Show #2587: Saturday 30th March 2024 - Kelly Lee Owens / Nookee / EVILS
Adam Walton, BBC Radio Wales, 30th March 2024: The Long Song - Nookee 'Devil's Dining Room' / Behind The Track - Kelly Lee Owens 'Jeanette' / Hard Drive Deep Dive - EVILS + more
Listen again via BBC Sounds here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001xs4k
PLEASE NOTE: This isn’t an official BBC / BBC Wales post. All words / opinions expressed here are my own.
Kelly Lee Owens comes from one of the most under-celebrated corners of Wales. Bagillt perches on the banks of the Dee estuary looking out over the Wirral and - just beyond - the Liverpool skyline. It's rural but with a tantalising glimpse of urbanity on the horizon. When the sun slow crashes into the Irish Sea every evening, the vista Kelly would have looked out over as she grew up is transformed into neon, sodium and halogen... an electric landscape ripe for exploratory imaginations.
It's not contentious to say that geography is a key inspiration to musical souls: whether it was the rhythm of the steel mills in Sheffield informing Cabaret Voltaire, The Human League and Warp Records; the heavy industry of the West Midlands driving the pistons of Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath; or - here in Wales - rural idylls in Snowdonia and Pembrokeshire synaesthesing the hallucinatory imaginations of Gorky's, Super Furries, Y Niwl et al.
So I imagine that one of the reasons Kelly's visionary electronic music stands apart from the music of her peers is the yin and the yang of tussocky sheep-shit field daytimes and the blinking LED's and shifting luminous dials of the estuaries at night.
Of course, her music is much richer and nuanced than just those polarities.
Since her debut as a solo artist in 2014, Kelly has released three albums of wondrous palette-expanding music. She's not the first artist to explore the rich hinterlands between digital and analogue paradigms by any means. She has a true artist's ear for an aesthetic whole, substrates of sounds that are naturalistically interdependent of each other, through Kelly's soul, skill, imagination and - often - her exquisite vocals.
Kelly's worked with inspirational epochal artists like Jenny Hval, Daniel Avery, Erol Alkan, Bjork, St Vincent and John Cale. The fact that she stands shoulder to shoulder in these collaborations is great testament to the esteem in which she is held. More recently Kelly supported Depeche Mode as they wowed stadiums filled with tens of thousands of people across the world.
Kelly's second album, 'Inner Song', has been a frequent companion since its release in 2020. It works on so many levels. I walk at night with it casting its spell directly through the streetlight glow. It's also on when I need a lift (the choral flourishes of 'On' are levitating, even on the heaviest days). And if I need inspiration for the music I want to make, it's a benchmark of vision and excellence... despite the fact that I'm a hobbyist operating in a very different field. (Although mine were tussocky and sheep-shit filled, as well).
For this week's Behind The Track, Kelly very kindly gives us an insight into 'Inner Song's' centrepiece, 'Jeanette': one of the most beloved pieces of music I've ever played on the radio, judging by the response it garners every time I play it.
Too often commentators focus on the precision and technological coldness of electronic music, and - of course - that is a valid philosophy, but 'Jeanette' is so soulful, yearning, bruised and healing within its arpeggios that build and build until they take flight.
'Jeanette' is a tribute to Kelly's grandmother, after her death, and love and a sense of loss inform every moment of this tour de force composition and production. Magnificent and so moving.
The Long Song this week comes from Nookee. Nookee are as much a collective and a philosophy as a 'band'. There's an uproarious, unquenchable love for music across a boggling array of flavours, both in terms of performing music and composing / recording their songs.
And there's a rare sense of community and collaboration to what they do, too. Music by committee doesn't always work, but in this instance - Nookee's current single, 'Devil's Dining Room' - it most definitely does. It's Sly and the Family Stone reborn for the 21st century... soul, blues, prog and psychedelia in a thrilling, dramatic sonic gumbo that sounds unlike anything else I've ever heard come out of Wales.
Violet and Gemma's ecstatic voices are not to be ignored. Nookee are not to be ignored. Lord alone knows where they'll go next, but it most definitely will not be moribund and most definitely will be worthy of our attention.
Please do send new music excellence to me via the BBC Introducing Uploader or as a download link to my BBC email address. You'll work it out. It has a dot between my first name and my last name.
