Thursday 17th October | 7pm | £12 / £8 ConC. / PWYC

Welsh guitarist Gwenifer Raymond and American singer-songwriter-guitarist Buck Curran celebrate the exhibition of artwork of Steffen Basho-Junghans which will be showcased on the night alongside the music.

‘She is legion. This Welsh musician plays really loud and really fast too, like a vengeful bluegrass musician conjuring up roiling fury, then dropping into languorous eddies, switching between paces with pin-sharp precision.’ The Guardian

Gwenifer Raymond is one of this country's most-noted fingerstyle guitarists. She has been compared to the likes of John Fayhey and is signed to the multi-Grammy award nominated label Tompkins Square.

Gwenifer Raymond began playing guitar at the age of eight shortly after having been first exposed to punk and grunge. After years of playing around the Welsh valleys in various punk outfits she began listening more to pre-war blues musicians as well as Appalachian folk players, eventually leading into the guitar players of the so called ‘American primitive genre’. It was then that Gwenifer began writing her own moody and often-times manic original compositions and started playing shows around the UK.
When she signed to Tompkins Square, she released her first single ‘Sometimes There’s Blood’ in October of that year and released her debut album 'You Never Were Much of a Dancer' in June of 2018 to worldwide acclaim. What followed was much international touring. Gwenifer headlined shows across much of Europe, debuted at several summer festivals including Green Man, Black Deer, Supernormal, Shambala to name but a fraction. She also played a number of support slots for well known artists such as Michael Chapman, Michael Hurley, Xylouris White and Charlie Parr.

In early 2020 Gwenifer was all set to get into the studio to record her follow up album when the minor inconvenience of a worldwide pandemic complicated matters slightly, and so she was forced to record and produce the album herself in a make-shift bedroom studio at her home in Brighton, UK. ‘Strange Lights Over Garth Mountain’ was released in November of that year and received tremendous praise, especially as something of a transformation from her previous album, moving from a more traditional folk style into somewhat more avant-garde and complex compositions.

BUCK CURRAN

Buck Curran (born May 23, 1967) is an American singer-songwriter-guitarist, record producer, painter and guitar maker. Curran's acoustic and electric guitar playing is characterized by the extensive use of low alternate tunings, slide, Ebow, reverb, manipulating string overtones and dynamics creating haunting voice-like timbres on the instrument.

 ‘tones linger and reverberate with a mystical translucence’ ~ jennifer Kelly/Dusted Mag

‘The mournful, elegant tones that neo-folk artist Buck Curran draws from voice and guitar have a capacity to linger in the air long after the notes have faded. Recorded at the American guitarist's home in northern Italy shortly before the area went into lockdown, 'No Love Is Sorrow' is a beautiful piece of work, interspersing space, atmospheric instrumentals with more complete songs like spooky western "Ghost On The Hill', the ballad "Deep In The Lovin' Arms of My Babe'" and the title track. Curran sings with the gravelly decorum of Mark Lanegan but the songs remain, bewitchingly, just over the next horizon’ ~ Peter Watts/UNCUT Magazine

Curran’s music invokes swarming natural forces, looking for the borderline between the real and the sublime and, maybe, the supernatural. ~ Jesse Jarnow/Relix Magazine

Curran formed the psych-folk duo Arborea in 2005 with partner Shanti Deschaine, with whom he recorded five albums and toured extensively throughout the United States and Europe between 2006 and 2015. Curran's music is associated with the Psychedelic Folk and Indie Folk genres, though his musical origins stem from performing traditional and original Blues and Folk in the 1990s. In 2009 he produced the benefit compilation Leaves of Life (2009),[1] which included notable artists Devendra Benhart, Marissa Nadler, Alela Diane, etc. Curran also contributed to the renewal of interest in Robbie Basho producing two tribute albums, We Are All One in the Sun (2010)[2] and Basket Full of Dragons (2016).[3] In the Winter of 2011/2012 The Fretboard Journal published a feature article on Robbie Basho (Voice of the Eagle) written by Curran for Issue 24. In 2019 he curated and produced a tribute to Jack Rose Ten Years Gone. The album was released on the December 5th, 2019 on the 10 year anniversary of Jack's passing.

In July 2016 he released his first solo record, Immortal Light,[4] a split release between ESP-Disk and Obsolete Recordings. In 2018 Curran released his second album Morning Haikus, Afternoon Ragas. His third album 'No Love Is Sorrow' was released during lockdown in Bergamo, Italy which became the initial epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe in the late winter and early spring of 2020. Curran was interviewed by Pitchfork in March 2020 at the beginning of the lockdown. On May 1 of 2020 he performed a 'Tiny Desk Home Concert' for NPR.

Curran is also an artist and painted the cover for Basket Full of Dragons. In July 2014 his paintings were part of a special exhibition in Denmark at the Fano Free Folk Festival, during which he also presented a special discussion on his spontaneous brushstroke technique using watercolors and improvisation in art. In 2017 his paintings were exhibited in Bergamo, Italy in December 2017 at InArteWerkkunst Gallery during the NOWART Exhibition. As well, he is a notable guitar maker who worked from 2002 to 2009 for renowned Maine luthier Dana Bourgeois, where he developed his own guitar model called Butterfly.[5] His prototype for the Butterfly was included (alongside other notable luthiers from Maine: Dana Bourgeois, John Slobod, etc.) in the 'Player's Art': Guitar Exhibition at the Colby College Museum of Art May 7 thru July 17, 2005. Acoustic Guitar Magazine featured one of Curran's Butterfly guitars (made in 2006) for their 'Great Acoustics' article in their March 2012 issue. In 2017 Acoustic Guitar Magazine featured Curran's acoustic guitar instrumental 'River Unto Sea' in their June issue, followed by Curran's acoustic guitar instrumental 'Song for Liam' in their March/April 2019 issue. In the January/February 2022 issue of Acoustic Guitar featured Buck Curran's 'Long Lost 2009 Sobell Model 1' for their 'Great Acoustics' page. Guitar Magazine/String Letter Media also included Buck Curran's 'Song for Liam' in their new publication DADGAD Guitar Essentials(2022). In 2022 the Bert Jansch Foundation asked Buck to participate in 'For Bert Jansch: Around the World in 80 Plays', a special project featuring performance videos of select musicians playing special 'Bert Jansch' Yamaha guitars that were sent around the world. Curran's video was filmed in historic Città Alta in Bergamo, Italy.

Plus DJ set from Oz Adams

Oz Adams is the founder and host of Different Strokes For Different Folks, a weekly show on Slack City Radio which has not only featured his own selections but the occasional guest mix from the likes of Project Gemini, The Bees, Large Plants, Lau Ro and one of tonights artists, Buck Curran. In addition to this Sunday morning psychedelic, cosmic and soulful hour he’s a regular DJ around town and burgeoning record label owner.