Danbert Nobacon is probably better known in the UK as the guy who chucked a jug of water over John 'Two Jags' Prescott in 1998 than for his musical or literary achievements. Similarly, his former band, Chumbawamba are doubtless best known by the masses for the ruddy irritating 'Tubthumping' than for being anarcho-punk agitators. I never really had any time for them myself: their reactionary anarchism based on opposition and antagonism demonstrated a preoccupied with railing against everything, without suggesting what they were actually for.
Having left his Leeds squat a long time ago in favour of a smallholding in the foothills of the Cascade Mountains in Washington state, Danbert's been keeping himself busy of late, with a community radio show, a new book, and this new album.
'Woebegone' is Nobacon's musical interpretation of Bebon Candorant's novel, 'Damengeist or The Devil Came Down from Yorkshire.' I haven't read the book, because it's not yet published, and is, in fact, still a work in progress, but I assume the title is a reference to the song 'The Devil Went Down to Georgia' by the Charlie Daniels Band.
From the ramshackle country folk of 'Other Country Blues' to the knees-up gypsy hoedown of 'Evolution 9', via the sparse 'Frank Woebegon's Lament', 'Woebegone' is densely populated with gangsters, loafers, wasters, down and outs and drunks and weaves a messy trail through a squalid underworld, and one gets a fair idea of the nature of the book pretty quickly.
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The Tom Waits parody growl Nobacon adopts for this album can only be described as wrongly comical in places: on 'Blow the Man Down' he sounds like a muppet doing a pastiche of cabaret, while the cawing crow sounds that accompany him in the second verse of 'Blind Dog's Chance' are just plain daft. Still, it's novel, at least at first. However, there's not a great deal of variety, and fourteen tracks and an hour on from the start, the novelty's worn off, along with any interest I may have had in the narrative.
Woah! Now be gone...
Danbert Nobacon on MySpace
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