Hold on to your hat!  The fourth album from Anglo-French supergroup, Topette!! Is a feast of frantic fiddling, blazing bagpipes and surging squeezebox.

Release Date:  19^th January 2024

Label: Self Release

Formats: CD / Digital

Topette!!, the Anglo-French folk ‘supergroup’ celebrate their tenth anniversary this year, and I can’t think of a better way to announce such a landmark event than with ON – Live at The Jam Jar, the band’s fourth album, a veritable feast of surging squeezebox, frantic fiddling, blazing bagpipes and raucous rhythms.  If your 2024 has got itself off to a slow start, then this is just the tonic to get your life back into the fast lane.

Topette!! are: powerhouse piper and banjoist Julien Cartonnet, accordion and melodeon virtuoso Andy Cutting, fiddler of finesse James Delarre, barnstorming bassist Barn Stradling, with propulsive percussionist Tania Buisse and her bodhrán in the engine room.  And, by way of a bonus, they’re joined by special guests Romain Chéré (violin and bagpipes) and Antoine Turpault on this new live recording.  The band came together in 2014 after meeting up in France a couple of years earlier; they have bases in both Bristol and Burgundy and they make a sound that is utterly glorious.  Nobody is at risk of boredom whilst Topette!! are anywhere in the vicinity.

By the way – if you’re wondering about the band’s name, it has its origins in the Poitou-Charentes region of western France where the members first met.  It literally means bottle or shot of liquor, but in the local slang, it has come to mean “Cheers!”  And cheer is most definitely what you’ll find within the grooves of ON – Live at The Jam Jar.

The tunes here were recorded during a show at The Jam Jar, a vibrant, popular venue tucked away in the very heart of Bristol.  It was a warm June evening – I’m sure that it was hot, sweaty and exciting inside the club – and that warmth and excitement is perfectly captured on the album.  I’ve always said that the best live albums are capable of making the listener imagine that they’re actually at the show, and Live at The Jam Jar has definitely captured that magical quality.

It’s there, right from the very start as, first, Andy and Julien, then, the whole band launch into rollicking opener Bourée Morvandelle/ La Lustrée.  The tunes have a true Breton feel that makes me yearn to be back on the hallowed turf of Brittany and, when I do get back there – next month, in fact – it’ll be tunes like this one that will be playing in the car.

Live at The Jam Jar is a wholly instrumental album and the tunes included are a mix of compositions by band members and close associates, and traditional pieces and it was Armagh composer Niall Vallely who came up with The Oblique Jig, one of several tunes to give Andy the opportunity to demonstrate exactly what he’s capable of.  Likewise, it was The Oyster Band’s Ian Telfer who provided Dixie’s, a tune that sits comfortably between Andy’s Polka Know and the Swedish traditional tune Halling Från Härjedalen Efter Per Myhr.  The tunes blend seamlessly together and it was easy to imagine the scenes inside The Jam Jar as this medley reached its climax.

Whilst the majority of the tunes on Live at The Jam Jar are of the hell-for-leather, take-no-prisoners variety, there’s also room for a few spots of gravitas and James provides the first of these with Year of the Metal Rat, a slow, sad, waltz tune in which James’ weeping violin is supplemented by sprinklings of banjo from Julien and Barn’s deeply resonant bass.  And the atmospheric JLP provides perhaps even more time to dream as James’ fiddle and Julien’s pipes merge together to evoke vivid images of wild open spaces.

But it’s the virtuoso playing that leaves the most lasting impressions and Pot Neuve/ De La Flamme, a stunning bagpipe and bodhrán extravaganza is a splendid example of what Topette!! have to offer, as is the breathtaking Le Sac de Jambon/ Ange/ Long Legs, a set of tunes that had me wondering whether Andy Cutting has been gifted with more than just the standard ten fingers, such is his digital dexterity.  It’s the same recipe for Venture as Andy surges through an impossibly fast tune and Barn and Julien keep up the pace on bass and banjo respectively and for Ricer, the album’s lead single, a delicious mix of melodeon and pipes, with bass and bodhrán providing real depth; it’s utterly joyful, instantly likeable, and The Jam Jar crowd loved it.

Romain and Antoine join the fun for Sur Les Bords de L’Eau/Recontre and stay for the rest of the show, and the sound is noticeably enriched.  The band take on an orchestral edge and Barn’s bass reverberates and that richness of sound is carried forward into Civet de Chevreuil/ Appelle la Dame!, a stately waltz tune that, for some reason, reminds me of Jimmy Shand’s The Primrose. 

This invigorating album is brought to its close by a pair of traditional tunes, the haunting La Couturiére, a pipe-led tune that builds in drama as the separate band members join in, and the magnificent Galician Sher, offered up as the encore to the live show.  Heralded by a funky bass intro from Barn, the tune transports the listener to the bazaars of Morocco or Turkey in a whirlwind of pipes, melodeon and fiddles.  It’s a thoroughly majestic ending to a wonderful album.

Watch Topette!! perform Ricer – Live at The Jam Jar – here:

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