Hailing from Bristol, an acclaimed fingerstyle guitarist (twice winner of AMAUK Instrumentalist of the Year) and one of the UK’s few professional female pedal steel players, drawing on folk and Americana influences Leave Your Mark is Carter’s debut album, one which, recorded live in the room and accompanied by guitarist husband Joe Wilkins, John Parker on double bass and drummer Matt Stockham Brown, explores the ways we can leave our mark on the world after we’ve gone and touching on themes of family dysfunction and mental health.
It kicks off with the chugging and train rolling rhythm of ‘What You See’, a tribute to Newcastle-born photographer Tish Murth who documented working class lives and died penniless because of her principles, capturing blinkered perspectives (“Wouldn’t know class if it kicked them in the teeth/They’ll cover up their walls with what they’d walk past on the street/‘Cos they will only see, what they want to see/When they want to see it”) as she defiantly sings “If you’re told ‘toe the line’ you can tell them where to stick it/‘Cos this world we’re in it can really it make you sick/It’s a shot in the dark, what you see is what you get/And well you’ve made your mark but they don’t know it yet”.
That theme of individuality and following your principles washes over into the bluesier tones of ‘Stetson Kennedy’, a song paying tribute to the activist and folklorist who infiltrated the KKK in the 40s, his exposure of their actions (“It’s so much harder to command fear/With all your rituals read out on the radio for the kids to hear/It’s the laughter that hurts them most”) leading to the 1947 revocation by the state of Georgia of the Klan’s national corporate charter.
A mind-tempo waltzer with steel spotlights, ‘Bear With Me’ is a letter from her brain to her ADHD self (“it’s not that I won’t/Work in the way that you’d hoped/You take a few steps /And then you’re lost in the fog again/Waiting to see”) advising “don’t try to collect what you’re scared you’ll forget/Don’t weigh down your heart with the thought of what’s next/If you hate it here, then wait here/And catch your breath” because “errors of mind are redeemed in good time/If you’ll only learn to wait”.
Following a tribal-shaded rhythm, ‘He’s A Man’ addresses identity and how we lean on possessions (“A man who spends a year’s wage on a watch and calls it taste/Refinement dependent on waste/And a luxury that settles in the absence of grace”) and position (“He’s a man with a place/More than important than his name/His actions fail to represent just what he stands to gain,/He stares straight ahead all the same/For the fear his eyes portray could lead so quickly to betrayal”) to express who we are as she wryly sings “Thank God he can’t express himself/Who knows the things that might come out/If he dared open his mouth”. Lacking self-belief, “He’s a man who finds himself/Through the eyes of someone else…/A life devoid of kindness/Is a special kind of hell/But there’s nothing in this world could make him ask for help”. At the end, however, there’s a glimmer of hope as she sings “He’s a man with a heart/It’s only small but that’s a start”.
Identity, self-doubt and the need to fit in are there too on the ‘Follow Your Lead’, a light shuffle with electric and acoustic guitars (“I’ll follow your lead/And I’ll play by your rules/There’s nothing easy about figuring out what I’m supposed to do …every time I get the urge to up and go/I get the feeling that there’s something I don’t know/And my autonomy resides outside of me”), the instrumental bridge followed by the lines “It seems my grievances at being forced to choose/Become entangled with what I fear I have to prove”.
The bluesy loping, slide-shaded punningly-titled ‘Idle Eyes’ continues with its justifiably jaundiced view of those who feel themselves superior or entitled on account of what rather than who they are, this particular barb directed at those of those cloth (“A hallowed touch/Grants him a parking space two paces from the church door/Could you ask for more, and more/If you were kind enough to draw the line/Between the fine and the divine/Would we even cross your mind?”) who manipulate religion to their own ends (“It’s hard to feign surprise as words transform before your eyes/Begin to shine, to prise the worry from the wise/When you’re the one who crafted each and every lie”), and feign compassion (“don’t mistake concern for care/The hands that gently place the noose around your neck will leave you hanging there”). No wonder “Jesus wept on the 309”.
A slow-paced ruminative strum with Parker’s bass the anchor, a contrast to much of the album, ‘Waiting For You To Come Home’ is a straightforward love song (“in my thoughts I find/You simmering behind my eyes/A love that frames my mind/Waiting for you to come home…You’re all my worlds rolled in to one/In you I find my home/The simple joy of being known/The means to grow”).
‘Don’t Mourn – Organise!’ is Carter’s comprehensively researched live tribute to legendary musician and union activist Joe Hill and this album has her covering her favourite song, ‘Where The Fraser River Flows’, written to support workers during the Fraser River strike for better pay and shorter hours in British Columbia, Canada, around 1912 and sung to the tune of ‘Where the River Shannon Flows’, her warbling vocals and the arrangement with Wilkins’ twangy guitar break as invigorating as the air in the hills.
Inspired by a Philip Larkin poem, the melancholic otherworldly ‘Out To Sea’ with its Gillian Welch colours, wailing steel, rumbling drums and double bass turns the lens on family disfunction (“Sorrow’s heirlooms rest upon the shelf/Sat amongst a glow of star-crossed wealth/Pardon not the strain on heart and health/But brace and feel the burden for yourself”) and the failure to connect with those around us (“Two pairs of hands reach out into the night/To grasp and shape the space where their fate lies/Pity soon abandons its disguise/To lay in wait and brace for the outcry”). It ends on an instrumental note with ‘Morewen’ showcasing her intricate fingerpicking and the influences of both Doc Watson and John Fahey, a final affirmation that she does indeed leave her mark.
Mike Davies
Artist’s website: www.hollycartermusic.com
‘What You See’ – official video:
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