Show #2589: Saturday 13th April 2024 - Y Dail / Hazmat / Datblygu
Show #2589: Saturday 13th April 2024 - Y Dail / Hazmat / Datblygu
Adam Walton, BBC Radio Wales, 13th April 2024: Y Dail interview / The Long Song - Hazmat 'Pulling Away From Me' / Behind The Track - Datblygu 'Gwlad Ar Fy Nghefn' / Gareth Potter selects... + more
Listen again via BBC Sounds here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001y6xz
PLEASE NOTE: This isn’t an official BBC / BBC Wales post. All words / opinions expressed here are my own.
Music's like daylight. It's essential. It can bring hope and joy. It doesn't matter that it's the same component parts - photons and waves - as it always has been, and always will be, it's where it lands, what it illuminates that makes all the difference.
Y Dail - a.k.a. Pontypridd's Huw Griffiths - is in the lineage of great, off-centre, psychedelic Welsh pop music that includes Eyes of Blue, Galwad Y Mynydd, Meic Stevens, Ffa Coffi Pawb, Gorky's Zygotic Mynci (including Euros and Richard's solo releases), Super Furry Animals (including Gruff, Cian, Guto, Bunf and Das Koolies' releases), Ectogram, Topper, Derrero, Colorama, Y Niwl, Cate Le Bon, Race Horses, El Goodo, Boy Azooga, Ynys. I'd use the well-worn phrase "acid tinged" but I don't think hallucinogens are entirely responsible. Wales' psychogeography (if I can repurpose a phrase that's urban in origin for a country - and an effect - that is mostly un-urban) and the myths, folklore and outsider history that still influence us, also play their part in a natural proclivity for wonderment and embracing what flutters beyond the daylight spectrum.
We exist between states: sunshine rain hills valleys the sea spring autumn summer winter urban industrial post industrial rural wilderness, almost on any day and from any viewpoint (although the sea is - admittedly - hard to spot from Welshpool).
There are parallel dimensions at every turn. It's no wonder that Welsh creative souls can so naturally suggest a magic beyond the mundane.
That doesn't mean we wear wizard's hats. Quite the contrary.
And it's not a reductive observation. None of the artists mentioned sound the same. I just want to explore and contextualise the lineage to which Y Dail's debut album 'Teigr' is a new and vibrant addition.
Like all the best debut albums, the first time I listened to 'Teigr' it sounded like the same song 13 times. (Well, 11 times, because 'Feel the Sun' is dressed so differently and the final track - 'Tarth Y Bore' - builds to a recorder-driven, string-swooned, choral climax that might hint at a more orchestrated, 'Odessey and Oracle'-like successor.)
It's not the sign of a limited imagination. It's evidence of the absolute opposite. Songwriters who don't have songs, artists without art, throw so many colours onto their palette everything becomes inevitable brown. Huw paints in a palette of bittersweet but vibrant hues. The glorious devil is in the details of the songs themselves. You actually benefit from listening, rather than just reposting / liking / sharing / surface-dipping for Tik Tok kudos.
Any album that tickles similar synapses as The Lovin' Spoonful, The Monkees, The Modern Lovers, baroque Kinks, Prefab Sprout, Mercury Rev, Aldous Harding and Tom Verlaine - amongst many others - is brimful of tonic for these challenging times.
There are Brian Eno double-tracked eBow guitars; dew-dappled melodies that sound like they're embroidered from the resonant frequencies of best dreams; Motown handclaps; sunset sunrise key changes; slide carousel snapshots; ‘Dr Robert’ fuzz; off kilter vignettes, Tarot Cards of tuneage; the endless, untrammelled possibilities of youth; Burt Bacharach and Hal David chord changes on junkshop guitars; Joe Meek Clavioline. And a philosophy of fearless ambition: "Why can't I make a great pop album to stand alongside the greatest pop albums?" (You can. You have.)
'Teigr' is further compelling evidence that pop music is as adaptable as the human imagination and experience. Love didn't end the day someone got married. Neither did music end the day some people stopped actually listening.
Is it going to change the world? Unlikely. Will it make the world a better place? Undoubtedly.
'Teigr' burning bright? You bet. Your ears will need shades.
Huw 'Y Dail' Griffiths is my special guest talking about 'Teigr' in the final hour of the show. As you can tell, I'm a fan, and Huw is as eloquent, enthused and fascinating as his music.
Datblygu were a generational band. No amount of my words are needed to underline their cultural import because Datblygu's catalogue of music has already woven itself so deeply, fundamentally and subversively into Welsh music present and future.
They were the dissonant voice throwing poetic molotov cocktails at the venerated, cosy Welsh cultural establishment: a milieu of jobs for life in areas - the arts and media - where no such thing was guaranteed for those actually capable of making Wales contemporary, honest and international.
David R. Edwards' sardonic wit, his brutally beautiful way with words, baited the sacred cows and institutions of Wales, and were an unflinching portrait of Welsh life from the mid 80's until his death in 2021.
David's words are - understandably - often the focus of attention when Datblygu are discussed, but David's rich, vital lyrics and delivery would have been little more than the barracking of slate-bellied clouds had it not been for Patricia Morgan's post punk situationist songscapes of guitars, drum machines and keyboards. PiL, The Slits, Gang of Four, Joy Division, Cabaret Voltaire, The Fall were probably sonic influences, but as with anything that ultimately emerges as original, tracing influences is nothing more than a forensic exercise.
