Bothy Culture

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Bothy Culture
Studio album by
Martyn Bennett
Released13 January 1998
Recorded1997
GenreCeltic fusion, world, dance
Length58:24
LabelRykodisc
ProducerMartyn Bennett
Martyn Bennett chronology
Martyn Bennett
(1996) 		Bothy Culture
(1998) 		Hardland
(2000)

Bothy Culture is the second studio album by the

Scandinavia, with Bennett finding and emotionally connecting to the similarities between the geographically dispersed styles. It mixes the styles with contemporary electronic music such as breakbeat and drum and bass
.

Named for the traditional party culture of Highland

SSE Hydro, Glasgow
, with his GRIT Orchestra, to celebrate the album's 20th anniversary.

Background

Martyn Bennett, already a

indie label Eclectic,[6][7] was recorded in just seven days.[1] The album had a large impact on Scottish music,[1] and Bennett become one of a leading group of Scottish artists, others including Peatbog Faeries, Tartan Amoebas and Shooglenifty, who pioneered an "electro-ethnic-worldbeat" genre in which Scottish Celtic music was mixed with other folk influences from Europe and further afield like Asia, South America, Jamaica and Africa, and with contemporary music, especially electronic music.[8]

The

rave and house scenes and his experimentation with numerous types of world music.[8] It was recorded solely by Bennett within his home studio.[10] Compared to his debut album, Bennett described Bothy Culture as "less of a kind of virtuosic performance. It's a simpler kind of collage in a way. I think it's more complex and mature as well. The first album is full of testosterone."[11]

Composition

Inspiration and themes

The traditional culture of Highland bothies gave the album its name.

Bennett explained Bothy Culture celebrates not only his own country's Gaelic culture and music, but also the

ceilidh music he played in his upbringing.[12] He felt he understood Islamic and Scandinavian music as soon as he heard them due to them expressing themselves without words: "I recognised them to be some past life I had lived through perhaps, or they seemed to well up under my fingers without my awareness."[12]

The album is named for

Highland huts where travellers and shepherds would traditionally meet, rest, swap tunes and party.[3] Bennett had stayed in bothies when trekking the Highlands, and had over time taken note of the bothy songs and tunes written by shepherds and drovers over generations, and noted similar traditions in other worldwide mountainous cultures, especially those with bothy-style traditions, like Spain, Austria, Greece, China, Bulgaria and Turkey. He found comparisons between the atmospheres of bothies and urban nightclubs, where he had "spooky" experiences arriving for soundchecks when the clubs were cold and empty, but noted: "Although the music and songs that have been played in them are totally contrasting, it is this same sense of excitement that can transform four bare walls into a chamber of sheer sensual delight."[12]

Mairi McFayden of Bella Caledonia noted the significance of the bothy as a totemic symbol within the album. She said, despite a bothy seeming "unremarkable in itself," it nonetheless holds significant importance within Highland culture in that it they were the source of many memorable and important experiences for peoples' lives – "of gathering and companionship, of togetherness, of conviviality, of sharing stories, music and song. Of communitas." She felt this was "at the heart" of Bothy Culture: "whether the rhythmic entrainment of the rave or nightclub or the cultural intimacy and conviviality of the bothy, both are a vital a source of this dynamic life force – a feeling of connection to something outside and beyond our own individual, corporeal existence."[13]

Music

First and foremost an album of

Scottish and Islamic music elements.[17]

doudouk
on "Ud the Doudouk"

Bennett plays all the instruments on the album, with instruments as eclectic as the flute and violin, the Turkish oud and dudek and numerous electronic and programming devices.[8][18] As with Glen Lyon (2002), Bothy Culture is one of Bennett's more studio-based albums.[4] Permeating throughout is a "flat" synth sound that is often minimised by the bagpipes, violin, unusual vocal snippets, samples and "other electronic curiosities."[10] The large amount of percussive breakbeats, as is common with contemporary dance music, augment Bannett's pipe and fiddle playing throughout,[19] though the electronic beats are mostly unobtrusive, allowing the fiddles and pipes more room to permeate.[16] Other electronic sounds on the album include ambient textures like in that of contemporary electronica, including modem-style squeals and micro-processed winds.[16]

Described by Bennett as "a party tune with a pile of twaddle over the top,"

Middle Eastern violin "rhapsodies."[10]

The fourth track, "Hallaig," features a sample of Gaelic poet

Mediterranean music elements atop a drum and bass rhythm, and finishes with Bennett playing the pibroch "Lament for Red Hector" on a lone bagpipe.[18][19]

