The Fannies get ever more timeless, free of any genre beyond their own, adding vintage psychedelia to their jangly languor.
AN AGREEABLE AMNESTY
There must be, by now, an agreeable amnesty around the venerable Glasgow band, it impossible to diminish the cosy warmth their music imbues. Like finding a welcoming snug bar off Sauchiehall Street, when the Winter sales get all a bit frantic, guaranteeing respite from the unforgivingness of modern life. Astonishingly, this is album number 14 since they first appeared, at the cusp of the 90’s, and number 3 since Gerard Love threw in his towel. That the band survived that blow might even sometimes surprise Norman Blake and Raymond McGinley, but survive they have. And thrived, with a new zest percolating the band and their music.
As men of a certain age, it hasn’t been all plain sailing, with personal bumps aplenty and personal bumps apiece, all tucked in and collected, inspiration thus never lacking. Blake, in particular, has been never shy of airing his feelings and it is gratifying to see the heartbreak, informing much of 2023’s Nothing Lasts For Ever, now tempered with a source of repair. This is also album number 3 with a stable line-up, with Euros Childs’ keyboards now firmly ensconced, adding hugely to the overall sonic palette. The rhythm section of Francis McDonald and Dave McGowan, drums and bass respectively, remains constant, even if both had dipped in and out the band pre-2019.
NO SENSE OF RUSH
It is with an acoustic jangly strum, of course it is, that the album opens. one of Blake’s, There Was You. As democratic as ever, rather than the 3 way split in songwriting credits that demarcated the Love days, down to the 2 songwriters, there there are 5 each from he and McGinley. With absolutely no sense of rush, it allows for a settling of the head, with Blake beginning to sing, before the rest of the band gradually start to slot in. An unashamed love song, it is beautifully simple and simply beautiful. Piano adds lustre to the guitars. The trademark Fannie’s harmony mesh is soon locked into place, surely an instantly recognisable template. Give or take Difford and Tillbrook, is there any other blending of voices than Blake and McGinley, even minus Love, that is so immediately gratifying? And has been, for so long.
Normal service locked truly into place, McGinley’s Tomorrow People then trots capably out the trap and into the ring. I am sure the two writers have identifiable USPs of their own, but, try as I might, I can never reliably tell one from the other. On this one there is much more going on than just the languid brushing of guitar strings, as McGowan’s bass is bubbling exotically away, with Childs adding some truly bonkers random synth parts, more Dik Mik than anything more overtly musical; it seems that the remote Black Bay Studios, Great Bernara in the Outer Hebrides are quite the repository of antique vintage analog kit, having also an old chapel organ. Love it, especially as the drums threaten to boil over towards the end.
GLORIOUS CARBON DATED AUTHENTICITY
Over And Over, by the same writer, is a slower picked lament, as louche as anything from the Arthur Lee songbook. Or, indeed, Bryan MacLean. As well as what must be some Ricky Riskenbacker 12 string, this too has bass that steps outside expectation, providing an extra bounce to the shifting lilt of melody. It could easily be a lost outtake from an Elektra archive. That above referenced organ then applies more carbon dated authenticity that is utterly glorious, becoming eventually almost Floydian, early Floyd, More or Obscured By Clouds.
Be With You Tonight returns the baton to Blake, and is graceful sway of whimsy, with pedal steel sneaking in from somewhere, blending perfectly with the piano and slowly chugging guitars. Rarely do the band allow themselves the luxury of solos, but there is a brief unshowy burst that takes a middle eight to the bridge.
SOMETHING REASSURING
There is a vague hint of Spirit’s Natures Way that permeates the start to The Same Air, fading away as it becomes a familiar minor key progression that this band can lock into so easily. There is something so reassuring about the long and drawn out organ swirls that Childs applies, that makes you wonder how they ever did without him. And, thinking it through, doesn’t “we breathe the same air” have the same general ring of Nature’s Way.
As in, it is, isn’t it, at least until we destroy that part. It is now the title track, which has a real dear diary aspect to it, as Love outlines his sort of day. A modern folk song, it is a song I can imagine being played by an in their heyday Lindisfarne, and it is a defiantly retro statement from the bastions of keeping on keeping on, whatever arises. What might seem a gloomy topic is gifted hope in spades. and a further guitar solo, or rather two at the same time.
CATCHIER THAN COVID
Take Time picks up again the psychedelic baton the band always threaten, with a tumble of guitars being embraced by an ebbing, flowing organ that reeks of 1969. The harmonies remain unstretched and unforced, sounding easy to replicate, at least until you try. Another song and another message leant from age: “no more running circles, no more eating our time“. I should say so! So much am I enjoying all this, I forgot we know already the next track, Day In The Sun, a single from the summer. Indeed, as it chimed in, my mind began to try and trick me, convincing me it a much better known song from their much further past, somehow getting a reprise. It has just that sort of capital C classic about it, and, boy, despite only 2 or 3 months, was I happy to hear it again, catchier than covid.
Something a bit different for Somewhere To Land. If not so much do you like our new direction, it represents certainly a further step back into 60’s psychedelia, a balladic epic of loftier construction and arrangement than any usual metier they offer. Add a lava light, some back projected slides, and we could (again, see Over And Over) be at the Roundhouse or some sort other of exploding plastic inevitable. I can’t wait to see if they can and do this one live.
As imagination runs rampant, Young And Wise closes the album with a slow Lennon-esque rumination on the whos, whys and whats of whatever makes up this tangled web of life and love. Yeah, I am getting carried away, it hard not to, a slight tear forming at the corner of my eye. I really hope that vintage Domus organ is up to being taken out on the road.
BIG HEARTED JANGLEDELICA
Says McGinley, “it’s been a while since we started doing this thing we do, but to us it feels like no time at all‘”. To that could be added the sense of timelessness that characterises this recording. Give or take a slight sense of enhanced control, experience, let’s call it, at the wheel, any of these songs could come from not just anytime since 1989, when the band first came together, but 20 years ahead of that or from 20 years hence. Or I hope so, it seeming a shame if there were no place for big hearted jangledelica in 2046.
Here’s the tour, UK dates November:
And here’s Be With You Tonight:
Teenage Fanclub: Website