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Croftwork
Croftwork (stylised on the album cover as CroftworK) is the fourth album by Scottish Celtic fusion group Peatbog Faeries, recorded in Roag on the Isle of Skye, and released in 2005 on the band's own Peatbog Records label. It was released as the label's second album following on from the band's previous album Welcome to Dun Vegas (2003). They recorded the album at Phat Controller Productions on the band's native Isle of Skye.
The album sees the band combine a wide variety of sounds, and also introduced a prominent brass section (The Wayward Boys) which critics said gave parts of the album a jazz feel. Music on the album includes experiments with electronica and dance music, jazz, including subgenres such as lounge-jazz, funk and Latin. The album was released in October 2005 and received positive reviews from fans and critics alike. One of the album's most popular tracks, "The Anthropologist", often opened the band's live shows in 2008.
After recording their electronica-influenced second album Faerie Stories in 1999, Peatbog Faeries encountered problems when the record label registered to release the album, Astor Place Recordings, closed due to bankruptcy. When the album was finally released in June 2001 on their previous label Greentrax Recordings, the band had decided it would be easier to set up their own label, Peatbog Records, for which they recorded their third album Welcome to Dun Vegas (2003). Welcome to Dun Vegas marked another stark, stylistic shift in the band's sound, featuring a wide range of influences, such as African music as well as experimental effects including backwards drumming and a track based around a kitchen cooker timer. It also marked the first time the band used vocals, and whilst only a small amount is featured, the last two tracks feature the vocal group The Veganites. In addition to touring the album throughout 2003 on the band's regular folk festival routine, the band also performed a low-key performance at Glastonbury Festival, prompting one NME journalist to note "I wanted to check out R.E.M. but sorry guys, it's your misfortune to be on at the same time as The Peatbog Faeries, the highlight of Glastonbury. Mere earth words can't do the Faeries justice...".
The enthusiastic reaction to the band only prompted enthusiasm for their subsequent album, Croftwork. The distance between recording Welcome to Dun Vegas and the new album became the shortest yet. Seeking a new musical direction, they enlisted several guest musicians for Croftwork, and recorded it in 2005 at Phat Controller Productions in Roag, Isle of Skye, with co-production between the band's longtime production duo of Calum MacLean and the band's percussionist Iain Copeland. The album was mastered by Denis Blackham of Skye Mastering. The band announced the album in 2005.
Croftwork was described by its press-hand out as "everything you've ever heard from the band in the past with a distinctly new sound for now" and by the band's website as "their most ambitious and dynamic offering to date." The "ambitious" and "dynamic" album is characterised by its "rich and varied instrumental maelstrom" and has been described as "slicker, funkier, harder hitting, and slightly less chaotic" than previous albums by the band. fRoots commented that the "unapologetic" album runs "from hi-tech drizzle reeling to plaintive electronic airs." Luxury Web Magazine said the album displays "a sound that is rock, Celtic and jazz" and commented that "energy is the key to this release, and you feel it throughout all the tracks and through all the instruments."
Unlike previous albums, Croftwork introduces a prominent small brass section to the band, that of The Wayward Boys, a duo from Kilmarie consisting of Rick Taylor and Nigel Hitchcock, who play trombone and saxophone. InSuffolk.com noticed the brass instruments seemed to introduce a jazz element to the band's sound. When asked if "that was intentional or something which happened organically", the band's bassist and sometime percussionist Innes Hutton said the band "have never considered the brass lines as jazz really", adding that "jazz is another beast entirely" and that they "were looking for added texture and dynamic from them and hopefully [the band] achieved that." Reviewer David Kidman also acknowledged the band "added the sound of brass to the mix with a mini-horn-section (trombone and sax) spicing up the already pretty full group sound, and to bristlingly good effect", highlighting title track as being a good example, "which is boldly heralded in by what might be a radio news call-sign and then pursues its quarry in the style of a contemporary Scottish-set crime-action-movie soundtrack complete with exotic touches of instrumentation and cinematically lush textures." The track has eerie, darkly hypnotic contributions from pipes & a fiddle, and has been compared to the work of Martyn Bennett.
