From: Pete Fyfe
[petefyfe_at_aol_dot_com]
Sent: 19 April 2012 15:32
Subject: Pete Fyfe: Ewan McLennan
- Last Bird To Sing
Attachments: Ewan McLennan - The Last
Bird.jpg
EWAN McLENNAN - The Last Bird To Sing (Fellside Recordings
FECD250)
Indelibly etched in my mind are the many times I recollect seeing
Dick Gaughan perform at folk clubs throughout the UK. His passion and at times
seething contempt for an unjust society also carries over into that conveyed by
this decade's young pretender Ewan McLennan. Perhaps more restrained but still
with a bite that would be the envy of many a Rottweiler his composition
"Whistling The Esperanza" is a damning indictment of a company's greed at the
expense of those who have to ply their trade getting their hands dirty digging
for gold. Much like Durham's pitman poet Tommy Armstrong his way with words
will I'm sure reverberate for years to come earning him a place in the ?folk'
balladeers hall of fame. On another track memories of the "Your Country Needs
You?" proclaimed by Lord Kitchener from the famous poster are given short
shrift in another of McLennan's songs "Joe Glenton" which might prick your
conscience in a Tom Paxton kind of way. He's also no slouch on the guitar with
a precisely finger-picked "Reeling & Staggering/Napoleon Crossing The Alps"
(hands up anyone old enough to remember the Morris On version of ?The Cuckoo's
Nest'?oh, maybe it's just me then?). With contributions from John McCusker,
Martin Simpson, Karine Polwart and Laurence Blackadder this second recording
doesn't appear to have been difficult at all and, along with the evocative
artwork by Meg Buik I'd say it's well worth purchasing to show off your musical
taste at a more civilised version of Come Dine With Me. www.ewanmclennan.co.uk
PETE FYFE