m:— Dispatch
if.
Finding poetry and the devil in motorway service station is easier than you think reckons Roddy Woomble.
l The underground American poet David Lerner has this poem I read recently called 'Satan after hours'. with lines like ‘Satan is a bus station', ‘Satan is a cold fried egg'. ‘Satan is the bland smile of the cashier at the bank‘. it's a pretty good poem, and a nice idea — that Satan isn't a big red ghoulish monster, but a series of annoying. disappointing, mundane glimpses that we get everyday. Not the cheeriest worldview. but it made me think. I think my version of Satan might have to be motorway services. We spent a bit of time in them over the years. enough certainly to breath mild dread when the car/van/bus pulls into another. I suppose it's the frustration that you have to accept what you're given. It's not hard to make a nice cup of coffee or a nice sandwich. but it's impossible to get one at the side of the M6 or the M1. No one ever looks particularly happy; the lighting alone makes everyone look like they‘re about to be sick. Westmorland services on the way south is a standout. mainly because of the duck pond and the farm shop. but by and large Satan is motorway services. especially at night.
Hotels too. can have their fare share of Satan. There are not many things that can pull the soul down more than turning up late to check into a Travelodge only to get a receptionist full of attitude. grudgingly giving you the keys to a functional characterless room that smells of school gym halls. We stayed in a few nice hotels in my time. The best hotels are the ones when you don't feel like you're in a hotel. But the bad ones outweigh them tenfold. It's all about the people that run them ultimately. A smile costs nothing as my granny often says. It's a truism. In the future I think I‘ll stay at home more. Or maybe I'll open my own hotel, or maybe not. Actually. Satan is staying in a hotel in a motowvay services. There you go David Lerner. I Roddy Woomb/e's own brand of Travelodges may not be opening any time soon but his debut solo album is out in July.
80 THE LIST 1 1—25 May 2006
womb CEILIDH Knockengorroch Farm. near Kirkcubnght. Fri 19—Mon 21 May
Huun Huur Tu
BIG BIG COUNTRY
HOWE GELB WITH THE VOICES OF PRAISE GOSPEL CHOIR
The Arches, Glasgow, Thu 18 May
As leader of Arizona’s Giant Sand, Howe Gelb has been mixing up his droll musings on love, life and art with frazzled folk-rock, ramshackle country, dusty jazz and random noise for 20 odd years. A serial collaborator, he’s worked with a score of indie and Americana mavericks, but few would have expected his latest muse to be a gospel choir.
A beautiful accident waiting to happen, new album Sno Angel Like You was born when Gelb found himself sharing a bill with some gospel choirs at a festival in Ottawa, Canada.
‘They just blew me away, I couldn‘t leave,‘ Gelb recalls. ‘When it was all over I was literally dizzy from taking it all in.‘
Later that night Gelb approached the church director and asked him if he thought it was possible to make some music with a gospel choir and not do religious songs.
‘He was encouraging enough. He said, “Yeah, if you keep it positive’".
So, a few months later, Gelb returned to Ottawa, found a funky little studio and hooked up with Arcade Fire drummer Jeremy Gara. ‘It just started igniting,’ he enthuses, going on to recall the contributions from the Voices of Praise Gospel Choir.
‘I would give them very little direction. I’d request them to maybe sing one line here or there and they’d arrange themselves. That was a fascinating process to witness.‘
A rough hewn gospel-blues diamond, Sno Angel Like You is possibly Gelb's finest achievement since Giant Sand’s elegiac masterpiece Chore Of Enchantment in 2000. All the classic Gelb elements are in place: the parched vocals and wild, fuzzy guitar leads, while the choir add a glorious range of textures, from soulful whispers to heavenly swells.
Gelb promises that his shows with the choir will be ‘thunderous’. ‘When you go to hear gospel choirs normally, they sing continuously, throughout the whole song. So what I’m sayin’ is, when we play live, I can‘t imagine all those girls standing around waiting for the chorus. They’re gonna come up with extra parts. By the end of the tour it’s just going to be rhapsodous, it‘s gonna be insane.‘
Amen to that. (Stewart Smith)