Blyth Power - Alnwick & Tyne (Midnight Music, 1990)

http://www.blythpower.co.uk/

By Class Warrior

I am a fool. A complete and utter fool. I bought a house that is a twenty-minute drive away from where I work. Fine - a lot of people live much farther from their work than that. What's the problem, you ask? First of all, I don't drive to work - I ride the city bus. It takes me an hour and twenty minutes to get from my house to the university where I work. Not only that, but I paid more for the privilege of arranging my life in such a time-sucking way. I could have bought a house a five minute walk from my place of employment for thirty or forty thousand dollars less. To make matters even worse, the house Mrs. Warrior and I bought is depreciating in value. If we tried to sell it now, we would have to conduct a "short sale" - we owe more on the property than it is worth. Then I think about all the fucking maintenance that I need to perform - sand and repaint the decks (yes, I said "decks," as in plural decks - jealous? You shouldn't be - I only get to enjoy them two months out of the year, thanks to snow, wind, and mosquitoes.), replace malfunctioning light fixtures, clean the carpets, replace the hot water heater...the list goes on. Deer are so thick here (almost as thick as the mosquitoes) that I can't grow a garden without surrounding everything with a ten-foot-high fence topped with concertina wire. It's too cold for gardening, anyway - the first frost last year was on SEPTEMBER 15. Fuck. Finally, the job I took does not pay me enough. Student loans and Republican legislatures are eating away at my salary. As a result, in 2011 I ended up paying more out than I took in. This trend continues in 2012, and shows no sign of abatement.

To make matters even worse, on occasion the bus runs late, so I miss my connection in downtown Frozen City. This makes my commute almost two hours when going home, and two and a half hours when I head to work. For those of you familiar with Oregon, I could drive from Eugene to Portland in less time. The latest incident occurred a couple of weeks ago - by the time I got to the Warrior abode, I was shaking with anger. Anger mostly directed at myself.

What a fool.

Every cloud has a silver lining, according to conventional wisdom. Every pile of excrement turns into rich, crumbly compost. (If you let it, that is. Humanure - look into it, you eco-criminal.) On days when I don't need to or don't feel like reading, grading exams, etc. while on the bus, I put on my headphones. The album I've turned to most often in the past year and a half is Blyth Power's Alnwick & Tyne.

For those of you who don't know, Blyth Power is an English band. Joseph Porter, the band founder and only consistent member, is a veteran of the UK peace punk scene of the late seventies and early eighties. He formed Blyth Power in 1983 and has kept it going for almost thirty years. The cast of characters surrounding Joseph's drum kit and microphone has changed radically since they started, but the band keeps cranking out high-quality music. Alnwick & Tyne is, beyond any doubt, their best album.

Their music is difficult to describe or classify into a specific genre. The best I can do is "Blyth Power Rock." They sound like Blyth Power. Not a punk band, not a rock group, not folk, certainly not folk-punk (complete aside: if you are contemplating listening to any band that labels itself "folk-punk," do this instead: run in the opposite direction, but try to smash their record/CD/mp3s under your bootheel with your first fleet step. Remember: smash and run!)...Blyth Power sounds like Blyth Power. There are lots of interesting parts that you would not find in a standard rock or punk album - I will provide more detail on this feature in a bit.

Joseph's lyrics are, quite simply, wonderfully puzzling. They are prose - full of metaphor, English medieval history, anarchy, war, drinking, powdered periwigs, and love of trains. Interesting, thoughtful, thought-provoking lyrics are just fine with me. For the most part, however, I don't know what the hell he's talking about.

Joseph is not the best part of this album - the female backup singers are. What? That's right. Their names are Jamie Hince (of the late 80s British punk band DAN) and Helen Rush. I'll bet you're thinking something along these lines right now: "Female backup singers? How cliche! Is this Prince or something?" You could not be more wrong. This album FALLS APART without the backup singers. They are the backbone. They are the base. They create harmonies with Joseph and each other in such a beautiful way that the songs are taken to the sought-after next level. Good songs become great, great songs are turned into transcendent moments.

The album contains three perfect songs (i.e., the "transcendent moments" mentioned last paragraph). Yes, perfect. I would change nothing about them. Perfect. They are "McArthur" (one of those songs where I have no clue what Joseph just said), "Better to Bat," and the title song. "McArthur" starts with the following lines, sung by Hince and Rush:

As the sun goes down McArthur drives a plow
And the steel-shod hooves of the heavy horses beat
A furrow in his brow
Shredding rosaries he turns the aching clay
McArthur's farce will live to fight...(Joseph) on another day.

Joseph sings an octave higher than usual on this song, and when he trades vocals on and off with Jamie and Helen...oh, wow. It makes my spine tingle every time. This is one of those songs I could listen to over and over...trust me, I have done so. The bus commute is a long one. I've probably heard this song more than a hundred times at this point.

"Better to Bat" (a cricket reference) begins with church bells, then the guitar starts, and in comes Joseph, and...the vocal harmonies begin again...this is just amazing, folks.

Okay, the lyrics to the song "Alnwick & Tyne" make a bit more sense to me. Joseph refers to it as a "bodice ripper," which works well as a description. It's a tale of deceit and treachery in medieval England. Fun stuff, especially for a nerd like me. This is one of the more straight-ahead rockers on the album. There is plenty of power chord riffage here. The highlight of this song (though the whole thing is, as I said earlier, perfect) is the midpoint where the drums stop and the vocal harmonies begin:

How we laughed once and how we sang and how we raised the rafters
God will grant us good sometimes and God will grant disaster
God will bid us time to pass and says manners maketh man
If God will give me one more chance, then I will prove the master.

Hey - if you want to play along on your guitar, piano, digeridoo (no...please, don't), hurdy-gurdy, or whatever instrument you have, Joseph provides the chords on the band's website. You'll have to find your own backup singers.

Most of the other songs are just a step below these three. Some highlights include: a 3/4 waltz breakdown (or is it 6/8? I've been out of junior high band for too long!) and singing of different lyrics at the same time by Joseph and Jamie/Helen on "The Thin Red Line;" the dual guitar solo (hello Iron Maiden!) and pseudo-reggae interlude of "Right Hand Man;" and the heavy-duty guitar hook in "Summer Song." A couple of songs are not quite as good as the rest, but I will leave you to figure out what those are. You will hear no negative words from I.

Alnwick & Tyne is a fantastic slice of Blyth Power Rock. If I make it to England anytime soon, one of my first missions will be to find out when and where Blyth Power are playing, then plan the trip accordingly. I don't think I'll be doing any international travel anytime soon because of my stupid expensive money pit house. And student loans, but let's not discuss that. I am such a fool.

I tickled my taint for nine and a half minutes! Almost a full ten minutes, but, like I said, a couple of songs are not quite as good.