Alasdair Roberts – new album and video

Alasdair Roberts

Alasdair Robert’s high-spirited new album, Pangs, is in stores today – and in commemoration with this forthcoming moment of uplift, we share with one and all the newly-minted video for the title track.

Throughout Pangs, Alasdair’s leads a band on electric guitar, offering an evocation of the 60s and 70s folk-rockers of the British Isles – the electric warriors of Fairport Convention, the Battlefield Band, Planxty, Richard Thompson and so many others. Of course, these sounds travel through the music of Alasdair Roberts, which is set very firmly in the world of today. And even a dark lament can lift the heart – the point in fact is ‘Pangs’ itself, a skipping ode considering the phenomenon of “sympathetic birth” – where the pain of the expecting mother is shared by another. We take this to be  Alasdair’s observation of the Brexit/Trump echo, a collapse that has been heard across nations.

It makes sense then that the  ‘Pangs’ video finds Alasdair hitching a ride through hostile counties, standing on the rock of Hadrian’s Walk (the ancient Roman wall built in the north of England to mark the boundary of their empire) and returning, prodigal-son style to a remote castle where children play and a preacher leads his flock. There’s magic involved, via a selenite Crystal Wand, and an evocation of end times. A stark but compelling vision that reminds us to consider others as we do ourselves. With a guitar solo too!

Alasdair’s UK and Ireland tour (with Alex Neilson and Stevie Jones) is under way check if they’re coming to your neck of the woods!

Artist’s website: http://www.alasdairroberts.com/

‘Pangs’ – official video:


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