Top Bar
Musique Machine Logo Home ButtonReviews ButtonArticles ButtonBand Specials ButtonAbout Us Button
SearchGo Down
Search for  
With search mode in section(s)
And sort the results by
show articles written by  
 Review archive:  # a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

Robin Crutchfield - The Hidden Folk [Important Records - 2010]

Robin Crutchfield started his musical life back in the mid 1970’s when he formed & played keyboards in the seminal & respected no-wave band DNA with Arto Lindsay and Ikue Mori. His new album 'The Hidden Folk' is million miles away from no-waves jerking & often discordant sonic world; this offer up collection nineteen short tracks of earthy, haunted sometimes cute, sometimes eerier  folk, music box unfolds & woodland bound moodsetting

Crutchfield utilises: harp, thumb piano, wooden vibes & gamelan, zither and a whole host of  other wooden & ancient stringed instruments  to build the tracks child like harmonics, and thier hypnotic & yet simply repetitions. Most of the tracks here fall between the minute & a half to two minute mark a piece and they find Crutchfield offer up his simply yet haunting layers of wooden percussion, earthy & music box like string pick ‘n’ pluck & eerier folk drones.  It feels like this could be the lost soundtrack to some strange eastern European stop monition animation film from the late 70’s or early 80’s about a odd collection of woodland animals & mystical creatures. All told the album as a whole offers up a very unusual mixture of cuteness & creepiness.

Through-out ‘The Hidden Folk’ Crutchfield offers up a selection of tracks that managed to be harmonic, atmospheric & often very hypotonic, yet there’s always this very knowing & unspoken feeling of dread ever present in even the brightest sonic connors of the tracks like the always present shadows in even the sunniest of woodlands.

Rating: 4 out of 5Rating: 4 out of 5Rating: 4 out of 5Rating: 4 out of 5Rating: 4 out of 5

Roger Batty
Latest Reviews

Robin Crutchfield - The Hidden Folk
Robin Crutchfield started his musical life back in the mid 1970’s when he formed & played keyboards in the seminal & respected no-wave band DN...
010725   Atomic Rooster - Atomic Roos...
010725   Con Funk Shun - Organized
010725   Various Artists - Heatwave- T...
010725   The Good, The Bad, The Weird ...
270625   Murder Rock - Murder Rock( Bl...
270625   The Black Torment - The Blac...
250625   Girls Without Shame - Girls W...
250625   Xiphos - The Age Of Alexander
250625   Timothy Fairless - Keep Tal...
240625   CORR//PT│0N_UN1T - S7ATU5_...
Latest Articles

Matthew Holmes - Of razor-sharp t...
It’s fair to say the Sharksploitation genre is often tried, tested, and to be honest, tired. Fear Below is a 2025 Australian film that tries to do some...
180625   Matthew Holmes - Of razor-sha...
280525   The Residents - Visits From T...
090525   Ennaytch - Of walls, abused ...
150425   Dead, Dead Swans interview - ...
110325   Sebastian Tomb - Walls of unb...
040225   Alien Sex Fiend - Possessed B...
231224   Best Of 2024 - Music, Sound &...
191224   Splintered - Somewhere Betwee...
031224   Shane Ryan-Reid - Coerced and...
221024   Whore’s Breath - life’s h...
Go Up
(c) Musique Machine 2001 -2025. Twenty four years of true independence!! Mail Us at questions=at=musiquemachine=dot=comBottom