On her debut album Deep Blue, I like many others raved about the hallucinatory, mystical experience of listening to Louise Patricia Crane’s music. Comparisons to Kate Bush, Tori Amos, St.Vincent, Peter Gabriel, Jethro Tull and King Crimson were brought together through a love of Hammer Horror, avant garde films and literature, it was a veritable feast for the ears, and especially the ears of someone like me who is stuck in the 1970’s. A gothic chanteuse, singing breathy, fantastical songs full of prog/folk/blues influences and cavalcade of musicians from a few of my favourite bands.
So when a follow up was touted I have followed the progress every step of the way and now I’ve had a chance to listen to Netherworld I can say it’s not only better than Deep Blue but a more emotional and diverse album. Crane again plays the majority of the instruments, wrote/co-wrote the songs, arrange and produced the record alongside Jakko Jakszyk, singer/guitarist of King Crimson. As Crane plays guitars, keyboard, piano, harpsichord, mellotron, bass guitar, EBow, percussion and provides “found sounds” or field recordings, such as the final track Japanese Doll which is a windup toy that plays Where Do I Begin from the 1970 film Love Story.
This last moment is part of the cathartic nature of Netherworld, it’s a record that tells a story, one very personal to Louise. She takes on the role of storyteller, beginning with an Irish folk song before the descent into the Netherworld and back out the other side as someone who now understands herself. It reflects her own journey with this album, infused with a sense of melancholy like many Irish/Celtic people.
During the conceiving/writing/recording of the album her thoughts of childhood uncovered buried trauma that stemmed from her own childhood during The Troubles in Northern Ireland, faced with paramilitary forces and violence at a young age, she was interrogated at gunpoint and repressed this for years, it manifesting in different ways over the years but starting a course of therapy while recording made the album all the more personal, a journey through her own psyche to unlock and overcome this trauma, through music.
It means Netherworld is perhaps not as fantastical as its predecessor, it has darker moments, but ultimately it’s about catharsis and the journey from childhood to adulthood. With Crane playing so much you may think that there was no time for anyone else but like with Deep Blue there is a host of special guests who supply magic to this musical journey.
Jakko Jakszyk adds solo guitars, keys and backing vocals while the rhythm section is the dynamic duo of bass extraordinaire Tony Levin (King Crimson/Peter Gabriel) and jazz fusion drummer Gary Husband (John McLaughlin/Allan Holdsworth), though Nick Beggs (Steven Wilson) plays bass on folksy opener Dance With The Devil and upright bass on Long Kiss Goodnight. Meanwhile flute again is from Ian Anderson (Jethro Tull), sax from Mel Collins (King Crimson) and Shir-Ran Yinon (Eluveitie) plays violin and viola.
So we’ll talk about the music on the album itself, Dancing With The Devil begins this transformative period, lilting Irish folk of strings and flutes, put together with militaristic, hypnotic drumming/percussion, Crane’s vocals smoky and mystical, the Kate Bush influence very strong with this opener, before the music is stripped back to 60’s acoustic psychedelia on Tiny Bard, though I say stripped back, everything on Netherworld is multifaceted and layered to create bewitching soundscapes. With Celestial Dust, we take more of a turn towards the UK prog scene inhabited by the likes of Mostly Autumn, Karnatarka etc, tender vocals, swelling synths, pipes/flutes and dreamy atmospheres.
These continue through Little Ghost In The Room, yet more Kate Bushisms as Jakko peels off a very Gilmour-like solo to end (but solo album Gilmour not Floyd Gilmour). We are just getting started though as Netherworld is 13 tracks, but never feels like that, sequenced as a musical journey, a ship through troubled waters, where the naivety of childhood is broken by real world dangers, Toil And Trouble building towards these revelations spiralling down the rabbit hole on The Red Room, the twisted The Beatles Pepper-isms a tad unnerving as darkness and light battle (as H.G Wells tells us in the novella of the same name).
As Bête Noire evokes some smoky, dark jazz club images, we’re hitting the crux and moving towards the end of the record to, it’s all a bit angular and haunting, maybe a bit threatening too and things build and release then build again, the outro taking us into the doomy country/jazz of Long Kiss Goodnight as more acoustic torchlight troubadouring is felt through Thieves Fools And Crows as Midnight View closes the album with the cathartic, emotive song writing of classic prog rock. With the doll ringing out Netherworld closes its gates beckoning you to travel again.
Louise Patricia Crane has crafted a stunning album that shifts away from the route set with her debut, into something more personal but more poetic too. For fans of arty music with virtuoso performances Netherworld is a realm in which you will love to dwell. 10/10
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