<img src="http://www.fosca.com/spitz-340.jpg" alt="" align=left>
Here's the final MP3 single from the new <a href="http://www.scarletswell.co.uk/">Scarlet's Well</a> album. This song is called "Blubberhouses" and is written and sung by Bid. It's a prowling, Kurt Weill-esque portrait of the Mousseron butcher's shop. I rather like the line about "raw chicken… smelling like crocodile", inverting the cliché of unusual meat dishes (e.g. crocodile, or human meat) predictably described as tasting of chicken.
It also contains the origin of "Offal Manipulator", one of the higher ranks people can reach at the <a href="http://s6.invisionfree.com/Scarlets_Well/">Scarlet's Well Message Forum</a>, by posting regularly. Other ranks include "Scurvy Scum" and "Bilge Pumper".
Link: http://www.fosca.com/Scarlets-Well-Blubberhouses.mp3
<b>Blubberhouses</b>
<i>Down a greasy alley by the harbour
There's a foggy window in a bay
If you wipe away the dirt
With your filthy little shirt
Oh, you'll see what keeps the sailors all away
It's not the prices that sting
It's the look of the thing
Bright red, bright red, bright red mutton
Glowing in your hands
In a bowel-splattered apron by the counter
Lurks a tatty, gibber-ridden man
As he cackles in his beard
I try not to look weird
Thus, manipulate some offal in my hand
It's not the feel you mistrust
It's the mystical gust
Raw chicken, raw chicken
Smelling like crocodile
The sausages are standing to attention
On a chessboard made of little squares of silk
On the waxwork of a Prince
There's a wig of turkey mince
And some kidneys bobbing in a bowl of milk
And on a sign is writ neat
"Come to my garden of meat"
Give me, give me, give me your liver
Liver like it used to be</i>
If you like it, do investigate its excellent parent album, "The Dream Spider Of The Laughing Horse", out this week on Siesta Records. It's available to buy online from <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0001ZXOW0/ref=sr_aps_music_1_1/026-6467729-9354057">Amazon</a>, or <a href="http://www.siesta.es/pags/disco.asp?codigoSiesta=194">from Siesta themselves</a>.
There's a review in this weekend's Independent On Sunday newspaper, by Simon Price:
"Descended from Indian royalty (it's technically an offence for the Queen of England to step on his shadow), the man known only as Bid is minor indie royalty himself. The former leader of cult 80s heroes The Monochrome Set has been namechecked by the likes of Franz Ferdinand, whose Alex Kapranos is one collaborator on his new project, Scarlet's Well. With Bid's handsome croon alternating with Alice Healey's fragile tones, The Dream Spider Of The Laughing Horse draws on gypsy music, Francopop, showtunes, sitar psychedelia, and rolling indie-folk a la Belle and Sebastian. 3/5 stars."
All very good, but I should mention that the lovely Mr Kapranos's song in question, "The Spell", appears on the <i>first</i> Scarlet's Well album, "Strange Letters" (1999, Siesta). Still, for many that may as well be a new release too.
Tickets for the first Scarlet's Well London concert (May 26th, The Spitz) are available to buy online <a href="http://www.wegottickets.com/gig.asp?3025">here</a>.
