Country Music Songwriters & Art

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Friday, 25 July 2008 at 06:36

http://netlog.com/anglodudeCarlos Fernandez NaysFernandez NaysCarlosanglodudehttp://en.netlogstatic.com/p/tt/018/503/18503680.jpgVenezuelaDistrito Federal anglodude

Bon Iver’s debut album, For Emma, Forever Ago, has received blanket critical acclaim for its almost twilight beauty and spectral, starry-eyed intensity. It’s not a one-off, either. Another rustic bunch of Americans, Fleet Foxes, recently crashed just outside the Top 10 of the UK album charts with an eponymous debut album brimming with back-porch country-folk, deep rural imagery and five-part harmonies.
At St Giles-in-the-Field, I’m ostensibly here to check out and then interview another group of widely tipped Americans, Port O’Brien, who are supporting Bon Iver on this warm summer’s evening. Unsurprisingly, these Californians won’t be offering diversions into Goa trance, death metal or UK grime, but yet more variations on music played on steam-age instruments.
Indeed, for the past decade there has been a steady influx of what has sometimes been called alt.country or Americana, with the likes of Uncle Tupelo, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy (aka Will Oldham), Lambchop and Calexico identified early on as pioneers of mixing American country music with a contemporary, brittle edge. Since then, barely a month – let alone a year – has gone by without more artists conjuring up baleful images of depression-era America while sporting, alarmingly, beards