Live on stage at The Trades Club, Hebden Bridge. Pics & Words: Alan Dearling
http://www.sentimentalists.co.uk/about.html
(This web site includes a link to the 2019 video of ‘Satellite’)
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I really enjoy the full-on, quirky, darkly Gothick nature of the Sentimentalists. Front-man, Pip Fowler, strode onto stage with an electric guitar strapped on. Straight into a twisted rock aria. It was a powerful opening number. Perhaps called ‘When it Rains’, and why we really shouldn’t get caught in it! There’s something unexpectedly edgy and uneven in the structure and words of Pip’s songs. ‘Maybe it reminds me of Talking Heads?’ That’s what I found myself thinking. It’s not a bad comparison.
I’ve seen Pip Fowler perform solo quite often. His wry irony, wit and humour work well when he performs on his own, but in the Sentimentalists’ set, it becomes a behemoth – something of a prowling monster. Pip reckons that the Sentimentalists were established in about 2011. It’s a stripped-down performing machine ideally suited to the material and it drives powerfully forwards. The songs and the words are very strange indeed. Sardonic and acerbic. Definitely warped, weird and sometimes bitter and twisted too! “On Chemicals again…listen son…listen before I get my gun!” That’s pretty much a trip through the glass darkly!
Pip’s sardonic humour commenced from the off. “I’m a rock star, don’t worry!” Even his suit looked suitably eccentric. He sang that, “He stared at the moon, and it stared back.” In a song called ‘Change’, Pip exclaimed,
“It’s not worth it when the stars are not your friend”.
“I am far from home and I haven’t moved at all.”
His song, ‘Wait until I tell John Bell’ is a highlight of the set. It’s a roll call of the rich and infamous in the music biz: “I proposed to Madonna…I have been threatened with violence by David Bowie…and…I met Andy Warhol.” Absolutely bonkers – love it! There was plenty more bizarreness – Pip sang that, “I am collecting broken hearts…the bloodier the better…I like their imperfection.” ‘We’ll get by’ is a sing-along-anthem, “I know I don’t listen and neither do you.” All the quirks of human-relationships are stripped bare. The final song from Sentimentalists was satirical, wry and once again complex and provided an opportunity for the band to create a genuine dystopian musical tapestry that was, “So, it’s dark, shining bright.” The band are great too, a macabre heavy-weight team to supply the dynamo for Pip’s extraordinary songs.
This is how they describe themselves: “The Sentimentalists present songs of melancholy, dark humour and gentle defiance, Sentimentalists stand for lyricism, lovely music, and character.”
Mark Radcliffe (BBC radio) recently described Sentimentalists as, “truly marvellous.” Mark Coles (BBC radio) said, “…beautiful…in a miserable way,” and guitarist Pete Greenway from The Fall described Sentimentalists as, “…the band that the world is waiting for.”
Sentimentalists ‘Satellite’ video Severn Arts Leeds 2015: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igUzZXsYp0I&t=208s
Sentimentalists ‘Have A Go Avocado’ video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIlkr54JGI0
The Yorkshire Post wrote about them: “A northern moralistic Ian Dury”; “Tindersticks meet Divine Comedy”; “Alan Bennett meets Sparklehorse”; “Like The Smiths and The Beautiful South, a perfectly mis-matched blend of edgy lyrics and upbeat melodies.”
The whole evening was a fund-raiser for ‘Love Music – Hate Racism’. Daniel Bath was on stage as pianist and MC for most of the evening. There were a number of speeches, exhorting boycotts against Israel, and, more positively, a Kurdish trade unionist from Bradford, suggested that we need to move towards, “A New Day and a society without borders.” Additionally, there were plenty of up-beat, ska and rock-steady vibes, from DJ JoMo and the dancing, bongo-playing Stu Hardcastle. A real dreadlock show with plenty of deep dub-step!
Support came from Amy-Rose Atkinson. Here’s her ‘Joe’s song’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZPonnUE-Sc
Amy-Rose performed powerfully with her quartet. Plus, a guest sax player, Peadar Long. A lot of her songs could be described as ‘soul’, and she even sang, “You’ve got the sun shining in your soul.” A lively and emotional singer and committed to the pro-Palestinian cause, which came over in her song, ‘The Long Way Back Home’. She also made it clear that she was fed up with the ‘scum-bag men’ that had populated her life in the past before she met her bass and guitar playing partner, whom she called ‘Her Prince’.
