Apprentice Green, the latest self-produced album from Stornoway musician Flakebelly, showcases his unusual blend of moods and styles, from humorous to haunting, from folk to funky. Its release comes off the back of a feature on Tom Robinson’s 6 Music BBC Introducing Mixtape, for Flakebelly’s track ‘In Parks of Tall Trees’.
It’s impossible to get bored listening to this 38-minute album in 10 tracks, which moves between genres in a way which is engaging and rarely jarring. It begins with an audible inbreath, and ends with an out-breath: this distinctive editorial choice ties the project together and points to the fact that it has come entirely from Flakebelly’s imagination and studio setup.
Bluesy bass and whispered vocals on ‘What the Thunder Said’ give way to a skit at the beginning of ‘Nightspiders’, a song which is notably spooky and unusual without slipping into gimmick. The heartfelt and melancholy ‘Waterline’, although in some ways more conventional, still draws the listener in with its poetic lyrics and pared-back sound. This track is especially emotionally affecting in the context of the album as a whole, an earnest moment in the midst of the experimentation and playfulness. The penultimate two tracks showcase a very different, much less breathy, vocal style, a departure which adds to the sonic diversity of the album but feels like a natural progression.
‘Plackwitch on the Bettigown’, a spoken-word track, is the strangest moment on the album.
Its enigmatic, archaic, mixed-up language and plucked backing track helped me realise that listening to this album is like being Alice in Wonderland, transported through a maze of moments in Flakebelly’s imagination. The fact that everything about this album was curated by the artist himself is audible, as the listener is carried along through this considered, intricate, and particular journey.
Apprentice Green is out now. Available here.
