BBC Introducing: Rigadoo! review

By Stephen Morris
Website contributor

Coleford-based band Riagdoo! offer a pretty eclectic mix of music

Let's call it an irrational prejudice: the fear that a band that plays a mix of folk, rock, blues and country, which they generally perform in country pubs, is going to be not very good.

It's a terrible, terrible assumption to make - but one sadly based on truth. Many a Saturday night in many an otherwise affable local has been disturbed by a pub band massacring Hotel California.

Rigadoo! embrace a list of styles as long as your arm: folk, jazz, country, blues, funk, punk, AOR, ska and even the odd hint of heavy metal. Stephen Morris

And so it was with this due sense of caution and extreme dread that I approached Forest of Dean band Rigadoo! I needn't have worried. This band is actually quite good.

Rigadoo! have a whole album available for your listening pleasure. It's called Follow the River and can be bought from the band's website along with other internet sources. It could well be worth an investment.

The contents of their press release (usually an outlet with which bands are prone to more wild claims than your average Dan Brown novel) is surprisingly accurate: the over-used terms "multi-talented", "diversity" oh, and "enjoyable" are, for once, entirely appropriate.

Just listen out for the opening violin solo on the title track: part folky fiddle, part seal mating call. It's an impressively versatile start to an album. And there's more of where that came from.

Rigadoo! embrace a list of styles as long as your arm: folk, jazz, country, blues, funk, punk, AOR, ska and even the odd hint of heavy metal.

Rigadoo! Mike Edwards: Bass, vocals Mike Mullan: Rhythm guitar, vocals Jane Pearl: Vocals, percussion Sam Jones: Drums Lyndon Webb: Lead guitar, fiddle, mandolin, keyboards

Somehow, all of these styles are filtered into a homogenised sound that is resolutely Rigadoo!, whether the band's playing twelve-bar blues or performing the Ramones-y "I don't Feel (Afraid)".

The lead singer on the majority of the songs is Mike Edwards. His vocal style is somewhere between the three (intriguingly northern) points of Ian Curtis' sneer, the strain of Nigel Blackwell of Half Man Half Biscuit fame, and the snarl of The Wedding Present's David Gedge.

It's a voice that provides a gritty appeal on top of all the violins, guitars, mandolins and drums.

The songs themselves follow a traditional folk theme, even where the music veers away from the genre.

There are personal stories about the Forest of Dean's mining past (The Old Miner), a very traditional (and slightly Billy Bragg-ish) folk number called Jolly Beggarman and an up to the minute song that goes by the name of Credit Crunch Blues.

Folk music has always embraced the social concerns of the day: "I'm Sick of Singing and Dancing" follows this tradition too with an angry employee's rant to his boss.

So it is only fitting that a band so folky in spirit, should embrace the recession with the credit crunch song - complete with a saxophone solo.

It is also entirely consistent that the same band rants and raves about health and safety regulations in Safety in Numbers.

Rigadoo! are a pleasant surprise of a band with a very well produced album. Sure enough they do have their twee moments: the album's closing track, What's Gonna Be is a little drippy in places.

Then again, I heard Simon and Garfunkel's Leaves that are Green on the radio this morning and had the same thought. And a bit of drippiness didn't seem to do Paul and Art any harm…

Any twee-ness is more than made up for in the main body of the album which mixes wit, passion and empathy with as much imagination as it does the various musical styles featured.

The result is an album with brains and a band not afraid to use theirs. Good stuff.