SAM AMIDON en showcase @ Balades Sonores

Le nouvel album de l’artiste américain Sam Amidon sort sur River Lea, label folk de Rough Trade.
Il sera disponible chez Balades Sonores le jour de ce showcase exclusif, et vous pouvez le réserver dès aujourd’hui par là 

Chanteur et multi-instrumentiste (banjo, guitare, violon) originaire du Vermont et aujourd’hui basé à Londres,
Sam Amidon présente un catalogue de sept albums, sortis du Bedroom Community et Nonesuch Records,
Salt River est son huitième album et premier sur River Lea, en collaboration avec le génial Sam Gendel.

« Salt River follows a busy and rewarding creative period for Amidon, which has recently seen him covering Bon Iver’s Sable EP in full at Justin Vernon’s request at the EP’s London launch in October; coaching actors Josh O’Connor and Paul Mescal in ballad singing for the forthcoming World War I movie The History Of Sound as well as collaborating on the film’s soundtrack; and teaming up with choreographer Michael Keegan Dolan on the new stage work Nobodaddy, which entwines Amidon’s music with modern dance and theatre. Nobodaddy premiered in Belfast in September 2024, followed by 10 sold-out performances at the Dublin Theatre Festival, and will come to Sadler’s Wells in London for four performances in November.

The multi-instrumentalist has also previously collaborated with the likes of The National, The Britten Sinfonia, Beth Orton, Lonnie Holley, Marc Ribot, the Kronos Quartet and The Blind Boys of Alabama, among many more.

Salt River will be Amidon’s first record for Rough Trade Records’ sister label River Lea, who have previously released albums with the likes of John Francis Flynn, Lisa O’Neil, Ye Vagabonds and more, confirming its place at folk music’s ever-evolving vanguard. »

Watch the video for launch single ‘I’m On My Journey Home’

The Vermont native, who is now based in London, has collaborated with saxophonist and producer Sam Gendel to reinterpret and regenerate ten songs that he has gathered together as part of a decades-long quest to recontextualise what it means to sing folk songs or make folk music.

The music on Salt River ranges from traditional Appalachian ballad “Golden Willow Tree” to a radical reimagining of Lou Reed’s ”Big Sky,” and was recorded by Amidon, Gendel and percussionist Philippe Melanson, who played together as a trio during sessions at Gendel’s home in Los Angeles.

Having initially encountered Gendel at his now-fabled residency at the Hollywood Italian restaurant Pace, Amidon and Gendel have collaborated on various recordings and concerts over the past few years; but Salt River is their first extended collaboration, sparked when Amidon suggested they delve into his treasure box of collected songs.

As Sam himself describes, “This album is a campfire, but the campfire is around Sam Gendel’s synthesizer. Or maybe it’s a journey through the corridors of my memory, if my memory was transplanted into Sam and Phil’s dreams.”

Taken together, these 10 songs feel like a shared playground of discovery, with Amidon finding new ways for old songs to exist in the company of his two unfettered collaborators.

The trio imbue Reed’s “Big Sky” with the aplomb of Arthur Russell as fluorescent stretches of synthesiser and shuddering electronic drums interlock with acoustic guitars from Gendel and Amidon; traditional hymn “Old Churchyard” is stunningly rechristened “Three Five” as it tessellates rhythms and electronic layers to evoke a redemptive cloud break, while dishes and glasses clink on their joyful rendition of Ornette Coleman’s ode to communality, “Friends And Neighbours.”

Lead single “I’m On My Journey Home” truly typifies the album’s approach giving the New England folk song first noted in the 1700s an authentic yet contemporary new life.

Inspired by a “loose swing that I had not heard in other shape note singing recordings” that Amidon found on a rendition of the song by early 20th-century vocal group, The Denson Quartet, the new recording sets the tone for the whole album.

‘“I’m On My Journey Home’ was the first one we tried as a trio and it woke us up,” declares Amidon. « It set us down the path of making Salt River.”