Release and reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
CMJ New Music Monthly
(favourable)[16]
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music[25]
The Living Tradition(favourable)[19]

Bothy Culture was released on 13 January 1998 by Rykodisc.[18] A relative commercial success, the album topped the

CMJ New World chart, based on combined reports of reggae and world music airplay on American radio stations, Bothy Culture reached a peak of number 3.[27] A music video for "Tongues of Kali" was directed by David Mackenzie and filmed at The Arches, Glasgow, in 1998. The music video was for many years unavailable, until The Martyn Bennett Trust uncovered the video and re-released it in January 2018 for the album's 20th anniversary.[20]

Although Bennett played all the instruments on Bothy Culture himself, he formed the band Cuillin when touring in promotion of the album, helping make the music sound "more organic" and helping to inject "even more energy" into his performances.

1998 World Cup match between Scotland and Brazil, where Ewan McGregor, Sean Connery and Ally McCoist joined the band on stage to dance.[3]

Bothy Culture received positive critical reviews. Dave Sleger of

CMJ New Music Monthly felt that "Bothy Culture's filtering of traditional Highland sounds through urban modernity [is] more than equal to the sum of its parts."[16] Keith Witham of The Living Tradition wrote that Bennett was a rare a musician "who doesn't have to hide behind electronic gadgetry to cover a lack of technical proficiency. As a classically trained musician he really is a master of his chosen instruments."[19]

Folk Radio UK wrote in 2018 that "Bothy Culture still sounds as fresh and exciting as it did on the day of its release."[20]

Bothy Culture and Beyond

SSE Hydro
, where Bothy Culture and Beyond was performed.

To celebrate the 20th anniversary of Bothy Culture, and the 25th anniversary of the

SSE Hydro, Glasgow as part of the festival on 27 January 2018.[20] The shows were billed as a "music-vision-dance-bike spectacular," and feature Lawson's rearrangements of the tracks from the album, as well as visual spectacles, including internationally famous Scottish stunt cyclist Danny MacAskill, whose appearance was inspired by the film The Ridge (2014), in which MacAskill performed a stunt to the soundtrack of Bennett's "Blackbird".[14][29] The show was Lawson and the GRIT Orchestra's second tribute to a Bennett album, following their Celtic Connections tribute to his final album Grit in 2015,[14] although the orchestra was even bigger for Bothy Culture and Beyond, adding a backline of Scottish fiddlers including Duncan Chisholm, Chris Stout and Aidan O'Rourke.[31] Lawson was a friend of Bennett,[20]
and when asked why he chose to perform Bothy Culture, he said:

"Grit celebrated the vocal traditions in Scottish music whereas Bothy Culture is about the melodic and dance traditions. It’s about saying 'let's hold hands and go dancing and have a fantastic time.' Being glad to be alive is a thing to celebrate and that’s what Bothy Culture means to me."[32]

The bulk of the music was the result of two separate string sections, with numerous Scottish fiddlers leading the traditional melodies in one string section while accompanying soundscapes were provided by classical violins, double bass and cellos in the other. The voice of "Aye?" was provided by Innes Watson of the Treacherous Orchestra.[14] David Hayman read Sorley MacLean's English translation of "Hallaig," while in a break from the album, Fiano Hunter and the Glasgow Chapel Choir recreated the Grit song "Blackbird", accompanied by Danny MacAskill's stunt cycle work.[14] "Shputnik in Glenshiel" was accompanied by whistle from Fraser Fifeld, while “Ud the Doudouk” featured punches of brass, Innes’ spirited chants and a "perfectly-timed finish." Meanwhile, the “impossibly whacky” intro for "Joik" was translated to strings, brass and percussion, unifying the folk and classical string sections.[14] "Waltz for Hector" was heralded in by drum beats and soft whistles and featured a percussion section from James MacKintosh capturing the song's complex beats.[14]

The show was critically acclaimed from the likes of

Folk Radio UK, who said the show "brought Martyn’s incredible music back to a live audience and proved just how complex his ideas, how inclusive his influences and wide-ranging his imagination really were."[14] Bella Caledonia said: "If the original live show GRIT was about a celebration of lost voices – of remembrance – then this year’s event was an unapologetic and euphoric celebration of Bennett’s life, energy and vision. Bothy Culture is dance music first. Everyone was as high as a kite,"[13] while McFayden of Folk Radio UK said: "As Greg Lawson said on the night – this was one man’s music, and it took this immense event to bring that music back to the stage. This week is the 13th anniversary of Martyn’s passing, and the music he was making 20 years ago continues to inspire today’s musicians. That's always worth remembering."[14]