Datblygu's influence and inspiration is more than lyrical and sonic, it's because they had the courage to shake the cage and the chops to face off, prick and deflate the dilettantes and oppressors.
In their early days Pat worked with Adwaith. I imagine that much of those conversations was about encouraging them to be bravely themselves and to not trickle into the mainstream, losing their them-ness and musical personality. That's Datblygu's legacy, as I see it.
Pat joins us this week to talk about Datblygu's 'Gwlad Ar Fy Nghefn' in Behind the Track. It's a brilliant, illuminating and inspirational 4 minutes of radio.
Don't miss it.
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
Steve Davis and Gaz Williams - 'Brain Freeze'
Bristol / Ffrith
Elkka - 'Your Skin'
Cardiff
Pickle Head - 'Millennial Falcon'
Cardiff
http://pickle00head.bandcamp.com
Buzzard Buzzard Buzzard - 'Sugar Sandwich'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/buzzardbuzzardbuzzard/
Dactyl Terra - 'Sugar'
Cardiff
http://dactylterra.com
Helen Love - 'Stay With Me'
Swansea
http://damagedgoods.co.uk/discography/helen-love-yeah-yeah-were-helen-love/
The Dead Flowerz - 'Cheers To The Weekend'
Rhondda Valleys
http://www.thedeadflowerz.co.uk/
Datblygu - 'Gwlad Ar Fy Nghefn [fersiwn Wyau]'
Cardigan
http://ankstmusik.bandcamp.com
SHLUG - 'Grated Thumbs'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/shlug.official
Novo Amor - 'Me v2'
Y Fan, Llanidloes
DJ Nervous - 'Cool Because You Wear Carhartt'
Cardiff
http://soundcloud.com/officialdjnervous
Tom Jenkins - 'Letter From The Hill (Huw Stephens Live Session 2024)'
Pontypridd
http://facebook.com/tomjenkinsmusic1
THE LONG SONG #039 - HAZMAT
Hazmat - 'Pulling Away From Me'
Wrexham
http://linktr.ee/hazzzzmat
Qiguai - 'The Bells of Breg'
Cardiff / Stafford
http://instagram.com/qiguaimusic
HARD DRIVE DEEP DIVE #007
Goodnight Said Florence - 'Blu'
Wrexham
http://link2wales.co.uk/2012/latest-news/goodnight-said-florence/
The Joy Formidable - 'Balls [live TJF Music Club 2024]'
Mold
http://thejoyformidable.com
Hannah Grae - 'It Could've Been You'
Port Talbot
http://instagram.com/hannah_grae
Baby Schillaci - 'Ultra HD Happy Face [edit]'
Swansea
Noah Bouchard - 'Sometimes'
Cardiff
http://facebook.com/noahbouchardmusic
Fabiana Palladino - 'Closer'
Cardiff parentage
http://fabianapalladino.com
The Honest Poet - 'No Good ft. Rowen Brittany'
Chepstow
http://facebook.com/TheHonestPoet8/
Rona Mac - 'showmehowyoumourn'
Pembrokeshire
http://ronamacmusic.com
Campfire Social - 'Patsy Decline'
Chester / Newbridge
http://campfiresocial.co.uk
BEHIND THE TRACK #009 - DATBLYGU 'Gwyad Ar Fy Nghefn (John Peel Session Version)
Datblygu - 'Gwlad Ar Fy Nghefn (John Peel Session Version)'
Cardigan
http://ankstmusik.bandcamp.com
GARETH POTTER SELECTS...
Llwybr Llaethog - 'Dinas Fawr'
Blaenau Ffestiniog / Cardiff
http://llwybrllaethog.bandcamp.com
Skamma - 'Rudeboy ft. JWillz, Load B and Kaye'
Barry
http://instagram.com/skammagram
Sydney Fate - 'Karma'
Cardiff
http://sydneyfate.net
Plastic Estate - 'Open Eyes'
Cardiff
http://instagram.com/plasticestate
Popeth x Leusa Rhys - 'Dal y Gannwyll'
Ysbyty Ifan / Aberconwy
Oracle - 'System Failure'
Bridgend / Newport
http://soundcloud.com/oraclesmusic
Y DAIL INTERVIEW ABOUT 'TEIGR'
Y Dail - 'The Piper Pulled Down the Sky'
Pontypridd
http://ydail.bandcamp.com
Y Dail - 'Feel The Sun'
Pontypridd
http://ydail.bandcamp.com
Y Dail - 'Whizz Kids'
Pontypridd
http://ydail.bandcamp.com
Redwood City - 'Uptight'
Caerphilly
http://instagram.com/redwoodcityuk
Mascot Moth - 'Treiglad Meddwl'
Llanfyllin, Powys
http://mascotmoth.bandcamp.com
Bruna Garcia - 'Temperature'
Cardiff
http://instagram.com/BrunaGarciamusic
Kate Miriam - 'And In'
Bannau Brycheiniog
http://instagram.com/katemiriammusic
SHOW STATS
505 diff songs/ 563 Total. 368 Artists in 15 shows since 1st, Jan '24 (~Songs per:38, Unique artists per:25) Welsh:99% Cymraeg:10% (feat. lyrics in Welsh); Source: Uploader:43%, Direct:16%, Bought:17%, 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