Cavil

hails from Leeds and came to Radio Khartoum by way of the Vespertine Organisation. Fragile songs and a lovely voice.

Mares’ tails — known to cloud watchers as cirrus uncinus — are feathery strands of frozen cirrus cloud. Beautiful from afar, they signal the approach of a warm front, forecasting change and turmoil. Cavil’s Mares’ Tails captures life lived under the presence of prevailing south westerlies in a Pennine town in a series of folk nocturnes, filled out with brushed drums, trembling bass, glockenspiel, and the occasional waves of echoing guitars. Delivered with a calm assurance, the major chords never far from minor, and the lyrics, while essentially contented, never far from a tinge of regret. These are lullabies of everyday betrayal and longing. Phantoms of freedom abound: the wind, a plastic bag waving from the branches of a tree, flocks of migratory geese, and the art of plane spotting. Recommended if your tastes run to Tindersticks, the Montgolfier Brothers, or the sound of a distant train whistle in the night.

“Swims somewhere in the same sea with Ben Watt’s North Marine Drive or Beaumont’s No Time Like the Past. A melancholy, almost spiritual album. A very personal joy. Something you might be tempted to keep all to yourself…”
—Corey W. Schmidt, Central Services

“‘Northern Englishness’ — that’s the quality I’ve been turning over in my head over the last few weeks. It’s something that Hood, John Shuttleworth, Jake Thackray and Pulp have — and this album has it in spades. The trouble is it’s difficult to define, it’s unmistakable yet unfathomable. Whatever it is, there’s an old-fashioned honesty in these songs and their delivery: love, nature and truth conveyed by an acoustic guitar, a piano and a voice.”
—Richard O’Brien, Vespertine & Son

LP includes download card.

CD and vinyl mastered by Jiri Adamik-Novak.
Loudness War Edition mastered by Jon Chaikin.

Further details? See the press release.

In an ever more jumbled world, sometimes it's what you can't see that's most important. The fourth volume of Radio Khartoum's 18fps series is a meditation on location and visibility: the hidden and the lost, things no longer here, and things that are elsewhere. A soundtrack is projected on the inner ear, momentarily cutting through the urban barrage of light, image and noise, to find a fleeting equilibrium between leaving one place and going to another, or to experience a departed lover's presence in the fragrance of a shirt.

The music begins with a small and sweet melody for things lost by The Pierres (featuring Christoffer Schou of Nice System/Remington Super 60), then makes a dramatic cut to Leeds based singer Cavil and a fragile song that hovers between music box and the rhythm of the rails. Dakota Suite contribute a chamber instrumental whose rich, woody cellos remind us of Simon Fisher Turner's Caravaggio soundtrack or Rachels' Music for Egon Schiele. Julien Ribot spins the album's second music box fantasy, but this one blows up, expanding to epic proportions, as Julien, his strings and guitars are swept away by a current of distant trumpets. Watoo Watoo collaborator Didier Duclos, aka Christine (third time out for 18fps) provides an interlude in the form of a wash of ringing guitars with a suggestion of Maurice Deebank, before French band Spring wind things down with a haunting, stripped down version of one of their classics. All tracks exclusive.
Further details? See the press release.

Appendix Out (Alasdair Roberts), Butterfly Child, Cavil, Fuxa, Gnac, Lazerboy, Mongers, Nautilus, Oneironaut (Ian Masters), Quigley and Transfiguration all avoid opening their mouths in a concept album charting an evening in a large, dank, ruin of a house with track-suited trick-or-treaters with byronic curls and an ever-expanding drinks cabinet.

“21 song compilation with Quigley, Gnac, Lazerboy, and many others playing top notch studio mood pieces that are challenging, not just soundscapes; these are fully developed songs by bands who seem to operate in a different arena than the verse chorus bridge one that is so familiar to us all. I really could have gone on and on about this CD because it is so good, but the very experience of this CD is not to do that; the experience schools you to just accept it as what it is and enjoy it in your own way. I hope you do just that and get to spend some time with this disc at the station or in your home.” —Carl Thien, Gullbuy

“One we’ll still play when all our friends have died” —DDDD

“An innovative record if nothing else” —City Life