Enfant Bastard – Pigsty Tapes
A little early in a career for a Best Of, one might argue, but given that Enfant Bastard‘s output is sprawled aver CD-Rs distributed haphazardly across the music collections of a few hundred Scottish music fans I admit that it does make sense to pull it all together at some point and try to, at the very least, take stock a little. And for those of you who don’t know the man, it works nicely as an introduction.
To say that Cammy is likely to prove to be a little polarising is an understatement. Basically, I reckon that a lot of you are going to genuinely think that this is awful. A few though, will think that it’s genius. And maybe a few more might be more like myself: staring fascinatedly at it for ages before deciding that you love it.
Enfant Bastard seems like the ultimate stream of consciousness music. You can almost imagine his albums being recorded in one take from start to finish, and half the original songs being left off in favour of ones he happened to think of as he was playing. I’ve never heard anyone sound like they were putting less effort into their singing, or in some ways the guitar playing, which sounds like it knew the chords once but can’t really be arsed remembering them now. You almost get the impression that at some point he’ll have had enough, throw his guitar on the floor and tell both song and audience to just fuck off.
The thing is, in amongst all this… well, what is it? Prickliness? Awkwardness? Borderline hostility? Whatever it is, in amongst it all there are some genuine gems of sensitivity, some brilliant lyrics and some surprisingly slick pop hooks. It’s almost like ambush music – allowing you to casually think ‘What the fuck is this?’ before sucker-punching you with something brilliant.
Even for fans like myself, though, there’s always a sort of trepidation that you might hate the very next thing he does just as much as you loved the last one. In a way that’s part of the appeal though: it’s genuinely an event, putting an Enfant Bastard album on the stereo.
Enfant Bastard – Joanna Newsom 666
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I really can’t put my finger on it but there’s something about Enfant Bastard that I find massivly endearing. I love the haphazardness of it all, like it’s more important to get all the songs out than worry about the result.
I know that sounds massivly condescending but I really don’t intend it to be. I think he’s fucking ace.
I love the fact that you genuinely do not know what’s coming next.
Trampoline show springs to mind. it’s the same on record and live, which makes him a really exciting prospect to go and see.
Whats he got against Joanna?
She is the evil leader of a goat-sacrificing satanic cult, didn’t you know that?
shit…and here i am swooning over her day in and day out (sigh) On the other hand, I do hate goats
They’re fucking bastards, goats are. Just look at ‘em. Evil little fuckers.
ha
vessel – great song! thanks.
That’s what I mean about surprise pop songs appearing when you least expect them. This is right near the end of the album, and superb.
oh boy…..i’m keeping my mouth shut….see it’s shut….look……mmmmmmmmmmnnnmmmmm
Just had my first listen to those 3 tracks. Pleasantly surprised! I was expecting some incomprehensible babble over disjointed rhythms (thought I suspect that is in fact what you hear Tom??) but it I did detect lovely undercurrents of melody. Vessel is indeed a lovely little number.
Very odd music is very rarely, very bad music. Though I still haven’t made it through the entirety of Trout Mask Replica in one session.
He’s put the NME quote on the front cover. That’s just genius.
Yup, I fucking loved that.
cutting the legendary cider intake has worked wonders. godlike genius.
You can’t say that the quantity of cider you drink has an inverse affect on your capacity for mental agility!
That’s just daft, I drink loads of cider!
Oh, wait.
His cover of Dans ‘Song For the Maudlin’ is quite something.
Hi Are you available for a support gig in February – Edinburgh Cabaret Voltaire ?? With Isa & the Filthy Tongues?
Rob St John put us onto you.
Cheers
Martin