Anais Mitchell’s Hadestown absolutely blew us away when it was released this year. It’s a folk opera based on the story of Eurydice and Orpheus feauring performances by Justin Vernon of Bon Iver as Orpheus, Greg Brown as Hades, Ani DiFranco as Persephone and the Haden Triplets. What’s more I feel pretty confident in...
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Beatnik is a monthly event at The Macbeth in Hoxton, featuring a free rooftop barbeque, puppet-making, hula-hooping, open mic, vintage DJ-ing and fine folk. It’s the brainchild of singer-songwriter Russell Swallow, writer of warm, Romantic songs like a draught of vintage. Having encountered such delights as Tommy Antonio and Perennial Company and Hope...
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Not one to be left out of all this Mercury spoofing, FFS is delighted to announce this year’s Schmercury Awards shortlist. We had such a hard time whittling all the fantastic albums released this year down to just 12 that we had to have a sit down with some tea and Belle & Sebastian...
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The record label and clubnight Communion is hosting a series of exciting (and free) gigs at the Kentish Town venue the Flowerpot this week. And as well as the evenings’ entertainments, the upstairs venue has become a temporary studio for the bands to lay down collaborations. The resulting studio sessions and live tracks will...
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Pete Roe is a decent man. He’s got dignity all over. You discover that the moment you listen to his music, influenced by the right and wrong doings of his close friends, the world, the simplicity of nature and the moral principles infused in him. You also discover that the...
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We came across Ben Phillips through his intriguing artwork on Peggy Sue’s releases. But his involvement with the London folk crowd doesn’t stop there. The Camberwell-based artist has been prolific over the past few years, providing artwork and posters for Daniel Johnston, Rachael Dadd and Alessi’s Ark. We got in touch with him over...
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We know Joni Mitchell Week was last week, but we’ve just had this submission from one Laura Marling, who’s been busy galavanting all over the States, and we just couldn’t leave it out. Laura’s said on many occasions that Joni’s a big influence, having been introduced to Joni’s records by her music-loving father....
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It had been a hard and gratifying spring. I was all lean muscle and mudstains after months of climbing trees at the Manchester airport protest camp and feeling good from all the fresh air, living in benders, hitching, cooking outdoors and dangling from blue polyprop.
I’d helped build treehouses, had ...
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US anti-folk legend Diane Cluck says: “I’ve never covered any Joni Mitchell songs, but I’ve enjoyed singing ‘Help Me’ since I was a kid in the 70s. The melody was swooping and fun to sing, and I imagined whoever was singing it was the gentle sort of man I could fall in love with....
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Below is our attempt at a comprehensive directory of folk artists currently on Twitter – of course, we aren’t Twitter deities and as such will almost certainly have missed out on certain artists. Let us know if you can think of any tweeting folk musicians in the comments below.
Akron/Family
Angus and Julia Stone
Asthmatic Kitty (Label)
Au...
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