Deffrwch Cymry cysgld gwlad y gan
April 19, 2021 12:16 PM Subscribe
Deffrwch Cymry cysgld gwlad y gan (Wake up, sleepy Wales, land of song!)
The Welsh music scene is so vibrant and full of talent. Croeso! Come in and listen to some new (and new-ish) Welsh music.
The Joy Formidable
Breichiau Hir
Blood Honey
Greta Isaac
The Anchoress
Campfire Social
Georgia Ruth
Deyah
Swnami
Holding Absence
Rosehip Teahouse
Adwaith
Paper Aeroplanes
Aderyn
Phoenix Rise
The School
Y Cledrau
Kim Hon
Los Campesinos (cheating a bit, band members are all English but the band was formed in Cardiff and this song just sounds like Wales)
And of course: Bonnie Tyler
YouTube Playlist Link
Spotify Playlist (contains many more songs than just the above!)
Bonus: Catatonia live set from 1999 (includes Mulder & Scully, Road Rage, and International Velvet)
Every Saturday night you can listen to the best new Welsh music with DJ Adam Walton on BBC Radio Wales, online worldwide. Follow along with live tweets during the show.
Here's hoping for some post-Covid festival fun at the annual Green Man Festival in the Brecon Beacons.
Previously: Gwenno
The Joy Formidable
Breichiau Hir
Blood Honey
Greta Isaac
The Anchoress
Campfire Social
Georgia Ruth
Deyah
Swnami
Holding Absence
Rosehip Teahouse
Adwaith
Paper Aeroplanes
Aderyn
Phoenix Rise
The School
Y Cledrau
Kim Hon
Los Campesinos (cheating a bit, band members are all English but the band was formed in Cardiff and this song just sounds like Wales)
And of course: Bonnie Tyler
YouTube Playlist Link
Spotify Playlist (contains many more songs than just the above!)
Bonus: Catatonia live set from 1999 (includes Mulder & Scully, Road Rage, and International Velvet)
Every Saturday night you can listen to the best new Welsh music with DJ Adam Walton on BBC Radio Wales, online worldwide. Follow along with live tweets during the show.
Here's hoping for some post-Covid festival fun at the annual Green Man Festival in the Brecon Beacons.
Previously: Gwenno
Don't forget Cate Le Bon and Gwenno.
(on preview, beaten to it)
posted by pipeski at 12:37 PM on April 19, 2021 [2 favorites]
(on preview, beaten to it)
posted by pipeski at 12:37 PM on April 19, 2021 [2 favorites]
These are fantastic. Thanks for posting!
There is an undefinable quality to Welsh musicianship. One of my favorite travel memories: I was in Cardiff and happened upon a Jazz Cafe there. My father was a jazz musician, and being a little homesick, and seeing the marquee advertise “Dixieland Jazz Night” I stopped in. The musicians - all talented - played through a few familiar songs, but there was something to them that was just a little... off from my memories of those songs from home. Into the fourth song, it hit me — the group was playing Dixieland Jazz with a Welsh accent. I have no other way to describe it. I frequently wish I had a recording of it, because it was wonderful.
posted by Silvery Fish at 12:51 PM on April 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
There is an undefinable quality to Welsh musicianship. One of my favorite travel memories: I was in Cardiff and happened upon a Jazz Cafe there. My father was a jazz musician, and being a little homesick, and seeing the marquee advertise “Dixieland Jazz Night” I stopped in. The musicians - all talented - played through a few familiar songs, but there was something to them that was just a little... off from my memories of those songs from home. Into the fourth song, it hit me — the group was playing Dixieland Jazz with a Welsh accent. I have no other way to describe it. I frequently wish I had a recording of it, because it was wonderful.
posted by Silvery Fish at 12:51 PM on April 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
Many thanks for the post: plenty here I've not heard of! There's also Seazoo. And Melin Melyn. And, not so new, Meilyr Jones & H. Hawkline. And Euros Childs is still at it!
posted by misteraitch at 12:54 PM on April 19, 2021
posted by misteraitch at 12:54 PM on April 19, 2021
Euros Childs is still at it?!?! Ugh, what rock have I been under? Thanks for the tip!! I was an insane Gorky's stan back before "stan" meant that.
posted by potrzebie at 12:56 PM on April 19, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by potrzebie at 12:56 PM on April 19, 2021 [2 favorites]
Carwyn Ellis & Rio 18 is really, really nice if a welsh/brazilian crossover is your thing
posted by uandt at 1:32 PM on April 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by uandt at 1:32 PM on April 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
Diolch yn fawr! I've been listening to Radio Cymru to tune my ear, but I'm not good enough to catch band names and such yet :)
posted by kalimac at 1:39 PM on April 19, 2021
posted by kalimac at 1:39 PM on April 19, 2021
There is more than sosban fach?