The album's opening track, "Scots on the Rocks", was described by one reviewer as being "like a Battlefield Band lift, until the cavalry arrives in the shape of huge granite rhythms and honking brass riding a funk groove." The fourth track, "The Anthropologist", was described as "probably the funkiest slice of strutting the Faeries have ever committed to CD, with a brazen jazzy swagger that propels it along the streetwise beat like nobody's business" and as having a punchy funky Latin feel. Both "When the Seahound Left Me" and "All About Windmills" are akin to lounge jazz, with the former being described by one critic as "could have come fresh from a Nathan Hines album before surging into a plaintive fiddle led lament" whilst the latter was described as presenting "presents an engaging series of jig-time variations with solo breaks and lush ensemble sections."
"Trans Island Express", whose name is a nod to either Kraftwerk's seminal 1977 album Trans Europe Express, its title track or the former railway service of the same name, features elements of "world music static filtering through the transmission distortion, soon zooming right on down to earth and trundling along its track rather stylishly." If the name of the song reflects the Kraftwerk piece, then the album name Croftwork could reflect their name Kraftwerk. "Decisions, Decisions/Kevin O'Neill", which runs to almost ten minutes, is also considered "spacey" and "a gentle nocturne for acoustic guitar and weirdness ... coupled to a driving fiddle reel with more weirdness" whilst "The Great Ceilidh Swindle", "Veganites" and "The Drone Age" are dancier numbers. "The Drone Age" has been described as "updating the Third Ear Band with a similarly hypnotic modern-day trance beat, taking it further into filmic terrain with added vocal nuances" by one reviewer, whilst another described it as "just strange". "Veganites" shares its name with the vocal group The Veganites who sing appear on two tracks on the band's previous albums, and they are thanked in the "thanks to" mentions in the Croftwork liner notes.
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Croftwork
Croftwork (stylised on the album cover as CroftworK) is the fourth album by Scottish Celtic fusion group Peatbog Faeries, recorded in Roag on the Isle of Skye, and released in 2005 on the band's own Peatbog Records label. It was released as the label's second album following on from the band's previous album Welcome to Dun Vegas (2003). They recorded the album at Phat Controller Productions on the band's native Isle of Skye.
The album sees the band combine a wide variety of sounds, and also introduced a prominent brass section (The Wayward Boys) which critics said gave parts of the album a jazz feel. Music on the album includes experiments with electronica and dance music, jazz, including subgenres such as lounge-jazz, funk and Latin. The album was released in October 2005 and received positive reviews from fans and critics alike. One of the album's most popular tracks, "The Anthropologist", often opened the band's live shows in 2008.
After recording their electronica-influenced second album Faerie Stories in 1999, Peatbog Faeries encountered problems when the record label registered to release the album, Astor Place Recordings, closed due to bankruptcy. When the album was finally released in June 2001 on their previous label Greentrax Recordings, the band had decided it would be easier to set up their own label, Peatbog Records, for which they recorded their third album Welcome to Dun Vegas (2003). Welcome to Dun Vegas marked another stark, stylistic shift in the band's sound, featuring a wide range of influences, such as African music as well as experimental effects including backwards drumming and a track based around a kitchen cooker timer. It also marked the first time the band used vocals, and whilst only a small amount is featured, the last two tracks feature the vocal group The Veganites. In addition to touring the album throughout 2003 on the band's regular folk festival routine, the band also performed a low-key performance at Glastonbury Festival, prompting one NME journalist to note "I wanted to check out R.E.M. but sorry guys, it's your misfortune to be on at the same time as The Peatbog Faeries, the highlight of Glastonbury. Mere earth words can't do the Faeries justice...".
