WOMADelaide 2011 - Day 4 @Botanic Park, Adelaide(14/03/11)

Tue 15th Mar, 2011 in Gig Reviews

This was to be the final day of WOMAD, the last of two days for these reviewers. Sunday was a pleasure. WOMAD lends itself to manipulation in the hands of a festival-goer as the range of acts, multiple well-organized time-slotting and general ease of access means that you have the choice of a wide variety of types and genres of music form an array of wide-reaching cultural origins. On Sunday it tended towards a Western flavour, at least in the cultural backgrounds of the majority of the acts, if not always the music itself. This was our choice. There was enough going on in all corners of the park at all times to have commenced a musical journey on a completely contradictory path if desired. If more due to a resistance to inertia than anything else, I knew Monday would turn out differently and it did. While Sunday was a significantly powerful and engaging experience, Monday turned out less so as WOMAD was vastly less populated, perhaps as many 4-day goers were tired, ruined even by the cultural face plant that WOMAD can sometimes be, perhaps because the line-up was just a touch below the skyscraping heights of Sunday (not that traditional WOMAD attendees tend to base their decision to attend on the actual acts that are playing). That said there were highlights unexpected and joyousness had.

Arriving at the seemingly stock-standard (for WOMADers in their 20s) time of 1.30pm we got the obligatory beer and cider and sped straight for Bob Brozman on the beautiful sounding Zoo Stage. Positioned in expectation with his array of guitars – Steel, Hawaiian and Indian – this was obviously going to be a typically eclectic, almost wild adventure with the madcap genius that is Bob. Announcing almost immediately that ‘If you haven’t met me before, I’m not crazy’ he ran head first into one of his strangest stylistic forays, wowing the crowd, who were half expectant and half confused, with his deranged yet perfectly constructed highly percussive head mess of a guitar technique. Playing every inch of his steel guitar from the neck to the body to the bridge using his fingers, fingernails, arms, pick, some kind of bottleneck and any other body piece he had at his disposal. This all accompanied by the manic crashing of his feet in a constantly percussive, resonating symphony. Further embellished by some manic vocalese and facial experience that would scare the shit out of a bikie. All of this, and still he was still ultimately genial, and affable, ensuring he had the crowd in his hands. He touched on a ridiculously vast range of styles – Appalachian folk, Franco-Reunion dance party, Calypso, Deep South Blues, Pacific Island Hula and many more. It was never over-the-top or unattainable though. You didn’t have to be a guitar freak, you just had to be willing to hear anything. His appeal was helped by suggesting tothe predominantly progressive WOMAD crowd that Adelaide and Australia were far superior to an America ravaged by greed. He discussed this in depth at times, suggesting he wished he were Australian, bagging The Tea Party and also putting the whole sentiment into song. For the last half hour he was joined on stage by Chris Finnen, normally a slide guitarist but a percussionist for today, who offered just a little bit of background body. Not that it was needed, but it was well received anyway. For a man of such awesome talent and exhaustive knowledge Brozman was as humble and as lovable as you could possibly imagine. Great start to the day.

Having caught Adelaidian multi-instrumentalist Adam Page a few months earlier playing to celebrate beards, I was intent upon making my way past the disappointingly generic heavy blues rock of Ash Grunwald towards the Morton Bay stage for a revival of talent. Arriving at the end of a song celebrating (loudly) the festival itself (“Womad, oh Womad” seemed to be the main refrain), I was witness to some of the most prolonged crowd-teasing around. Discovering that sudden bursts of loud music makes people jump, Mr Page was letting out bursts of “Woma” and watching the effect ripple through the crowd. Tiring of this game, he went on to thank friend and co-writer of the next song James Brown. The wrong James Brown stood up to accept the praise, however, sparking another round of titters from the seated crowd and causing Adam Page an absolute fit of merriment. When a third James Brown was found in the same crowd, it was decided that this was cause for a short improvised song centred on the name. Being conscious of the time and my desire to get to the Creole Choir of Cuba, I was relieved when, some fifteen minutes after I had arrived, the musician began to do what he does best: put on a one-man show that sounds like a seven-piece band. Using recorded loops of several instruments, including a melodica, ukulele, keyboard, vocals and guitar, Page created a sweetly folk-like sound completely incongruent with the electronic assistance provided by the sound system on stage. The lightness of each instrument was layered with delicacy, such that the repetition was, if not unhearable, unimportant in the face of the overall experience. Plugging his latest recording in a typically humorously unabashed way, Page explained that all his live performances were improvised – except for that particular tune. Bringing Renee Donaghey, friend and front-woman of Adelaidian The Beggars on stage, I heard the beginnings of a danceable soft rock number as I picked my way through the crowd to head to the Creole Choir of Cuba.

A sun-drenched stage 3 was the next stop for me as I went searching for my first genuine boogie-opportunity with the*Creole Choir of Cuba*. It was delivered too. Sweaty and sunscreened up my jiving bones just got into gear in reaction to this troupe of 10 harmonising, soloing, harbingers of good times. Their harmonies were intricate and backed by only minimal percussion; the gender balanced crew danced in unison, swapping the spotlight over and over again. For a ‘choir’ they had a surprising array of voices, ranging from deep baritones to prancing tenor, some deliciously rough and hewn and others pure and crystal clear. Singing in Cuba’s second language, Creole, they brought the music of their Haitian past to the stage, showing that just because it’s from Cuba doesn’t mean it’s got be brassy or jazzy or made for the Samba. They sang of the sun, love, dancing, and all without speaking more than 5-6 words of English between them. Traditional yet vital they are a party that still showcases some beautiful heritage music.

