Joe Doveton (vocals, drums, shakers, djembe, harmonica, harmonium, Shake n Vac, guitar, beard, notebook, double bed)
Richard John Scott (guitars, vocals, bass, piano, organ, synths, drums, samples, accordian, charango)
WITH
Jennifer Taylor (vocals, keyboards, percussion)
Simon Gunningham (drums, percussion)
Michael Eyers (bass guitar)
PAST AND PRESENT ASSOCIATE MEMBERS INCLUDE:
The Honourable Norman Walker (bass, vocals)
Mr. Stacey Harvey (Banjo, Guitars);
Emily Powell (Flute, Drums); Mickey Buccheri (Wurlitzer);
BJ Cole (Pedal Steel);
Nicholas Metcalf (chair);
Elaine Patience (Violin);
Marjorie Marjorie (Cello);
Les Hendrix (mandolin);
Drew Smith (trombone);
Pete Qualm (disc jockey);
Jason D (shouting in German; getting our shit together);
Susan Young Morrison (vocals);
Ashley Slater (trombone);
Lucy Nebel (tap dancing);
Bela Emerson (cello);
Annie Kerr (violin); Chris Anderson (saxophone); Des Crawley (trumpet); Richard Walmsley (executive producer) J.V.Gris & G.T.Witcheskat (belly drums)
Influences
Country, Folk, Psychedelia, Latin and Pop
Sounds Like
Pink Floyd, R.E.M, Tom Waits, Crowded House, Calexico, The Triffids, Lionel Bart, Lee Hazelwood, Howe Gelb, Lambchop, Elvis Costello, Steely Dan, Robert Wyatt, Talk Talk, The Blue Nile, Green On Red, Eels, Gomez, Big Star, The Band of Holy Joy, Elliot Smith, Flaming Lips, Mercury Rev.
Caramel Jack, the Alt.Country tinged pop group from Brighton, England, finally return to the world of recorded music with their first album in three years, "1900". Following from the critically lauded "Songs From Low Story" album, "1900" sees the duo (Richard Scott and Joe Doveton) moving away from Americana towards a more English sound, in this dramatic and evocative suite of 15 songs.
Much of the Alt.Country instrumentation remains: BJ Cole is back, lending his graceful pedal steel playing to three tracks; the traditional feel is enhanced by delicate acoustic guitars, soulful Hammond and swooping strings. But Caramel Jack seem to be asking questions of the Americana genre: is this music still country, if the songs are entirely urban in subject matter? And what if that city is London? If "Low Story" was a geography fixated record, with characters locked into their rural landscapes just as they are in the songs of, say, Jimmy Webb, "1900" is a history record. Joe Doveton's… more »
Caramel Jack, the Alt.Country tinged pop group from Brighton, England, finally return to the world of recorded music with their first album in three years, "1900". Following from the critically lauded "Songs From Low Story" album, "1900" sees the duo (Richard Scott and Joe Doveton) moving away from Americana towards a more English sound, in this dramatic and evocative suite of 15 songs.
Much of the Alt.Country instrumentation remains: BJ Cole is back, lending his graceful pedal steel playing to three tracks; the traditional feel is enhanced by delicate acoustic guitars, soulful Hammond and swooping strings. But Caramel Jack seem to be asking questions of the Americana genre: is this music still country, if the songs are entirely urban in subject matter? And what if that city is London? If "Low Story" was a geography fixated record, with characters locked into their rural landscapes just as they are in the songs of, say, Jimmy Webb, "1900" is a history record. Joe Doveton's lyrics deftly revolve the same themes and imagery in every song: love, war, desire, collective memory, all set against a backdrop of the familiar landmarks of the Capital.
Pivotal song "Buttercups" sums Caramel Jack's multi-layered approach perfectly. Over a skeletal strum, Doveton conjures up an hallucination of long dead Londoners in a busy summer park: "Here are the Lindstrom sisters, moving to a new flat in Dulwich, surrounded on three sides by cemeteries and close to the shops, the dead of London sleep...". The awkwardness of lovers, the fear of commitment, the buildings we see and share, the legacy of empire: all jostle for position with the image of a graveyard of war-fallen, who "want back their cheated years".
"Bed" and "Traitor George" follow this pattern too. The vaudevillian "Bed" treads the boards of old-music hall, and is a straightforward Edwardian sing-a-long. However, the flickering hi-hat loop is a modern touch, and the warnings about "unexploded bombs" and "call up papers" could refer to 1938, and 1913, as well as 2008. Equally, "Traitor George", a country pop crooner that sounds like 50's English pop in the era of Cliff and Billy Fury, in fact tells the story of a Falklands War whistleblower.
