Darren Hayman & The Long Parliament - The Violence

[23 Daves]

Another folky concept album orientated thread that may be doomed to plummet to the bottom of the board, but fuck it, I haven't started a series of deeply unpopular Oscillations threads in ages...

I also saw Darren Hayman perform live last night, largely from his new album "The Violence" which focuses on the legendary witch trials in Essex.  Very subtly drawing parallels between those times and now (many of the accused witches were just elderly disabled women who were deemed a drain on the nation's resources) it's a heartbreaking listen in places, contrasting vividly to the disturbing listen DCW's "Don't Wait To Be Hunted" offers.  This is certainly most apparent on the ballad "Vinegar Joe", where a one-legged eighty year old woman addresses her dog from the gallows, her only companion towards the end of her life.  Both the woman in question and Vinegar Joe actually existed, like many of the characters on the album which comes with historical notes:

http://youtu.be/zbDYZGlomlE

By Hayman's own confession the album is terribly long and it's tempting to say it would be better if some fat had been cut off it, but the highs on the record are unbelievably good, and damn the album has been issued at just the right time too.  It's filled with late Autumn/ early winter chills, all minimalist arrangements and campfire tales.   

So that's two really good folk concept albums issued in the space of two weeks.  You wait for one bus to turn up, then etc. etc. etc.