Bellowhead - Albums Collection 2006-2012 (5CD)

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Bellowhead - Albums Collection 2006-2012 (5CD)

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Although they began and continued to work as a duo, John Spiers (melodeon) and Jon Boden (fiddle and vocals) had a vision of a larger sound for their music. In 2004, they put together Bellowhead (the name derived from their album Bellow) to play the Oxford Folk Festival. The 11-piece group was an immediate success, its mix of strings and brass virtually unprecedented in traditional English folk music. They took the band into the studio that autumn to record a five-track teaser, E.P.onymous, which proved very popular with fans as well as industry types, and settled into playing festival gigs (about the only ones that could afford them), increasing their repertoire and bedding in as a group. Something of a bidding war ensued to sign Bellowhead, with German label Westpark the eventual winner, and Burlesque, their full-length debut, appeared in 2006. The tighter Matachin, released in 2008, veered from dark cabaret to a mad New Orleans band. Umbrellowhead (2009) and Hedonism (2010) followed. The latter went on to become the biggest-selling independently released folk album of all time with over 60,000 copies shipped. The band also recorded the theme tune to BBC Radio 4's Ambridge Extra, a spin-off from the iconic soap opera The Archers. In 2011, they released a live DVD of their performance at Bournemouth’s O2 Academy entitled Hedonism Live. A fourth album called Broadside was released in 2012, produced by John Leckie and recorded at Rockfield Studios. It was met with a positive response and gave them their biggest success to date, reaching number 16 in the national U.K. charts. During the latter part of 2012, the band toured the record across the U.K. and Europe. In 2014, they ended ten years of staunch independence by signing with Island, for whom they recorded their fifth album, Revival, with big-name pop producer Rupert Christie. The album was released in June of that year. During the summer of 2015, the band announced their separation; a mutual decision following Jon Boden's intent to step down as frontman; the group felt the project would never be at its best unless they were all together. Bellowhead decided to bid farewell with one last national tour, which was recorded and released as Bellowhead Live: The Farewell Tour in early 2016.

Biography by Chris Nickson, Allmusic.com

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Bellowhead - Albums Collection 2006-2012 (5CD)

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Bellowhead - Albums Collection 2006-2012 (5CD)

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If Tom Waits ever decided to make an album of traditional English folk, it might sound a little like Bellowhead, the folk big band. The aptly titled disc has a real circus quality to the sound, especially on the opener, "Rigs of the Time" and the more abstract "Flash Company," which make full use of the mix of brass and strings. But this very ambitious full-length debut takes in a great deal, from the ballad "Death and the Lady" to the more gospel-ish "Jordan" (actually a shanty tweaked a little) and some instrumentals, like "Sloe Gin" that have been expanded from their original form to sound very full (as well they might with an 11-piece group). "Courting Too Slow" is revisited from an early Spiers & Boden album, with Jon Boden showing just how his singing has improved, a mix of deep emotion and fairground barker. It's a record that's to be praised for the chances it takes – they could have played it fairly safe and been praised as groundbreaking – even though they don't all succeed. But even the failures, like the clumsy "Flash Company" are never less than interesting. Kudos to the producers, who bring clarity to a dense sound. This is a summation of the formation of this sound; where they take it will be the fascinating part.

Review by Chris Nickson, Allmusic.com

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Bellowhead - Albums Collection 2006-2012 (5CD)

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Full credit to Bellowhead. After the occasional chaos of their first album, live gigging tightened them up a lot, and for their sophomore effort, they come up with a variety of material and arrangements that really play to their instrumental and vocal strengths. For the most part the music is still traditional, but in many ways you'd hardly know it, since stylistically it pretty much falls out of time, sometimes like a dark cabaret, sometimes like a New Orleans brass band lurching madly. Jon Boden's voice continues to progress, and it's quite commanding these days, especially on something like "Fakenham Fair" or the creepy "Widow's Curse." There's plenty of fire among the musicians, and although the arrangements can be quite complex, they gobble them up with glee, especially on something like "Cholera Camp," a Kipling poem by way of Peter Bellamy. They're a completely integrated band now, rather than Boden and the rest, nobody really stands out from the pack, and that's become one of their strengths. As before, there are a couple of sea shanties, both lustily performed, and much of the choice of material is off the beaten path, avoiding comparisons to well-known versions, and thus allowing them to put their stamp on it. As a folk big band, there's no one around even remotely like them, and that's a good thing – they'd certainly be hard to emulate.

Review by Chris Nickson, Allmusic.com

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Bellowhead - Albums Collection 2006-2012 (5CD)

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'Umbrellowhead' is a collection of songs from individual members of the mighty musical juggernaught bellowhead. Remarkably when this multi-award winning collective are not busy touring the world, recording as bellowhead or appearing in a myriad of musical projects, the 11 members also find time to explore individual projects. From marimba to fiddle, from the balkans to bangladesh and onwards to japan, some of the staggering range of influences of this accomplished and original group are revealed in this latest album.

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Bellowhead - Albums Collection 2006-2012 (5CD)

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Arguably the most rock & roll outfit on the contemporary folk scene, 11-piece collective Bellowhead's knack of blending punk, funk, jazz, and cabaret with centuries-old ballads and sea shanties couldn't be more removed from the winsome fare of the in vogue no-folk brigade. Produced by John Leckie (Radiohead, Stone Roses), their third album, Hedonism, continues to blur the boundaries on 11 imaginative reworkings of traditional standards which prove that British folk can be as exhilarating as it can be melancholic. Opener "New York Girls" sets the tone immediately with its array of jaunty fiddles and frenzied percussion providing a suitably upbeat backdrop for Jon Boden's antiquated pirate-esque tones, and is followed by possibly their greatest interpretation to date, "A-Begging I Will Go," whose funky guitar licks and Stax horns turns the 17th century classic into something that could have been the theme tune to a Blaxploitation film. Elsewhere, "Yarmouth Town" is given a breathless jazz club workout; the instrumental "Cross-Eyed and Chinless" cleverly drifts from accordion-led Morris dance to seductive tango; while the mournful child ballad, "Cold Blows the Wind" is virtually unrecognizable as a brass-led vaudeville show stopper. The radical transformations don't always come off quite so effortlessly, particularly "Little Sally Racket," a chaotic and discordant fusion of manic surf rock riffs, anarchic vocals, and frantic punk rhythms. But while the sinister waltz of Jacques Brel's "Amsterdam," the haunting Scottish balladry of "Captain Wedderburn," and the slow-burning cinematics of "Broomfield Hill" show the band can enthrall even when they slow down the pace, Hedonism is at its most triumphant when it lives up to its name.

Jon O'Brien, Allmusic.com

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Bellowhead - Albums Collection 2006-2012 (5CD)

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There was a time when Bellowhead could never match the excitement of their live shows on record. But then they teamed up with producer John Leckie, of Stone Roses and Radiohead fame, and recorded the full-tilt, huge-selling Hedonism. They are back with Leckie for the follow-up, and have cranked up the energy level even more. This is a brash, noisy set that at times almost topples over because of the complex arrangements and constant changes of mood and pace, but succeeds because of the 11-piece band's frantic enthusiasm. Folk purists should beware; the Carthy/Swarbrick favourite Byker Hill is now treated to a gutsy, romping backing and bursts of full-bloodied choral work, the Copper Family classic Thousands Or More is reworked with jaunty and then elegant strings and brass, while the traditional ghost story The Wife of Usher's Well becomes a menacing mood piece dominated by pounding, percussive vocals. Over-clever, maybe, but highly entertaining.

Review by Robin Denselow, Guardian