as a sing-along song with a memory-challenging chorus that appears on mugs, t-shirts and tea towels in Souvenir shops in Widecombe on the Moor (where the song originated) in Dartmoor National Park, Devon. Despite being one of the most monetised folk songs, this belies the fact that it’s about the overloading of a horse that gives up (and becomes) a ghost in the final verses, accompanied by multiple (also deceased) riders. The Goblin Band lift it from the doldrums through a rousing arrangement, including an improvised-sounding violin interlude before the final two verses. It provides a fittingly surprising conclusion.
Come Slack Your Horse! is a true landmark release from Goblin Band. Not only do they refreshingly interpret and perform folk songs, but they also champion inclusivity, not just in words but also in deeds. While their music may be rooted in the past, Goblin Band represent a vibrant, exciting, and more accessible future for all who enjoy British folk music. Highly recommended.
Come Slack Your Horse! is out today and available on Bandcamp: https://goblinbanduk.bandcamp.com/album/come-slack-your-horse
Listen to Goblin Band in the latest KLOF Mag Folk Show here.
Catch them live:
May 1 – EP Launch / Broadside Hacks Folk, Moth Club
May 3 – @weird_walk / Landsdown Hall, Stroud
More details on Broadside Hacks Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/broadsidehacks
Follow Goblin Band on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/goblin.band/