The enthusiastic reaction to the band only prompted enthusiasm for their subsequent album, Croftwork. The distance between recording Welcome to Dun Vegas and the new album became the shortest yet. Seeking a new musical direction, they enlisted several guest musicians for Croftwork, and recorded it in 2005 at Phat Controller Productions in Roag, Isle of Skye, with co-production between the band's longtime production duo of Calum MacLean and the band's percussionist Iain Copeland. The album was mastered by Denis Blackham of Skye Mastering. The band announced the album in 2005.
Croftwork was described by its press-hand out as "everything you've ever heard from the band in the past with a distinctly new sound for now" and by the band's website as "their most ambitious and dynamic offering to date." The "ambitious" and "dynamic" album is characterised by its "rich and varied instrumental maelstrom" and has been described as "slicker, funkier, harder hitting, and slightly less chaotic" than previous albums by the band. fRoots commented that the "unapologetic" album runs "from hi-tech drizzle reeling to plaintive electronic airs." Luxury Web Magazine said the album displays "a sound that is rock, Celtic and jazz" and commented that "energy is the key to this release, and you feel it throughout all the tracks and through all the instruments."
Unlike previous albums, Croftwork introduces a prominent small brass section to the band, that of The Wayward Boys, a duo from Kilmarie consisting of Rick Taylor and Nigel Hitchcock, who play trombone and saxophone. InSuffolk.com noticed the brass instruments seemed to introduce a jazz element to the band's sound. When asked if "that was intentional or something which happened organically", the band's bassist and sometime percussionist Innes Hutton said the band "have never considered the brass lines as jazz really", adding that "jazz is another beast entirely" and that they "were looking for added texture and dynamic from them and hopefully [the band] achieved that." Reviewer David Kidman also acknowledged the band "added the sound of brass to the mix with a mini-horn-section (trombone and sax) spicing up the already pretty full group sound, and to bristlingly good effect", highlighting title track as being a good example, "which is boldly heralded in by what might be a radio news call-sign and then pursues its quarry in the style of a contemporary Scottish-set crime-action-movie soundtrack complete with exotic touches of instrumentation and cinematically lush textures." The track has eerie, darkly hypnotic contributions from pipes & a fiddle, and has been compared to the work of Martyn Bennett.
The album's opening track, "Scots on the Rocks", was described by one reviewer as being "like a Battlefield Band lift, until the cavalry arrives in the shape of huge granite rhythms and honking brass riding a funk groove." The fourth track, "The Anthropologist", was described as "probably the funkiest slice of strutting the Faeries have ever committed to CD, with a brazen jazzy swagger that propels it along the streetwise beat like nobody's business" and as having a punchy funky Latin feel. Both "When the Seahound Left Me" and "All About Windmills" are akin to lounge jazz, with the former being described by one critic as "could have come fresh from a Nathan Hines album before surging into a plaintive fiddle led lament" whilst the latter was described as presenting "presents an engaging series of jig-time variations with solo breaks and lush ensemble sections."
"Trans Island Express", whose name is a nod to either Kraftwerk's seminal 1977 album Trans Europe Express, its title track or the former railway service of the same name, features elements of "world music static filtering through the transmission distortion, soon zooming right on down to earth and trundling along its track rather stylishly." If the name of the song reflects the Kraftwerk piece, then the album name Croftwork could reflect their name Kraftwerk. "Decisions, Decisions/Kevin O'Neill", which runs to almost ten minutes, is also considered "spacey" and "a gentle nocturne for acoustic guitar and weirdness ... coupled to a driving fiddle reel with more weirdness" whilst "The Great Ceilidh Swindle", "Veganites" and "The Drone Age" are dancier numbers. "The Drone Age" has been described as "updating the Third Ear Band with a similarly hypnotic modern-day trance beat, taking it further into filmic terrain with added vocal nuances" by one reviewer, whilst another described it as "just strange". "Veganites" shares its name with the vocal group The Veganites who sing appear on two tracks on the band's previous albums, and they are thanked in the "thanks to" mentions in the Croftwork liner notes.