Eliza Carthy & The Restitution' album Queen of the Whirl marks her 30th year as a professional musician and includes 15 reworked tracks from her long career. It will be released on four consecutive EPs, and finally on CD on 11 November 2022.
“This collection is honestly the best and most comprehensively reimagined, replayed representation of my work in English traditional/contemporary music over the last thirty years yet.” Eliza Carthy
Queen Of The Whirl is a celebration of thirty years of silliness and profundity; thirty years of music reimagined, from Billy Bragg to Peggy Seeger, from The Ratcatchers to Imagined Village, from bloody boots in Trafalgar Square to the moors of North Yorkshire, and everywhere in between.
This year, multi-award-winning Eliza Carthy MBE, celebrates 30 years as a professional musician with the release of Queen of The Whirl, an album of newly recorded versions of some of the most beloved songs from her career. It will be released as a standard CD, Double 12” vinyl, and as a special limited-edition 4 EP deluxe package.
The first single ‘The Snow It Melts The Soonest’ is taken from EP 1, which will be released on 4 August. EP 2 will be released on 1 September, EP 3 on 29 September and EP 4 + the full album on 28 October.
The release will be supported by a UK tour in November and December this year.
Over her thirty years as a professional musician, Eliza’s music has effortlessly crossed boundaries of genre and style. She has toured the world, danced with Hugh Masekela in Ghana; crossed the Prairies, the Alps and the waters of Lake Titicaca, all for the sake of playing the fiddle and spreading the word of English traditional music.
She has two Mercury Music Prize nominations, several BBC Folk Awards, an MBE as well as innumerable other accolades. She has worked with Shakespearian director Barry Rutter, composing music for two of his productions and can also count Kae Tempest, Paul Weller, Nancy Kerr and Billy Bragg in her diverse roster of collaborations. Choosing material from such an illustrious career was a challenging prospect so in true democratic fashion Eliza put it to the good people of Twitter (yes, there are some!) who came up with some surprises as well as obvious crowd pleasers. From earlier recordings such as 1997’s Eliza Carthy & The Kings of Calicutt through to 2013’s Wayward Daughter, Queen of The Whirl reimagines the best and most popular songs from throughout her career.
Recorded with her trusty band, The Restitution, these new versions include favourites from her break-through Mercury Music Prize nominated album Red Rice (1998): ‘The Snow it Melts the Soonest,’ ‘Stumbling On’ and ‘Accordion Song.’ Winner of the 2003 Best Album at BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards (and also Mercury nominated), Anglicana was born out of Topic Records' ‘Voice Of the People’ series and from that is ‘Pretty Ploughboy’ the track which became the album’s centrepiece. ‘In London So Fair,’ also from the album, is also featured. The earliest songs included come from the album Eliza Carthy & The Kings of Calicutt – ‘Whirly Whorl’ and ‘Good Morning, Mr Walker.’ The later is a tribute to Eliza’s mother, the late, great Norma Waterson, and Slinger Francisco, also known as The Mighty Sparrow, who wrote and recorded Good Morning, Mr Walker in 1968. This new version of Good Morning, Mr Walker is the only track in the collection to feature guests, known collectively as The Sweet Rosemarys, who include Jon Boden and John Spiers, Sheema Mukherjee, Rory MacLeod and the Mighty Sparrow's bandleader himself, Lane Steinberg.
Listening to these new recordings, no matter how familiar the tracks, is to hear the music afresh. Eliza has never been an artist to stand still; rather, she’s been at the forefront of the music scene pushing her way forward – often in the most unconventional way. Queen of The Whirl shows us that her love of traditional music and new ideas is as strong as ever and as she puts it, the whirl keeps going.
EP II Stumbling On:
The EP’s lead track, Stumbling On was originally released in 1998 appearing on Eliza’s Mercury- nominated double album, Red Rice. Described as “audaciously brilliant” by the Observer, the album’s cutting edge, electric folk-fusion sound revitalised the folk tradition and established Eliza as a figurehead of a ‘new roots’ scene.
Written by her aunt, Lal Waterson and cousin, Oliver Knight, Eliza’s ’98 version had a more jazz-inspired feel, while her new version opts for a happy barrelhouse groove. Delighted her fans picked the song, she says “This was always one of the most fun songs to play. You can’t beat a happy song about truly miserable things!”
