Music
Shovel Dance Collective's 'Everything in Readiness' is a Dissonant Folk Assault
A nine-piece London collective is tearing apart traditional folk music, forging a sound that is simultaneously raging, lo-fi, and joyful. Their latest offering, *Everything in Readiness*, uses jarring sonic shifts to link Britain’s violent past with the present day, positioning their work as an intense, almost hallucinatory confrontation with history.
The Sonic Collision: Shovel Dance Collective’s Ecstatic Dissonance
The arrival of Shovel Dance Collective, marked by their third album *Everything in Readiness*, signals a significant recalibration within the landscape of folk music. This nine-piece London-based group is making a deliberate choice to bypass the gentle introduction of newcomers; instead, they deploy a bracing approach to traditional music that sounds simultaneously raging, lo-fi, and profoundly joyful. Their core ambition is to forge a visceral link between Britain’s violent past and its present moment, positioning themselves within an electric folk wave that has seen its initial optimism curdle into the dark realities of the early 1970s.
The sonic architecture of *Everything in Readiness* is constructed through chaotic collage. The album kicks off with a three-song suite that stretches over ten minutes, utilizing dramatic sonic jump-cuts to propel the listener through a dizzying journey. This sequence moves jarringly from a grinding one-note drone to a reel that seems to split the difference between traditional folk fiddle playing and the punishing squall of the Velvet Underground’s "Black Angel’s Death Song." This initial assault is intentionally unsettling, yet it manages to achieve a strange euphoria—a purgative release following the mounting sonic weirdness.
Deconstructing Tradition: Folk as Political Weaponry
Shovel Dance Collective’s methodology for engaging with traditional English music is inherently provocative. The group employs a glib shorthand suggesting they are mirroring the approach of groups like Lankum in their handling of Irish equivalents, weaving in an experimentation reminiscent of the boundary-pushing found in publications like *Wire* magazine. However, it is crucial to note that their chaotic collage feels distinct from those more overtly experimental collections of field recordings and avant-garde composition released by labels such as Folklore Tapes.
The music careens unpredictably across a wide spectrum. Listeners encounter gentle lo-fi recordings saturated with distortion and tape hiss alongside tumultuous, surging racket on tracks like the coalminer’s song "Jowl, Jowl and Listen." Furthermore, they venture into disquieting ambient shimmer with pieces such as "Who Killed Cock Robin? A Summoning (Kind Morning in our Fists)," which evokes the atmosphere of a vast, echoing crypt. This unpredictability is central to their appeal, suggesting that embracing traditional music’s sinister overtones can function as a search for connection—a reaffirmation that the country has always been turbulent and strange.
The Political Echoes: History and Anarchy
The group’s willingness to dig into contemporary resonances within material hundreds of years old positions them squarely in this vein. Their approach suggests an impulse toward retreating into the certainties of a historical music that spoke of a more stable past, a concept Rob Young’s peerless history of "Britain’s visionary music" once championed. This exploration aligns with the electric folk wave—which included acts like Fairport Convention and Pentangle—that repurposed traditional music’s bleakness for the twitchy, post-9/11 era.
The album’s thematic density extends into darker territory. Tracks such as "I Wish There Was No Prisons" are viewed as a 19th-century equivalent of anarchist stickers proliferating during economic hardship. This connects to the broader cultural context where folk music can function as a search for connection, reaffirming that the country has always been violent and strange. The album’s sound is not merely historical homage; it is an active engagement with the visceral bloodiness inherent in traditional forms.
Sonic Textures: From Drone to Euphoria
The sheer variety within *Everything in Readiness* is what ultimately captures the listener. The sonic palette moves fluidly from the abrasive and harsh to the ethereal, featuring everything from unaccompanied vocal performances against birdsong to the disquieting ambient shimmer of "Who Killed Cock Robin?" The instrumentation itself is deliberately obscured; while a heavily distorted guitar is certainly present, the resulting effect is euphoric rather than claustrophobic.
The album showcases moments where the sound dissolves entirely, offering experiences that leave the listener feeling faintly punch-drunk and disoriented. This textural play—moving between lo-fi recordings and complex arrangements—is what makes the experience so compelling. It suggests that embracing traditional forms can be a method for finding new sonic language, rather than simply replicating old sounds.
Contextualizing the Moment: Beyond Folk Boundaries
While Shovel Dance Collective occupies a distinct niche, it is worth noting the broader cultural currents influencing contemporary music consumption. The current climate sees artists aggressively pushing boundaries across genres, exemplified by acts like Angèle, who are breaking pop’s language barrier through eclectic, sometimes jarring sonic shifts that blend chanson with machine-gun-paced noise and lo-fi piano ballads.
This environment suggests that the success of Shovel Dance Collective lies in its ability to create something entirely unique—a sound that does not neatly fit established folk or experimental boxes. They operate in a space where artists are encouraged to be both deeply personal and aggressively strange, offering listeners an experience that is intentionally difficult to pin down, much like the complex interplay between dancefloor energy and conversational restraint currently being debated in club culture.
‘It’s an experience that leaves you feeling faintly punch-drunk and disoriented.’
‘The music on Everything in Readiness careens unpredictably from gentle lo-fi recordings caked in distortion and tape hiss to the tumultuous, surging racket they serve up on their version of the traditional coalminer’s song Jowl, Jowl and Listen’
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