posted by Virtblue at 2:41 PM on April 19, 2021 [3 favorites]
posted by Virtblue at 2:41 PM on April 19, 2021 [3 favorites]
Hey now nothing wrong with a little sosban[sospan] fach
posted by benzenedream at 3:25 PM on April 19, 2021
posted by benzenedream at 3:25 PM on April 19, 2021
Diolch yn fawr!!!
posted by Tesseractive at 4:20 PM on April 19, 2021
posted by Tesseractive at 4:20 PM on April 19, 2021
Mod note: Playlist link is working now!
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 4:39 PM on April 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 4:39 PM on April 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
Loving the links to even more great music, thanks everyone!
One of the few truly enjoyable Covid-times habits I've developed is listening to the Saturday night Radio Wales show every week. It's on at 5 pm EST here on the US East Coast, and it's been such a joy to have new music to listen to during a time when we used to go out to dinner and now we just sit around the house. I've been attempting to learn Welsh on Duolingo as well, and hope that my skill at saying "Good morning, I am a dragon" will come in handy some day.
posted by banjo_and_the_pork at 7:29 PM on April 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
One of the few truly enjoyable Covid-times habits I've developed is listening to the Saturday night Radio Wales show every week. It's on at 5 pm EST here on the US East Coast, and it's been such a joy to have new music to listen to during a time when we used to go out to dinner and now we just sit around the house. I've been attempting to learn Welsh on Duolingo as well, and hope that my skill at saying "Good morning, I am a dragon" will come in handy some day.
posted by banjo_and_the_pork at 7:29 PM on April 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
And then there's Y Niwl! Also known as Gruff Rhys's sometime backup band, they play surf punk instrumentals with track names that are numbers in Welsh. Bandcamp lists their music as “devotional”, and I have to agree.
posted by scruss at 7:41 PM on April 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by scruss at 7:41 PM on April 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
Silver Fish: the group was playing Dixieland Jazz with a Welsh accent
There's a similar story about Richard "Nobel Physics" Feynman learning to play Samba on sabbatical in Brazil:
So this guy picked up his frigideira and his metal stick and . . . "brrra-dup-dup; chick-a-chick." Gee whiz! It was wonderful!
The boss said to him, "You go over there and stand next to O Americano, and you'll learn how to play the frigideira!"
My theory is that it's like a person who speaks French who comes to America. At first they're making all kinds of mistakes, and you can hardly understand them. Then they keep on practicing until they speak rather well, and you fin d there's a delightful twist to their way of speaking - their accent is rather nice, and you love to listen to it.
posted by BobTheScientist at 11:39 PM on April 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
There's a similar story about Richard "Nobel Physics" Feynman learning to play Samba on sabbatical in Brazil:
So this guy picked up his frigideira and his metal stick and . . . "brrra-dup-dup; chick-a-chick." Gee whiz! It was wonderful!
The boss said to him, "You go over there and stand next to O Americano, and you'll learn how to play the frigideira!"
My theory is that it's like a person who speaks French who comes to America. At first they're making all kinds of mistakes, and you can hardly understand them. Then they keep on practicing until they speak rather well, and you fin d there's a delightful twist to their way of speaking - their accent is rather nice, and you love to listen to it.
posted by BobTheScientist at 11:39 PM on April 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
I spent most of the first decade of the century hanging around the Cardiff music scene. One of the better things about producing great music that is (apart from about 6 months in the late 90s) almost entirely ignored by the wider world is the sense of community that develops when your audience is disproportionately composed of your peers. It was a generous and supportive scene (although inevitably not without its drama), and feel like I'm justifed in looking back on it fondly.
I will indugle my nostalgia with a few links to stuff by people I either knew or sort of knew from that scene*:
Rhodri Viney
Gindrinker
Mclusky
Spencer McGarry Season
Ninjah
*or, in one case, lived with in a house so messy that someone once remarked that they'd "seen tidier crackdens"
posted by howfar at 2:11 PM on April 20, 2021 [2 favorites]
I will indugle my nostalgia with a few links to stuff by people I either knew or sort of knew from that scene*:
Rhodri Viney
Gindrinker
Mclusky
Spencer McGarry Season
Ninjah
*or, in one case, lived with in a house so messy that someone once remarked that they'd "seen tidier crackdens"
posted by howfar at 2:11 PM on April 20, 2021 [2 favorites]
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posted by yellowcandy at 12:22 PM on April 19, 2021