Cat Clyde – Everywhere I Go
Brilliant opening track from the new ‘Down Rounder’ album released on her own Second Prize Records label. It is a record that has to be one of the most immediately enjoyable, familiar yet fresh records in a folky / country vein that I have come across in recent times. As this live version shows, Cat has a street wise edge to her delivery, a laid back nonchalance with a cutting edge and I strongly recommend checking out ‘Down Rounder’ for the highlights are many…
Miss Grit – Follow The Cyborg
Performing a new arrangement of the title track of their debut album, here New York based musician Margaret Sohn is incorporating strings and a strong visual aesthetic. The album is entirely self produced and the favourable influence of an artist like St Vincent is hard to ignore, particularly in the presentation style, the arch fusion of the melodic and electronic not to mention the fuzzy disturbance caused by the excellent guitar solo played here. Miss Grit is taking an already modernist sound and shaping it to their own vision with panache…
Night Beats – Hot Ghee
This band, the grungy kaleidoscopic vision of singer and songwriter Danny Lee Blackwell, are clearly not letting go of any momentum. It was in 2021 that I rated their ‘Outlaw R&B’ LP as one of my albums of the year, you can read my piece on that record here: https://fruit-tree-records.com/2022/09/28/night-beats-outlaw-rb/ ‘Hot Ghee’ is a heady psych storm taken from Night Beats’ new album ‘Rajan’ set to be released on July 14 2023 on Fuzz Club and Suicide Squeeze Records…
Mirna Bogdanovic – Wish I Didn’t Miss You
This is the superb official video for ‘Wish I Didn’t Miss You’ by Mirna Bogdanović from album ‘Awake’ set to be released on Berthold Records on May 12th. The song is probably best known in its original recording by Angie Stone but this version adds a delightful layer of menace and anguish. That is especially captured in this video where Mirna is portrayed torturing herself relentlessly observing the object of her emptiness as they move on to new beginnings in life whilst she remains weighed down with hurt and obsession. Powerful stuff amid a tasty new arrangement…
Sam Shackleton – Pretty Saro
Folk ballads are made to be sung and passed through generations but it takes a special kind of talent to inhabit them and make them breathe in the authentic way that Scottish singer Sam Shackleton does. He says of this busked performance from earlier in the year, “this was filmed in the courtyard of the Old College of the University of Edinburgh which dates back to the 1700’s. This place is very familiar to me and I was here many times during my 5 years studying ethnomusicology and folklore at this lovely university – I even took exams here! But now I’m back here playing my own Scottish version of this beautiful English folk ballad which also dates to the 1700’s. This song disappeared in England and Scotland but was later re-discovered in the musical folk tradition of the Appalachian mountains – carried there by early English and Scottish immigrants”…
Meshall Ndegeocello – Vuma
I will conclude this edition of Fresh Juice with a giddy, groovy slice of Africana that feels so right to welcome in the sunnier days ahead (weather wise at least). This is from Meshell’s new album, ‘The Omnichord Real Book’, which is released on Blue Note Records. That is a tantalising combination for the German born, American singer and songwriter once credited with helping to start the neo-soul movement and the legendary label famed for its quality releases and for remaining the first port of call for anyone investigating Jazz music now or any time over the past sixty or seventy years…
Fruit Tree Records 