Caramel Jack's sense of fun explodes all over "1900". "Look Out" broods brilliantly, a haphazard waltz, with groovy New Order bass, and rich with Herb Alpert brass and Hawaiian guitar. Banal, throw-away lines like "naked sunbathing, hey is that a raven?" rub shoulders with warnings about civil liberties "Everybody's scared of terrorists...I've just been made illegal...look out!"
With "We Could Build Skyscrapers" Caramel Jack introduce us to a whole new subgenre of music: Goth-a-nova! This is driving, chiming, eccentric pop at it's most schizophrenic. It starts like a Christina Aguillera record.....no hang on it's ABC covering Os Mutantes....no it's a Gene Pitney number....with PIL's guitar sound! It's a ...err.....hit?
The variety on "1900" is astounding: we also get straight-up-Art-Punk-Pop ("Hell's Driver"), a prog-oddity ("Johnny Jarvis") and an authentic sea-shanty ("Away Haul Away") complete with a rum soaked choir. And as it ends with the bedsit-soul of "Curtain", replete with raw trombone courtesy of Freak Power's Ashley Slater, you realise that Caramel Jack have delivered one of the definitive English albums of the century. ...
“Seven Brides...” being subtitled “Un disco romantico per tutti gli innamorati” (“a romantic record for all lovers”) alludes to what you might expect from the album.
Already dubbed the Gilded Palace of Sin’s top album of the year so far, Tom Sheriff has described them as not strictly country, but more along the lines of Flaming Lips and Mercury Rev, albeit with a traditional sound. Yet it’s the moments in the album where the band evoke more traditional proceedings that things work best.
While the opening “The Devil’s Musick” features crickets (“as themselves”) and nicely broody lyrics, accompanied with acoustic guitar and challenging chord changes; it’s not until half way through the album that things really pick up in style, with the horns of “Comin’ Up” and, without a doubt the highlight of the whole album, “Hear My Song.” With the first harmonica you hear ingratiating itself so easily with a song of real hooks, it’s a wonder that more isn’t made of it throughout.
All the same, it’s a record with a real evocative feel for a multitude of different styles and slants. This is one of the most memorable forrays into leftfield Americana this year, and grows with stature on every listen.
Who'da thought Blighty's most provocative new country stars would be holed up in Brighton? This six-piece have already been hailed in some quarters as the natural heirs to Lambchop, but there's much more besides.
"Her Friend The Rain" and "Living And Dead Singers" (BJ Cole on lap steel) weld '70s Cali-troubadour strum to Clifford T Wards bedsit folkiness, while "Elephants" dissolves into an acid-carousel waltz that's as unsettling as Johnny Dowd. The diversity is mind-spinning - country-folk to chamber-pop to burlesque with hip hop beast - and singer Joe Doveton a genuine find. ****
Independent On Sunday
Do not readjust your set. This is a country-rock suite of songs containing banjos, charangos, a scratching DJ and pedal steel legend BJ Cole - all played with heartfelt sincerity and a sweeping sense of grandeur by a pop group from Brighton who are clearly no strangers to Gene Clark's "No Other".
It is also sublime stuff : when Joe Doveton sings "Thank God for drinking...and her friend, the rain", you'll remember that it's time to trim those hairs on the back of your neck.
The whole thing makes you realise what was missing from the last Lambchop effort - like, durr, forgot to put the songs on, dude. Anyway, this is a one-off that will probably only be discovered when Caramel Jack have long gone. It deserves better. SR ****
The Independent
Subtitled "A Burlesque In Thirteen Acts" and introduced by spooky circus music, this album sees the Brightonian six-piece lay their hats in the Calexico and Sparklehorse corner of advanced Americana.
They do a fine job, too, particularly for a bunch of Brits, combining chilling atmosphere with warm melodies and reflective lyrics. ****
Drowned in Sound
"Songs From Low Stroy" is a soundtrack to a lost piece of burlesque theatre - at least that's the concept. I have no idea whether "Low Story" really existed, despite the frayed poster on the album sleeve - and I don't really care. Real or not, it's the inspiration for an extravangant faux Americana collection that dives in at the deep end without armbands, when the safety guard has snuck out for a cigarette.
This is an augmented band, the strong core quartet bolstered with extra players at full stretch. So the orchestration is charming; raw violin tangled up in honky trombone and tons more beside. The ubiquitous BJ Cole jumps onboard too, lending his always graceful pedal-steel to proceedings. But for once, everything around him equals his efforts.
There's a hugely complex lyrical narrative running through the whole shebang: "I rode the railroad, I rustled cattle, I threw my pocketwatch in the dust...."
Basically, Caramel Jack outgun everyone in alt-country by a Sussex mile. With few resources and no popular acclaim to lean on, they're a fat cow pie more satisfying than Handsome Family, Willard Grant's clan or the Calexico crowd. Occupying the same expansive, piano-led vaudeville universe as Howe Gelb, they bring a wide screen, sharp focus and simply brilliant songs. Chunky Joe Doveton's painstaking ancient Yankee louche is more believable than Gelb's real thing. Moments here out-Hazlewood Lee.
