Customer Reviews

Lochanside

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
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There's nothing flashy about North Sea Gas. Thank God.

There are plenty of bands out there who are trying to do something a little different with the music, digging deeply into Celtic traditions for source material only to add electric guitars and drum kits to the arrangement, blend a little jazz into the mix or otherwise reinvent the music for a modern audience. And I like that stuff, really I do. But sometimes I want to hear traditional music the way it was meant to be presented, the way it's been performed by generations of musicians who wanted to honor, not alter, their musical roots. Lochanside is an album like that. These three musicians from Scotland is quite comfortable in their own skins, playing and singing with plenty of polish and enthusiasm, but they're content to play their acoustic instruments and sing without undue embellishment. And let me tell you, after sifting through a dozen or so Celtic rock albums, it's refreshing.

That doesn't mean they do it exactly as their fathers and grandfathers did before them. The band's arrangements put an NSG stamp on the music, but it's the sort of thing you'd be as pleased to find in the corner of a pub as you would on-stage.

by Tom Knapp, Rambles.NET editor

I've got Keltic Heritage and Scottish Destiny. Both of those are "better" as they have more classic songs. That said, I'm glad I picked this CD up as well. "Paradimethlaminobenzaldhyde" is a wonderfully funny drug song. Reminds me of the old rhyme about little Johnny mistaking H2SO4 for H20 and now little Johnny is no more.. So get this CD if you already own the other two.

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