Keep on trucking x
THIS WEEK’S PLAYLIST
Public Order - 'HELLO'
Merthyr Tydfil / Porthcawl
http://facebook.com/PublicOrderUK
Niques - 'Mate'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/Niquestheartist
Yours, Ours - 'Better'
Swansea
http://facebook.com/YoursOursUk
Slate - 'Remoter Heaven'
Cardiff
http://instagram.com/slatecaban
Murder Club - 'CryBaby'
Newport
http://facebook.com/Murderclubuk
MissFaithee - 'Take'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/MissFaithee
Siula - 'Lucid Love'
Cardiff
http://instagram.com/siula_x
Lucas Alexander - 'Soz Not Soz'
Cardiff / Jamaica
http://facebook.com/DjLucasAlexander
Llwybr Llaethog - 'Cyfundrefn Gyfalafol'
Blaenau Ffestiniog / Cardiff
http://llwybrllaethog.bandcamp.com
Elle Darlington - 'One More Night'
Prestatyn
http://instagram.com/elledarlington
Swansea Sound - 'Markin' It Down'
Swansea
http://swanseasound.bandcamp.com
Helen Love - 'Swansea's Got An Our Price'
Swansea
http://damagedgoods.co.uk/discography/helen-love-yeah-yeah-were-helen-love/
Picsel - 'F****d Society [radio edit]'
Swansea
Toby Hay & Aidan Thorne - 'Good Morning'
Rhayader / Cardiff
Mari Mathias - 'Pan O'wn y Gwanwyn ft. Angharad Iris & Evie Rey'
Ceredigion
http://facebook.com/marimathiasmusic
4Dee - 'Strike Lightning & Thunder'
Cardiff
Katielou - 'Trouble'
Newport
http://www.dirtycarrotrecords.co.uk/artists/katielou
HARD DRIVE DEEP DIVE #005…
Evils - 'Juliet Bravo Theme'
Cardiff
http://lazerbeamproductions.com
The Meritones - 'Ashdown Sales'
Cardiff
http://instagram.com/themeritones
Samana - 'The Knife'
Talybont On Usk
http://samanaroad.com
THE LONG SONG #037…
Nookee - 'Devil's Dining Room'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/NookeeBand
Y Dail - 'Pedwar Weithiau Pump'
Pontypridd
http://ydail.bandcamp.com
Angus Powell - 'The Art of Letting Go'
Pennant / Carno
http://facebook.com/Anguspowellmusic
Sybs - 'Canned Laughter'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/SYBSband
Twst - 'Was I Ever Alone? (Tsatsamis' Hymn)'
Barry
http://instagram.com/twstwstwstwst
Guilty Party - 'Wanna Change'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/guiltypartyo
BEHIND THE TRACK #008...
Manic Street Preachers - 'Solitude Sometimes Is'
Blackwood
http://manicstreetpreachers.com
Kelly Lee Owens - 'Jeanette'
Bagillt
Movement81 - 'Over'
Swansea
http://instagram.com/movement.81
falselove - 'chemicals'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/falseloveuk
JP - 'Say Ya Won't'
Wrexham
http://tiktok.com/@j.pqpwxm
Honddu - 'The Gallop of Love'
Brecon
Stereo Club - 'Nice To Be In Orbit'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/StereoClubOfficial/
Eurekas - 'While The World Was Ending (I Was In A Rock & Roll Band)'
Cwmbran / Newport
http://facebook.com/eurekasband
Leri-ena Graham - 'Do What's Right'
Llandudno
http://instagram.com/leri_enagrahammusic
Vega West - 'Hanging Tree'
Machynlleth
http://instagram.com/vegajoyy
TewTewTennau - 'Rhedeg fyny'r mynydd'
Denbighshire / Sir Dinbych
http://facebook.com/TewTewTennau/
The Welcome Party - 'Gracie's Song'
Wrexham
Plainspoke - 'Red Light'
Denver / Cardiff Producers
Amanda Whiting - 'Facing The Sun'
Cardiff
SHOW STATS
428 diff songs/ 484 Total. 328 Artists in 13 shows since 1st, Jan '24 (~Songs per:37, Unique artists per:25) Welsh:99% Cymraeg:10% (feat. lyrics in Welsh); Source: Uploader:43%, Direct:17%, Bought:16%, Plugger:21%, Commission:3%
Comprehensive Session / Interview List: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1w-rIPj0l0QhUcbEm08PUPLUWh-416mwlteG_8wpNWtQ/edit?usp=sharing
Subscribe to my Substack: https://adamwalton.substack.com
Adam Walton