Sorry to use comparisons but the shock factor is half the battle - Caramel Jack aren't similar to Lambchop, they're better and they need to be shouted about from the rooftops. I like all those others but Songs From Low Story is the finest piece of alt-country - with hints of the circus - I've heard for five years.
Americana UK
Now, I'm born and raised Sussex, and I'll try not to let that affect my opinion of this record, anymore than the "Thank you" to our own Mr Whitfield in the credits. It's hard not to see this album as a triumph though, and our friends in Electric Soft Parade aside, Caramel Jack are very close to the top of the "Best Brighton" band table. I appreciate that this sounds like faint praise, but there's been some pretty serious competition in recent years, and this band can hold their collective heads up in the international Americana scene with no difficulty.
The key to their allure is the low-key nature of proceedings, the songs minimal but not self-conciously so, and the arrangements polished but spare, with scrapings of cello and violin deepening the sound. Pedal steel genius BJ Cole pops up here and there, and in some ways his presence symbolizes the dichotomy at the heart of the attraction. Caramel Jack sound authentic because they don't care too much about whether they are or not. Instead, they've clearly spent a lot of time getting the sound right for their songs and establishing the mood. So often the mere fact that a band of this genre sleeps under the same grey skies as the rest of us on this side of the Atlantic undermines their credibility, but these guys sound English and just right.
An excellent example of their studiedly lacksadaisical approach to the limitations is "The Californian" built around a beat, a guitar figure and Joe Doveton's warm vocals, it's a fantastically melancholic and claustraphobic number, and the mild hip-hop references actually enhance this texture and emotional impact, where in less-skilled hands they could irritate and sound forced. The horns are killer as well.
"Lover of a Country Boy" is somewhere between a swooning Abbey Road ballad and a slow down blues tune which wouldn't sound out of place being sung by Ella Fitzgerald or Declan McManus ( hell, just imagine the duet ).
If Caramel Jack are to continue putting out records of this quality, they genuinely stand a chance of selling shit loads of records, here and in the US. MP
Caramel Jack is a pop, folk and experimental group based in Brighton, England and built around the songwriting and production team of Richard Scott and Joe Doveton.
With a floating line up of anything up to 13 associate members, CJ has released five albums, the last of which, "Songs From Low Story" achieved huge critical acclaim in publications like Q Magazine, Uncut and The Independent.
The new Caramel Jack album "1900" is now available and can be ordered from all good record stores or from here.
The album was produced by Richard Scott and features cameos from BJ Cole (pedal steel), Ashley Slater (trombone), Des Crawley (trumpet), Bela Emerson (cello), to name but a few.
Also available are "Songs From Low Story" and "Seven Brides For Caramel Jack". See reviews section for more details.
Watch this space for tour dates, official album launch and other band news.
Hey hows it going. Hope is well. I was wondering if you would like to have a free download of the album? You can get it at http://www.megaupload.com/?f=3NNQTYF1 I would love to know what you think
!!!DONT FORGET!!! CURTIS ELLER'S AMERICAN CIRCUS will be rolling into town for one night only this SAT - 11th APR @ the DUKE OF YORKS PICTUREHOUSE, BRIGHTON.
Alongside the man himself this special *MIDNIGHT* show will feature a selection of sensational silent film with piano accompaniment!
Drift Record Collective present: LE RENO AMPS, COTTONMOUTH ROCKS, TANDY HARD Listen to songs online via the drift records myspace www.myspace.com/driftcollective This will be a very enjoyable night.
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Hello, thanks for the add1 I hope you are having a wonderful day! My management company Sam Watkins Country is now on MySpace: http://www. myspace. com/samwatkinscountry. Please add them They have uploaded 6 of my songs. Two you have already heard, the other four are new to MySpace. Listen to my songs and give me your feedback and comments; let them know what you think also. They are looking for new Artists and Bands to represent. If you know someone that needs a manager in the Austin area have them contact them. They have done a fantastic job for me. Have a great day! Thanks and God Bless! Sam
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Thanks for the add guys! like your tracks. If you fancy a 3minute slice of indie-pop fun, check out my vid for Brighton based Stars and Sons on my page.
Diolch yn fawr i ti (big thanx with respect) 4 add in respect for apple carts that once travelled the byways of the isle of Avallach, i except your offer of friendship.... ok, i dig your tunes, and your image also...... bought a piece of vinyl today...."the world east of eden featuring jig-a-jig" @1971...reckon u guys might like it Hope u keep in a fine mess Peace, Love, Unity and Faith Forever PS reckon this might be easier to move than a piano...hmmm
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