Almost everything is somehow subtly wrong with this album, and I cannot stop playing it.

And by wrong, of course, I most certainly do not mean bad, I just mean eerily, creepily, uncomfortably wrong.

It is, in theory, one of the prettier records I have heard in a long time, with acoustic strumming and slow, gentle vocal delivery, violins in the background and gentle harmonies.  It is, however, absolutely never pretty.

The violins are eerie, the vocals ghostly (not in that distant, lo-fi, reverby way fashionable production would have them be ghostly either, but genuinely ghostly in their very nature, not merely in their treatment) and the songs seem to convey the feeling of broken families, of revenge yet to be exacted, of the iron fist of fate hanging ominously over you, certain both of its murderous intent and its unavoidability.

There is just a hint of ominous organ shimmering away underneath some of this, a slow mocking banjo refrain, and drums which skitter like rattlesnakes.  The violin always seems to be playing a murder ballad from the American Civil War, and the solace of something truly warm and beautiful is never quite afforded you, despite promising to break through here and there.

So I wouldn’t say that I love this record exactly.  I find it disturbing, and it fascinates me, and I can’t stop playing it, but it is not nearly ‘nice’ enough to say that I love it, although in many I ways I think I do. And especially for someone working in such a well-established musical style, I really think Delhart has done an impressive job of creating music I find so elusive and fascinating.  Top stuff.

Jose Delhart – Accountability

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Jose Delhart – Broken Hearted Chant

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Preview/buy from his Bandcamp page

Hoarse.  Horse.  Hoarse.  Horse.  Geddit geddit, see what I did there?  Yes, another tedious pun, but I know you know to expect no better from me these days.  Anyway, it’s only called the Hoarsecast because I have a bit of a phlegmy flu which, whilst not fun, is hardly very debilitating so there is no need for me to moan really.  Not that this usually stops me, but anyhewww…

It’s a funny old mix, this playlist.  I rearranged the songs time and again, swapped a few in and out here and there and just couldn’t find a way to make them click together for some reason, so for all I like everything that’s on here it is still a little bitty, as a single coherent mix.

Mind you, with me talking pish between all the songs, there’s fuck all chance of these things really flowing in the first place.

Direct download: Toadcast #142 – The Hoarsecast

01. Wilco – I Can’t Stand It (00.17)
02. Hooray for the Riff-raff – Slow Walk (08.32)
03. Interpol – Evil (15.49)
04. Jose Delhart – Broken Hearted Chant (22.17)
05. Flower Orgy – Boneyard (25.12)
06. Willie Nelson – Good-hearted Woman (31.59)
07. Willard Grant Conspiracy – Notes From the Waiting Room (38.07)
08. Dumbo Gets Mad – Eclectic Prawn (40.33)
09. Sexual Objects – Here Come the Rubber Cops (47.56)
10. Grinderman – Star Charmer (57.53)