There's nothing flashy about North Sea Gas.

Thank God.

There are plenty of bands out there who are trying to do something a little different with the music, digging deeply into Celtic traditions for source material only to add electric guitars and drum kits to the arrangement, blend a little jazz into the mix or otherwise reinvent the music for a modern audience. And I like that stuff, really I do. But sometimes I want to hear traditional music the way it was meant to be presented, the way it's been performed by generations of musicians who wanted to honor, not alter, their musical roots.

Lochanside is an album like that. The trio from Scotland is quite comfortable in their own skins, playing and singing with plenty of polish and enthusiasm, but they're content to play their acoustic instruments and sing without undue embellishment. And let me tell you, after sifting through a dozen or so Celtic rock albums, it's refreshing.

That doesn't mean they do it exactly as their fathers and grandfathers did before them. The band's arrangements put an NSG stamp on the music, but it's the sort of thing you'd be as pleased to find in the corner of a pub as you would on-stage.

North Sea Gas is Dave Gilfillan (lead and harmony vocals, banjo and guitar), Ronnie MacDonald (lead and harmony vocals, bouzouki and guitar) and Cameron Gaskell (harmony vocals, fiddle and mandola). Joining them in the studio for this recording were Tim O'Leary (fiddle and whistle) and Gerry McKenna (banjo, bass, guitar and keyboards).

Tracks include "Freeborn Man of the Travelling People," "Hector the Hero," "The Gallowa Hills," "I'm Looking for a Job," "The Twa Recruiting Sergeants" and, um, "Paradimethylaminobenzaldehyde." That last one, which I'm not even going to try to pronounce, features lyrics by that old Scottish songwriter Isaac Asimov. There are also a few instrumental sets to get you out of your seat and dancing, if you're inclined to do that sort of thing.

The liner notes are exactly what you'd hope them to be: a thick set of pages providing lyrics to every song, a bit of background to every track and some information about the band. Of course, the members of NSG have had plenty of time to get it right; Lochanside is the band's 13th recording over its 25-year career.

Lochanside is good Scottish fun -- clean, simple, unpretentious and entirely entertaining.

by Tom Knapp
Rambles.NET
7 October 2006