Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about the relationship between music and place. Whilst I’ve been mulling this over for some time, it came to a head seeing Shovel Dance Collective on Friday at the Hope and Ruin with my pals Andy and Grace. Shovel Dance Collective are (as the name suggests) a collective of 9 musicians who explore and reinterpret the traditional folk music of the British Isles, drawing from their diverse backgrounds of folk, drone, free improvization and even metal. They were superb; this date was the first night of their UK tour, and I can strongly recommend to catch them at one of their remaining dates if you have the opportunity. But the reason that I bring them up is that they finished the night by performing an a capella version of ‘Thousands or More’, a song by the Copper Family which I’ve linked below.
The Copper family have lived in Rottingdean and Peacehaven, two small towns on the white cliffs of Sussex, for over 400 years, and during that time they have remained the stewards of a number of local folk songs which have passed down from generation to generation. It was a surreal thing to be at a gig and suddenly be hit with the weight of both history and place; to look around at people from all generations singing along to a song that had been sung by folks living on this small stretch of coastline for literal centuries. I however, sadly did not know the words (although thankfully the song is pretty easy to pick up and join in on). Infact, I have only recently been made aware of the Copper family thanks to a dedication on the inside cover of an album from a band that are very important to me. A band that will always resonate in my mind as belonging to the Sussex coast, and the band that started me on my musings between music and geography. Today, we’re talking about Sea Power.
I first discovered Sea Power, formerly known as British Sea Power, not due to geography, but maths. Mr Wood, my mathematics teacher at Ringmer Community College, was the brother of ‘Woody’, the drummer of the band, who had made Brighton their second home after migrating down from their homes in the Lake District. He would mention their exploits from time to time - telling tales of fighting bears on stage and crowds waving branches of foliage they’d scavenged before gigs. I can’t quite remember when I made the leap from knowing this fact to actually listening to them, but once I had I was hooked, and I've been an avid fan of Sea Power ever since. I remember loving their 2008 record Do You Like Rock Music? so much that I burnt a copy of the album to a blank CD for my mum to play in her car, marking the one of the first bands that I introduced to my parents.
But why do I love them so much? The thing that immediately captivated my attention and has continued to draw me back to the band over the years is their appreciation and respect for nature, and more broadly the natural landscape of the British Isles. I can think of few other bands where in listening to their discography you are exposed to esoteric treatises on light pollution (‘Lights Out For Darker Skies’), antarctic ice shelves (‘Oh Larsen B’), or climate change and historic flooding events (‘Canvey Island’). But these mentions and references are not there to gatekeep, or block you out; they are a letting-in, an invitation to explore the history that is around us in both man-made and natural worlds, and in particular the spaces where they collide.
Take ‘Carrion’, from their first record, the excellently titled The Decline of British Sea Power. It’s a wicked song, crackling with energy that’s harnessed to create an uplifting anthem of appreciation for the shores of the British Isles. Drawing parallels between the drowning of doggerland (the landmass now lost beneath the North Sea, only remembered when trawlers occasionally bring up the remains of woolly mammoths that once roamed its landscape), the historical naval locations of Scapa Flow and Rotherhithe, and “the lapping of an ebbing tide”, they’re able to summon a sentimental connection to the coastlines of our country and the temporary nature of our existence in comparison with the historical or geological. But these connections didn’t just stop at the music itself. When they released it as a single, they hand inscribed a unique British coastal feature on each of the 1,264 copies they had pressed, from Land’s End to Fingal’s Cave. But why 1264 copies specifically? Why, to match the date of the battle of Lewes of course! I adore this attention to detail; every discovery feels like you’ve solved a piece of a great puzzle, the limits of which cannot be observed. There’s an endless well of intrigue and mystery here, of excitement at the lost past enbedded in the landscape under our feet.
So, as you probably have guessed by now, we’re doing something a little different this week. Your postcard today contains 10 of my personal favourite tracks by Sea Power, picked to showcase the range of their musical output. One track that could have just as easily slotted in my Spring playlist last week is ‘Machineries of Joy’, the title track of Sea Power’s 5th ‘proper’ album, released in 2013. It’s a track that is constantly whirring and unfolding before you, driven by that ever present motorik drum beat (one of my fav little tricks in music) and ringing drone, but riding the waves of dynamic build and release. It also contains one of my favourite lyrics of all time, a line that to me is as inscrutable as it is beautifully evocative: ”We are a vision of extraordinary contortion/an athletic form of warm distortion”.
‘Canvey Island’, from Do You Like Rock Music?, is far more blunt in it’s lyrical delivery. Drawing parallels between the 58 lives (and football records) lost during the flooding of the titular Canvey Island in 1953 and the looming threat of climate change, it’s a song that has only become more poignant as time has shown it’s warning to “brace yourself for storms and summer droughts” to be increasingly correct. The soundscape they conjour matches this so well; I love how Woody heralds in the crashing wave of guitars in the chorus with those three drum hits, almost mirroring the warning signs discussed in the lyrics. And the chorus itself - oh man, it just sounds enormous. I don’t know what they’ve done to their guitars to get them to sound like a howling storm, but my god I’m thankful for it. It’s just fucking great.
Finally, closing out the playlist we have a song which is very dear to my heart. ‘The Smallest Church in Sussex’ is, unsurprisingly, about the smallest church in Sussex - Lullington Church, just a few miles north of Cuckmere Haven (and handily close to the Long Man brewery if you fancy a visit). Recorded using the actual harmonium inside the church, ‘The Smallest Church in Sussex’ is just a flatly beautiful song that touches on place, memory and lost relationships in a way that leaves me a yearning for the smells and heat of my childhood summers spent in the Sussex countryside. A few years ago now on one sunny November afternoon, I managed to gather a foolhardly crew to come with me on a musical pilgrimage bike ride from Brighton to the church. In looking back in fondness at the photos from that ride, I am struck again by the elegance and relevance of some of its closing lyrics: “I have been so glad here/Looking forward to the past here”.
Here’s the Tidal link for anyone who needs it today. And thanks for indulging me with this weeks’ postcard. We’ll be back to our normal offerings next week, I promise. Until then, listen to these songs and think of who may be listening to them 400 years down the line.
Postcard 12: 08/04/2024.
Sea Power - From the Sea to the Land Beyond (from From the Sea to the Land Beyond, 2013)
Sea Power - Lights Out For Darker Skies (from Do You Like Rock Music?, 2008)
Sea Power - Oh Larsen B (from Open Season, 2005)
Sea Power - Whirling-In-Rags, 8 AM (from the Disco Elysium soundtrack, 2021)
Sea Power - Cleaning Out the Rooms (from Valhalla Dancehall, 2011)
Sea Power - Machineries of Joy (from Machineries of Joy, 2013)
Sea Power - Canvey Island (from Do You Like Rock Music?, 2008)
Sea Power - A Light Above Descending (from Sea of Brass, 2015)
Sea Power - Lately (from The Decline of British Sea Power, 2003)
Sea Power - The Smallest Church in Sussex (B-side to ‘Remember Me’ single, 2003)