Adelaide is probably not accustomed to Ukrainian folk, but from the conversations going on around four-piece DakhaBrakha, the style would find a cosy home here. This self-described (though it is supremely undescriptive, really) ‘ethno-chaos’ band livened up folk from its ‘soft and sweet’ lazy guitar connotations and dumped it cleanly in the realm of dark vocals and strong percussive undertones that surely draw influence from further afield than the middle of Europe. Conjuring images of urban jungle more than meadows, the vocals were a gritty overlay to an undertone of foreign stringed intricacy. Though we failed to get to the stage with enough time for more than the last twenty minutes of the set, DakhaBrakha’s intriguing and evocative style of strong instrumentation typical of folk, provided a refreshing interlude before the lauded Horace Andy took over our minds and feet.

Reggae legend and all around prolific solider of the Jamaican Isle, Horace Andy performed on Stage 2 with Londoners Dub Asante. They provided the perfect backing, at least instrumentally, if not in pure aural sound for the Jah-riddled, hope-roots-reggae and of this now lauded politico-music icon. It was a reggae party, with a colourful crowd accompanying every song with jive-rastaring of the drunken order. While technically the sound seemed a little compressed – the keyboard was too loud and didn’t have enough bass-drive and the guitar, which was by far the most musically exciting part of the show, was shunned in terms of volume – it was still quality Reggae that is required at any WOMAD. Horace was in full voice, occasionally (and unbeknownst why to me) he’d stop the band, perfectly to a beat 10 second into a song and start it again. This put fully on display their tightness but confused me to a degree. Horace has some lyrics at his disposal that are pure genius and he sings in a timbre and style unique enough to always remain interesting. This allowed him to rest on his laurels a bit and Dub Asante could have been more adventurous and explorative with their arrangements, but having said all of these no one stopped dancing. The momentum was held constant as break between songs were short, if present at all. Class reggae from an elder statesman.

Leaving the Horace Andy set rather danced-out, we decided it was time for something less invigorating. Amadou & Mariam was probably the wrong choice for that. Standing front and centre, this duo’s music was focused on movement, with the supporting singers dipping all over the place and encouraging the crowd to do the same. With the fourth day of Womad the main stage appeared to have lost its magnetism somewhat, the dedicated crowd clustered close and quickly becoming sparse. This probably didn’t bother the duo, who both lost their eyesight as youths and were wearing dark glasses to top off their brightly-coloured outfits. In spite of the African-driven drums and percussion, the riffs coming out were decidedly rock, and the crowd were getting into the groove. Filling the stage well for two not particularly large people, Amadou & Mariam demonstrated the type of presence that comes only with a long history of performance.

The All Star Gala was up next. This traditional gathering of WOMAD acts in the one place has morphed from originally being a poorly prepared yet often exhilarating jam to a showcase for select acts, rarely with more than two or three acts having it out on stage. This has its pros and cons. Performances are now tighter, better thought out, sometimes more interesting in an intellectual way and often surprising in the results of genre combinations that are born. It also has drained it of its spontaneity and verve, making it more of a cerebral exercise than a party that could explode at any time. Despite this, it attracted the biggest audience of any act on Day 4, which contrasts to previous years. Coordinated by the multi-talented Eastern-Jazz influenced Nitin Sawnhey the show cycled through a well-manicured and highly organised set which included, by far not exclusively, members of ScrapArtsMusic, 17 Hippies (with a wonderful cameo by Christopher and Kiki) and an absolutely astonishing combination of modern post-rock and Pakistani qawwali singer Faiz Ali Faiz who played the perfect foil to a back drop of strangely synonymous horns, guitars and keyboards swirling everywhere. Punctuated occasionally by the beautiful piano-jazz of Nitin himself, the show was well coordinated and took enough of WOMAD’s elemental array to make a show well worthwhile, with hardly a note wasted.

After a quick jaunt past the Afro-Cuban All Stars, who were almost the size of a symphony and had the sound to justify it, we settled in for our last proper show of WOMAD, The Alan Kelly Quartet. Comprising band leader Kelly, Ireland’s leading proponent of the piano accordion, blond-locked violinist Tola Custy, flautist and sublime vocalist Steph Geremia, and a supporting acoustic guitarist, they tripped through traditional reels, songs inspired by the deep south, contemporary Irish balladry and much more all with musical chops to die for. Sitting in a straight line and led by the masterful, finger dancing of Kelly, the set ranged from the beautiful to the contentedly sublime. I am unashamedly a lover of all music Irish and have always yearned for WOMAD to bring more and for 9.30 on a Monday night I was raring to go for this. Only one track with vocals from Steph was showcased; a neo-Irish ballad called The Garden. All performances shimmered with grace, especially from Kelly whose complete effortlessness behind the accordion belies the beauty and complexity of his work. This gig was one of the best justifications I’ve seen for more Irish music at WOMAD. Here’s hoping it catches.

Tired, wasted and delectably wounded, we’d nearly burnt out our WOMAD quote. Desiring deeply to see Reggae-Punk combo pioneer Don Letts behind the boards, we decided that dancing was beyond us and that desire could not be fulfilled. So we decided to catch a bit of Faiz Ali Faiz, the natural protégé the legendary and now deceased Nusfrat Fateh Ali Khan. If qawwali music is the communication devotional tool of Sufis, I definitely felt it for the short time we indulged. With a passion and fervour that is natural with a voice of Faiz’s power and calibre the intensity was relentless. But we were almost gone to a world of pleasant unconsciousness and without the ability to allow complete absorption, it seemed a little selfish to still be there.

Another WOMAD down and as expected sentence spoken at the end of the day suggested it was a bit shit that WOMAD was over again. Designated sit down gigs were the surprise of this year but didn’t detract from the overall experience. We’ll be waiting for the line-up next year – maybe hoping that it has a bit more variety, maybe hoping it to be similar. Thanks again WOMADelaide.