The record, a rich and vivid exploration of city of Birmingham and surrounding areas of the English Midlands, features the words of friend and poet Darren Cannan set to James Summerfield’s striking yet elegant take on Americana.
Lyrically, Analogue Tales: Sounds From Arden covers ground familiar to most residents of the city, with the Jewellery Quarter, Longbridge Rover car plant, the M42, Ladywood, Birmingham city centre and Sutton Coldfield featuring in the allegories, observations, asides and stories that make up the album.
The extraordinary pictures of the region’s people, landscapes and identity has further detail added by the voices of guest narrators: The Beat frontman Ranking Roger, broadcaster Robin Valk, James Summerfield’s grandmother Marjorie Summerfield, authorsMike Gayle and Catherine O’Flynn, and songwriter and actor Paul Murphy.
lyrics
1. Enter the lift, a lozenge moving vertically in the throat of the block,
always swallowing and coughing up, it never stops.
Soundproofed silence, changed only when the shaft is climbing or falling,
in a riot of clicks and hydraulic groans.
2. Jaundiced, dead air sewn with Bisto and bleach smells, are blown in your face,
like an annoying friend trying to irritate you into action,
from dormant fire hydrants and unused exits.
Quilted analogue sounds,
a quilt of analogue tinny sounds;
only single numbers leave at once.
Beware loan sharks; notice common room opening times;
call the mobile hairdresser after 2pm.
Do you remember the ‘50s?
Foyer messages disappear as you rise.
Fifth floor bare-walls-paint-in-’9-7 with European money.
It won’t last.
Suspended lives on high, no front doors are ever opened fully.
Quilted analogue sounds,
a quilt of analogue tinny sounds;
only single numbers leave at once.
Seventh floor: he worked for The Times, they say.
He wears a cravat after 6.
He doesn’t watch television.
He listens to analogue sounds on the radio.
credits
from Analogue Tales: Sounds From Arden,
track released January 6, 2015
James Summerfield
Darren Cannan
Simon Fox
Richard Pharaoh
Craig Hamilton
David Booth
Katherine Griffiths
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