Track listing

  1. "Tongues Of Kali" (7:07)
  2. "Aye?" (6:22)
  3. "Shputnik In Glenshiel" (5:50)
  4. "Hallaig" (8:19)
  5. "Ud The Doudouk" (5:44)
  6. "4 Notes" (5:55)
  7. "Joik" (3:26)
  8. "Yer Man From Athlone" (6:25)
  9. "Waltz For Hector" (9:20)

Personnel

References

  1. ^ a b c d e "Obituary: Martyn Bennett". The Daily Telegraph. 2 February 2005. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
  2. ^ a b c Harris, Craig. "Artist Biography by Craig Harris". AllMusic. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g Irwin, Colin (2 February 2005). "Obituary: Martyn Bennett. Storming innovator in Scottish music". The Independent. Retrieved 5 July 2016.
  4. ^ a b "The ecstatic beat goes on". The Scotsman. 8 January 2006. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  5. ^ "Gifted man of music gets a loud and clear salute". The Scotsman. 16 January 2006. Retrieved 9 July 2016.
  6. ^ "A fizzpop treat of youth and strength". The Herald. 16 March 1996. Retrieved 9 July 2016.
  7. ^ Adams, Rob (17 May 2014). "Martyn Bennett's music lives on as Grit gets reissue". The Herald. Retrieved 5 July 2016.
  8. ^ a b c d e Sleger, Dave. "AllMusic Review by Dave Sleger". AllMusic. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  9. ^ "Knives In Hens, Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh". The Herald. 5 June 1995. Retrieved 9 July 2016.
  10. ^ a b c d e f Verna, Paul (7 February 1998). "Reviews & Previews". Billboard. Vol. 110, no. 6. p. 75. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  11. ^ McNally, John (24 October 1997). "Music: Preview". The List (318): 42. Retrieved 22 June 2020.
  12. ^ a b c "Bothy Culture".
  13. ^ a b c d McFayden, Mairi (2 February 2018). "Bothy Culture and Beyond: A Live Lasting Culture". Bella Caledonia. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  14. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k McFayden, Neil (30 January 2018). "CELTIC CONNECTIONS: THE GRIT ORCHESTRA, BOTHY CULTURE AND BEYOND (LIVE REVIEW)". Folk Radio. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  15. ^
    ISBN 978-1908373281
    . Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  16. ^ a b c d e f g Frampton, Scott (February 1998). "Reviews". CMJ New Music Monthly (54): 30–31. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  17. ^ a b c Adams, Rob (28 January 2018). "Review: Bothy Culture & Beyond, The SSE Hydro, Glasgow". The Times. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  18. ^ a b c d e Sinclair, David (18 October 1997). "Global Music Pulse". Billboard. p. 53. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  19. ^ a b c d e f Witham, Keith (1998). "MARTYN BENNETT - "Bothy Culture" - Rykodisc RCD10381". Folk Music. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  20. ^ a b c d e f McFayden, Martyn (19 January 2018). "MARTYN BENNETT: BOTHY CULTURE & BEYOND". Folk Radio. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  21. ^ "Bothy Culture: Tongues of Kali Video recovered". Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  22. ^ a b Molleson, Kate (28 January 2018). "Bothy Culture & Beyond review – joyous fusion of bike stunts and sonic chaos". The Guardian. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  23. ^ a b Ross, Peter (18 March 2012). "The restorative power of music". The Scotsman. Retrieved 8 July 2016.
  24. ^ link
  25. ^ a b Larkin, Colin (2011). The Encyclopedia of Popular Music (5th edn). London, UK: Omnibus Press. p. 2549.
  26. ^ a b Cartwright, Garth (2 February 2005). "Obituary: Martyn Bennett". The Guardian. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  27. ^ Lien, James (11 January 1999). "New World '98". CMJ New Music Monthly. 57 (601): 22. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  28. ^ Sturges, Fiona (2 May 1998). "Travel: Your complete guide to ... Festivals '98". The Independent. Retrieved 10 July 2016.
  29. ^ a b c "Bothy Culture and Beyond". BBC. 2018. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  30. ^ "The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland Martyn Bennett Memorial Scholarship". Margaret Bennett. Archived from the original on 6 February 2018. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  31. ^ a b Shepherd, Fiona (29 January 2018). "Celtic Connections review: Bothy Culture and Beyond, Hydro, Glasgow Read". The Scotsman. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
  32. ^ Scott, Garry (17 January 2018). "Celtic Connections: A unique tribute to John Martyn and Martyn Bennett". Herald Scotland. Retrieved 5 February 2018.

External links

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