Album Review

Cocos Lovers – Gold Or Dust

• 22nd Jul 2013

What do you get if you take English folk music and mix in the rhythms of Appalachia and Africa? If you take hugely harmonised vocals and lay them over layers of guitar, mandolin, banjo, flute and assorted percussion instruments? The answer is apparently Cocos Lovers, a seven strong Kent collective of far travelled folk musicians whose music pretty much defines the term eclectic.

But while there are some lovely moments within this twelve track album the lack of overall coherence makes it difficult to warm to. Some of the tracks have several very distinct phases that appear welded clumsily together. The title track, for example, starts with a gentle a capella folk intro before suddenly changing into an upbeat, almost jaunty, travelling song. In others flutes or trumpets suddenly appear, adding very different melodies before fading out again.

There are good tracks on the album. Emily is the pick, a lovely country edged lament with a beautiful soft female vocal. Opening track Roots Of The Willow has a nice, traditional folk sound, the male and female voices working well together. The banjo led Saidan’s Plot has a warm folk feel, the strong male vocal well backed by a haunting female harmony. And the closing Hollow Is The Ground is pleasant enough before it gives way to a nine minute long hidden track – at least I think it is a separate song. But there are several others that simply feel confused with no real structure or direction.

This is an album that in many ways I wanted to like. The wide range of influences that Cocos Lovers bring to their music should take them to a level of creativity that is well above that of the nu folk/ pop bands that have suddenly become trendy. But perhaps there is a case here of trying to do too much. Just because you have a dozen instruments doesn’t necessarily mean that they should all be used at the same time. Less is sometimes more.

Venue: Gold Or Dust
Support Band: Smugglers Records