About this item

Following early singles ‘Raglan Road’ and ‘Sheffield Grinder’ and early backing from CLASH, The Quietus, KLOF, Rough Trade, Americana UK and BBC Radio 2’s Folk Show, Brown Wimpenny’s announcement builds on a growing live reputation which has seen them open for folk legend Andy Irvine, record multiple sell-out shows in Manchester and London (including a headline at Hoxton Hall), and notch up festival appearances at Green Man, Fire in the Mountain, plus Cambridge, Sidmouth and Manchester folk festivals.

A collective who mine the transcendental collective power of traditional folk music, Brown Wimpenny, split between Manchester, London and Liverpool, are bringing communities together to celebrate that rich catalog of folk songs owned by no individual in particular bar humanity itself.

Taking their name from a distant 19th century relative of tenor banjoist Seth Lockwood’s, Brown Wimpenny began with informal get-together Sunday jam sessions in his Manchester living room. Growing as large as 25 members before being whittled down to its current number of 11, early gigs saw the band take up half the capacity of the room they were playing in, lyrics being passed around to attendees too, as part of a broader ideal of reducing the gap between audience and performer.

“We see the band as a shared social and creative endeavour.” explains Anna Korbel. “We love the sense of the everyday and the normal, and rejoicing in the collective and communal. I think that's the key to our process and our ethos. We're not over-egging anything. We're just seeing it and playing as it is.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: At times almost devoid of motion, and other unmeasurably frenetic, Brown Wimpenny's music is shaped and informed by traditional folk, with repeated phrases and minimal instrumentation used to forge their sound. Round-robin singing and slowly building melodic elements remind me strongly of the off-kilter alt folk sounds of Set Fire To Flames or Silver Mt. Zion's riotous vocal build.

TRACK LISTING

1. Gas Lights / Seanhamac Tube Station / Sailor’s Wife / Lovely Bann Water
2. The Sheffield Grinder / Black Joak
3. Old Molly Metcalfe
4. O’Keeffe’s / Farewell to Whalley Range
5. Raglan Road
6. I’m Often Drunk and I’m Seldom Sober / Kings of Kerry / Teddy Bear Jig
7. Jesus At Thy Command
8. Pratty Flowers (Holmfirth Anthem)