Erland and the Carnival
Erland And The Carnival
Release Date: Jan 25, 2010
Genre(s): Rock, Folk
Record label: Full Time Hobby
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Album Review: Erland And The Carnival by Erland and the Carnival
Very Good, Based on 2 Critics
Based on rating 7/10
A supergroup made up of some not-so-memorable musicians, playing a load of covers? It doesn’t exactly jump out as the formula for debut album of the year, does it? Thankfully, that literal description doesn’t do justice to the strange magic that Erland And The Carnival do brew up on their first LP. They’re only a ‘supergroup’ in the sense that two of their members have played in bigger, more famous bands – Simon Tong as a member of The Verve and The Good, The Bad & The Queen, and David Nock as Paul McCartney’s right-hand man in avant garde side-project The Fireman. Two men used to playing out of the limelight then, and that’s how it stays in Erland And The Carnival, as the main focus is singer and guitarist Erland Cooper.
Opinion: Excellent
A freakbeat, folk-savvy take on sample culture. Will Dean 2010 There's not much more British than slightly freaky folk music. As if to prove the point, Erland Cooper has mined these pleasant pastures for a debut album of depth and weird beauty. Along with Cooper, who grew up in Orkney – a place where it's hard to believe there's any other kind of music ever performed except slightly freaky folk music – the Carnival is made up of Simon Tong (The Verve; Blur; The Good, the Bad & the Queen) and David Nock (drummer from Macca's The Fireman offshoot).