EP III Blood on My Boots:
The lead track from EP III is the stomping ‘Blood on My Boots’. The song recalls an evening that was equally transcendental and traumatic when Eliza’s drink was spiked on a night out and she ended up in hospital. It originally appeared on the album ‘Neptune’ (2011) which The Guardian called ‘Her bravest, most original work to date.’
EP IV Accordion Song:
EP IV includes the self-titled second single, ‘Accordion Song’, originally found on Eliza’s break-through Mercury-nominated album Red Rice. A jaunty song about lusty teenage hormones inspired by an inscription on a Celtic cross found in a local graveyard, it features Saul Rose on melodeon. Like the other tracks on the album, it has been re-vamped and re-recorded creating a fresh, full-bodied sound.
The release is accompanied by a video to the track Good Morning Mr Walker (Slinger and Norma Go To The Dancehall Mix). The song was written by Slinger Francisco (aka The Mighty Sparrow), a calypso vocalist introduced to Eliza by her mam, Norma Waterson back in the 60’s’, with the video featuring some of Eliza’s dearest musical friends including Jon Boden, John Spiers and Angeline Morrison as well as four lucky fans (the result of a twitter competition) who appear performing along to the band. The song’s fun, uplifting, party-vibe provides the perfect celebratory climax to the album’s closing track.
Eliza Carthy & The Restitution UK tour 23 Nov – 5 Dec 2022:
23 Nov 2022 MASHAM TOWN HALL, MASHAM
24 Nov 2022 DISS CORN HALL, DISS
25 Nov 2022 HOWARD ASSEMBLY ROOMS, LEEDS
26 Nov 2022 LUDLOW ASSEMBLY ROOMS, LUDLOW
28 Nov 2022 THE GLEE CLUB, BIRMINGHAM
29 Nov 2022 BRIGHTON KOMEDIA, BRIGHTON
30 Nov 2022 GLEE CLUB, CARDIFF
01 Dec 2022 TURNER SIMS CONCERT HALL, SOUTHAMPTON
03 Dec 2022 SAGE GATESHEAD, GATESHEAD
04 Dec 2022 BAND ON THE WALL, MANCHESTER
05 Dec 2022 JUNCTION 1, CAMBRIDGE
FEB 04 2023 BARBICAN, LONDON (with Martin Carthy & special guests)
Eliza Carthy & The Restitution: Queen of the Whirl
Eliza Carthy "Queen of The Whirl", Need To Know / HemHem Records, 2022
Queen of the Whirl
Eliza Carthy & The Restitution
Need to Know Music NTKBB2022ECX (CD, UK, 11 November 2022)
Need to Know Music NTKBB2022EC1 (LP, UK, 18 November 2022)
Queen of the Whirl EP 1: The Snow It Melts the Soonest
Eliza Carthy & The Restitution
Need to Know Music (EP, UK, 4 August 2022)
Queen of the Whirl EP 2: Stumbling On
Eliza Carthy & The Restitution
Need to Know Music (EP, UK, 1 September 2022)
Queen of the Whirl EP 3: Blood on My Boots
Eliza Carthy & The Restitution
Need to Know Music (EP, UK, 29 September 2022)
Queen of the Whirl EP 4: Accordion Song
Eliza Carthy & The Restitution
Need to Know Music (EP, UK, 11 November 2022)
Eliza Carthy & The Restitution' album
Queen of the Whirl marks her 30th year as a professional musician
and includes 15 reworked tracks from her long career.
It will be released on four consecutive EPs, and finally on CD on
11 November 2022.
Produced by Eliza Carthy and Ben Seal;
Recorded by Ben and Joseph Seal at The Piggery, Fife;
Mixed by Ben Seal;
Mastered by Nick Cooke;
Original artwork by Tracy Dovey;
Design by Dan MacDonald Studios
Eliza Carthy: violin, octave violin, vocals;
Saul Rose: melodeon, vocals;
David Delarre: electric guitar, vocals;
Phil Alexander: piano, organ, accordion, vocals;
Ben Seal: bass, percussion, vocals;
Willy Molleson: drums, lead vocals [7], vocals
with
The Sweet Rosemarys (Rory MacLeod, Lane Steinberg, Jon Boden and John Spiers,
Matt Quinn, Angeline Morrison, Jon Loomes, Neil S. Reddy,
Helen Lindsey, Ben Walker, John Burscough, Scott Doonican, Amy Gill,
S. Chevalier, Tom Hughes, Sheema Mukherjee,
Morton Fontenot) [15]
Tracks
Queen of the Whirl EP 1: The Snow It Melts the Soonest