‘Archangel Hill’ is testomony to a life effectively lived
The songs that Shirley Collins sings are like time capsules, every with huge histories ready to be uncovered. Some have journeyed throughout a long time, even centuries, shape-shifting and assembly every second as they’re reborn time and again. At 87, Collins has given herself totally to this work of making certain the vitality of English people music.
Archangel Hill is her latest album and the third since ending a 38-year interval of what she has described as shedding her voice. It comprises many songs that Collins has sung earlier than, reshaped and reimagined, carried out with the heat and gravity that comes with years of gathered perspective. Sagelike, Collins presents these songs as a testomony to a life effectively lived, all its sentimental nooks and crannies totally intact.
“Hares on the Mountain” has been part of the musical panorama of Southern England since no less than the early 1900s. It is a bawdy track about youthful want (the rabbit metaphor being very intentional) that Collins has recorded twice earlier than, together with a canonical model from 1964 with guitarist Davey Graham. Right here its plucky lyrics are tempered by a extra cryptic tone, every verse slumping right into a minor chord with weary slide guitar offering a counter melody. Somewhat than depress the track’s lifeforce, the juxtaposition offers one other perspective on irrepressible and loveblind craving, insinuating a serrated edge.
Collins is intrinsically linked together with her residence of Sussex, a coastal county in Southern England, and that sense of place permeates Archangel Hill. Along with “Hares,” opener “Fare Thee Properly My Dearest Pricey” (collected by Ralph Vaughan Williams in 1904 and initially recorded by Collins on Amaranth from 1976) and “Babes in a Wooden” (handed down from the well-known Copper Household of Sussex) have deep roots within the space. “Excessive and Away,” one of many few unique tunes on the album and based mostly on a phrase Collins borrows from Almeda Riddle, begins with the grounding sound of rain on the downs. Archangel Hill is a nickname Collins’ stepfather gave to a peak close by their residence years in the past; the title observe options the singer studying a poem her father wrote throughout World Battle II as he longed for residence. There appear to be recollections of the land, her household, pals and collaborators embedded in every track, simply out of attain for the listener however vivid as sunshine in Collins’ thoughts.
We’re led into the center of a kind of recollections midway by the album: Collins cedes to a previous model of herself, accompanied by her sister and steadfast collaborator Dolly on harpsichord in 1980. That includes lyrics written by their uncle, “Head and Coronary heart” is a narrative of sophisticated romantic entanglements sung gingerly over the featherlight plucked strings. This was doubtless considered one of her final performances with Dolly, who died in 1995. Collins’ voice sounds very completely different now, and the distinction can really feel jarring at first, however when you hear intently, a by line of tender earnestness emerges. That sincerity, the bridge between at times, is the nice present of Collins’ music and underpins the facility of those songs which have resonated all through her homeland and her life.
