Cherbourg at The Borderline

Cherbourg at The Borderline

06 February, 2009
by: Sween

'Folk' sounds so bluntly pleasant. But it can end up a nefarious, diluted affair. Recently, there've been waves of those toting shy-heartedness, wooden instruments and loosely clasped bundles of gutless phone-ad tunes about love, summer and love that somehow managed to weedle their way into folkistry. That said, 'folk' (lets plump for a literal translation - 'music made by people') was the start of everything, so I'd be a purse-lipped pillock to state that now folk having become so broad is anything but right. Though it means that when you dig out the word, it is a loose rag that has to be augmented – good folk, bad folk, pop folk. Ugh-Folk.

So I seek something more adequate to describe Cherbourg... but ultimately, they're a folk act.

But good. There's no hint of a teenager's summer spent in his bedroom writing songs about girls as set-padding crap. Much more obvious is the stir to a jig – but a 2009 jig it must be. There is lip service to thumping traditional rhythms, and, alongside, a good deal of rocking out. The violin (NB: not fiddle) augments rather than envelops, and 3-part vocal harmonies are used sparingly but with brassy confidence – it'd be rather tricky to lay them on thick and not get tagged as wannabe Fleet Foxes, and they pull it off nicely. Dare I say, the occasional Scottish + punk leanings remind me vaguely of Arab Strap. Every song presents something different. What really rescues them from an early bath in derision is that for the most part, the Rape of the Rural that we city-types remorselessly half-inch to shield us from exposure is absent. Other than a noticeably overplayed Caledonais accent, there's no such masquerade.

In fact there's a feeling that for Cherbourg, the medium has been adopted only out of a proximal arrangement – and that the songs themselves are part of a musical effort that would stand alone outside of any toffee-nosed mewlings about genre.


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Sween