Turnip Greens – Carry Me Down The Aisle (Black & Tan Records).

Blues and roots music is very popular in Scandinavia and this is being reflected in the number of bands coming from the area. Turnip Greens are four seasoned musicians from Denmark, influenced by the likes of Dr. John, Daniel Lanois, Ry Cooder and Muddy Waters amongst others. They open with Carry Me Down The Aisle, like the rest of the songs on the album, an original composition, and it’s a painfully & achingly slow opener. This is very appropriate as it is about death and a funeral (a common theme for blues music) and is surprisingly powerful despite being a strange one to start with. The pace doesn’t really pick up much on the quirky blues The Reverend In Town. This is a hypnotic tale about a disaffected Reverend who has a brush with the devil who considers him too weird to take into hell. My Baby Loves Me sees the pace pick up slightly and there’s some evidence of lead guitar from the capable Henrik Bruhn who also takes on the vocal duties. This is a driving blues where drummer Sune Nielsen does ballistic at times. The acoustic Gather My Bones is haunting and returns to the slower pace. I absolutely love this and it is so laid back, it’s horizontal. Electric guitars return on Top Of The Hill but with the drums sounding like they’re in an echo chamber perhaps the boys have gone a little too quirky this time. The basic song is there but it’s just on the peripheral.

SixSixtySix has more references to the devil but it does mark a return to form with slide guitar and a driving rhythm. There’s a slight change in direction on the almost Country offering Kissed Her On The Cheek before they go back to the quirky side for Two Sets Of Rules but maybe this one doesn’t work so well. A Man Said Goodbye is another of the albums standout tracks with fuzzed vocals and idiosyncratic beat that reminds me very much of Canadian Joe Fournier. Quite Often confirms the fact that Turnip Greens have a style all of their own and they finish much in the manner in which they have conducted most of the album – slowly. A slightly disappointing uninspired finish to what is, overall, a clever, original album.

http://www.turnipgreens.dk/
http://www.black-and-tan.com/

David Blue.