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Review from Cornstalk Gazette - March 2009
Life of Brine
The Roaring Forties RF042CD
The Roaring Forties – Don Brian, Robin Connaughton, Tom Hanson, Margaret Walters and John Warner – are one of Australia’s best-known acappella singing groups and specialise in rousing chorus songs and sea shanties. Their new CD will not disappoint shanty fans but their choice of material takes the Forties in different directions too. There are songs from the USA, West Indies and Britain but there’s also a focus on material written or arranged by Australians or with Australian themes. The listener is taken well beyond those favourite old sea shanties you’ve heard before.
There are traditional ‘forebitters’, songs of sailing life seamen would sing at the ship’s bow when not sweating on capstans or halyards – and recent songs of the sea include Merv Lilley’s Bound for Darling Harbour and two of Harry Robertson’s including my favourite Ballina Whalers – “hey ho you trawler men, come on/ forget your snapper and your prawns”.
Settings of nautical poems by early 20th century English poet Cicely Fox Smith are a feature with A Channel Rhyme enhanced by a great tune and stirring chorus by John Warner. John’s own song Batavia reminds us he’s one of Australia’s best songwriters.
If you’re not really into sea songs but just love harmony singing there’s a lot here for you too. The last track Seamen’s Hymn, written by the legendary Bert Lloyd, allows the Forties to end the CD with beautiful close harmony singing but listen to what they do on the way through with the choruses, especially for A Channel Rhyme and Davy Lowston.
So I really enjoyed this CD – well chosen material, well sung and arranged and very well recorded. It has a fresh and immediate sound and there’s not too much of the studio reverb which sometimes makes acappella singers sound as though they’re in a big barn. None of that here – you can play this softly and enjoy the blend of five good voices or turn it up full tilt and imagine you’re toiling at the capstan.
Bob Fagan
Life of Brine - Seas Shanties and Forebitters
The Roaring Forties
RFO42CD
This CD is a great CD - buy it and love it!
That about sums up what I'd like to communicate about The Roaring Forties' latest CD. After all, I'm no expert on Australian sea-shanty singing or sea-shanty singing from any place at all. However, I am a keen listener of voices in harmony, especially those who are singing about work and life (as opposed to the doo-wop kind of harmony singing).
These sea-shanties sparkle. The ensemble of four bearded men and one fair maid ought to sparkle - they have been singing sea-shanties together for a very long time and they sing with knowledge of passion for their subject. For those unfamiliar with the sea-shanty "scene", it is alive and a-blowin' in Sydney as a number of regulars gather on the James Craig at Darling Harbour to join in hearty renditions of these songs. Incidentally, the sessions are open to anyone. Beard optional.
The production on this cd is superb. The sound you get is a great ensemble sound which is greater than the sum of its salt-whipped parts. Beautifully balanced without being over-slick. I like to play the cd in the car - loud and with the windows down. How it annoys the young people.
About half the songs are from the Australian tradition - the rest are from other English speaking shanty traditions. You don't have to know a thing about the tradition to enjoy the cd. There are brief and informative notes about each song to be perused once you have recovered from laughing at the excellent CD title.
Historically, singing has held a special role in easing the burden of work. That these shanties have survived and are being recorded and passed on makes our contemporary lives richer and more knowledgeable about our past.
You'll love it! Buy it!
Christina Mimmocchi
Hazard, Hardship, and Damned Little Pay is only now availabe in CD format. Here are two reviews of when it was released as a cassette in 1988.
Leonard, Regnier, Sydney , Music Diary Nov 1988
This cassette provides a fascinating insight into the world of nineteenth century commercial sailing. Viewed from the comfort of our living rooms this era must seem a romantic one, yet, as the title suggests, there were hard realities confronting the men, and these "most remarkable work-songs in the English language" (cassettes leaflet) were born out of gruelling work in very adverse conditions.
The Roaring Forties (Robin Connaughton, Brian Grayson, Tom Hanson, Len Neary, Tony Cochrane, Bob and Margaret Walters) are to be commended on their effort to bring these songs to our attention in their raw, unaccompanied original form, together with much genuine atmosphere of those bygone days. Their singing is consistently clean, which, with all the fourth and fifth intervals, is not as easy as it sounds. The words, for the most part, are clearly understandable. It pays to listen to the words, for they are full of remarkable lines of rough, poetic beauty.
The cassette's musical presentation is so appealing that one becomes interested in the subject.
Cierwen Jones, Cornstalk, August 1988
I have always felt it odd that so much joviality is associated with shanty singing, especially when they are, after all, work songs, formulated to add rhythm and co-ordination to manual labour. But then, my association with them is being two sheets into the wind and feeling frustrated because my fellow alcoholics are slurring the lyrics.
The Roaring Forties shanty group, previously known as the "Ensemble of Fat Bearded Shanty Singers" (EFBSS) comprises a varying collection of singers. For the purpose of this recording, the members are Robin Connaughton, Brian Grayson, Tom Hanson, Len Neary, Tony Cochrane, and Margaret Walters, most of whom I have heard as individuals, and as such are fine performers. With this collection of people, I can't help wondering whether the name refers to the trade winds or their ages.
The 24 shanties on this tape are sung unaccompanied. While unaccompanied singing is by no means a new phenomenon, it is only relatively recently that it has been successfully combined with the technology of the recording studio. This is not without good reason. Our ears are accustomed to a broad range of sound emanating from our stereo speakers, so that voice alone may sound lost and thin.
Where a number of voices of varying tone and timbre are combined in close harmony, as in this case, the sound is remarkably full, and added instrumentation would probably confuse rather than enhance the sound. Refer to Ladysmith Black Mambazo to see what I mean. The similarity with LBM doesn't stop with singing a capella. There is a structural similarity in that the songs comprise call-and-response with a heavy emphasis on rhythm. In the case of LBM this comes from the natural rhythms of the Zulu language; in the case of the shanties, it comes from the pace required by the tasks which the songs accompany.
I can recommend this tape to all those who would otherwise be left mute when a shanty session develops at the bar, Armed with a copy of Hazard, Hardship, and Damned Little Pay, you'll have enough ammunition to contribute something more than , "two pints, please."
Shore Leave -- The Roaring Forties Canberra Times 18/7/97
This is a group of five Sydney-based singers who started out, as their name suggests. singing sea shanties. Shanties are work songs used on sailing ships to assist in raising the anchors and sails, usually sung unaccompanied, in a call-and-response style.
While still including sea shanties on this recording, the group has expanded its repertoire to other songs that fit their close five-part harmony style, including several hymns and songs from a wide variety of writers.
There are songs from Rudyard Kipling, James Keelaghan, and a variety of lesser known Britons and Americans. All are strong, powerful songs, chosen carefully to suit the style of singing, full-throated and strong.
All six singers get a chance to take the lead on various songs, with the others adding finely worked-out harmonies. It's a recording full of energy, and they sing with verve and gusto.
It is perhaps not a record to suit all tastes, but there is plenty of enjoyment for fans of unaccompanied singing. One can only wonder why they had to tell us that no animals were harmed in the making of the record. A private joke, one imagines.