NULL

Published date03 December 2022
Publication titleMix, The
Time is a slippery thing and patience seems to have fallen out of fashion. So where does that leave Richard Dawson? Where he has always been, Newcastle upon Tyne, and inhabiting multiple periods of existence simultaneously. 2017’s album Peasant was set between 400AD-600AD as the Romans were leaving Northern England. It’s grim up North. 2019’s album 2020 is set in the modern era. Hygiene is better but it’s still a hard, bleak life for anyone except barons and warlords. Now the final album in his masterful trilogy, The Ruby Cord, is set far in the future, long after the Entertainment has taken most of humanity. Guess what: it still takes everything a person can summon just to see the rainbow through the black walls of cloud. Things, tactile things, may change. Technology will move forward but people, with their needs and desires, are the same. You can be a beggar in the ancient kingdom of Bryneich or a wage slave for Amazon; Dawson lets us know that there is hardly a difference. When we are all but gone our museum will be a collection of memories: “Gently spinning astronauts / A classroom deep in thought / Throngs of cheering football fans / A doctor crying alone / Riot police beating climate protesters / Babies being born.”

The sounds Dawson and his collaborators produce here is like being in the room with them. The first 10 minutes of the 41-minute long opening track The Hermit (yes, 41 minutes) is the sound of the band slowly moving into position, before eventually Dawson’s voice is heard. You can almost see the woodgrain on the body of the instruments, it’s so alive with musical details tumbling out of the speakers. One minute we are doing a full band Iron-Maiden-gallop on Tip of the Arrow; the next, Rhodri Davies’ harp is spinning delicate webs across the sound-stage. Always waiting is Dawson himself. If...

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT