from traditionally laced through to contemporary shanty and even rock-sided, Butler delivers a very mature and slightly quirky sounding take on the form.
Play 90 second soundbite of 'Painfully Slow' @ 'CD quality'
from traditionally laced through to contemporary shanty and even rock-sided, Butler delivers a very mature and slightly quirky sounding take on the form.
Having a maturely deep sounding vocal intonation Butler sounds older than his years. He has a peculiar habit of letting his voice err off the pure note at times that some might find somewhat distracting but, to me, just adds more colour to his quirkiness. His songs are superbly written and beautifully played; again Butler's maturity shines through beautifully. With a little help from some friends Butler fills his songs with bright instrumentation and nifty vocal harmonies, never cluttered but sensibly and sensitively arranged, Butler's songs demonstrate great compositional skills and amazing professionalism.
'Trapped At Sea' by Philip Butler is typically British folk music; Butler rarely strays from the musical roots of his homeland but injects sufficient 'world' nuances to make his songs globally acceptable. This is generally a gentle but cleverly persuasive album; it isn't really something that instantly smacks you in the face but, with repeat plays it slowly comes to you and you find yourself caught up and kinda swimming around in Butler's nu-folk ramblings. For a guy who's background tended towards the more fiery indie-rock scene Butler shows that if music's truly in your soul you can turn your hand to almost anything and make it work - music is the drug and Butler seems to be blessed with a 'master' key to unlock almost any genre door and make it work for him!
Philip Butler is quite clearly a great songsmith and a very accomplished multi-instrumentalist. 'Trapped At Sea' clearly demonstrates Butler's all-round abilities and artistic prowess. 'Trapped At Sea' may not be truly ground-breaking but it is a damn fine piece of eclectic folk creativity. Philip Butler will need help if he's gonna take this work on the road; he openly admits in his press pack that the inclusion of his 'friends' and the consequent layered recording will be difficult to reproduce in the live scenario - but hey, that's what 'friends' are for and I'm sure they'll all rally round to help him out on his travels. 'Trapped At Sea' by Philip Butler is a very accomplished album and suggests that Philip Butler has a great future in the music business - will he stay true to these folk beginnings or will he drift out again into other genre realms? Only time will tell and Philip Butler is the only one who knows the answer! Whatever, 'Trapped At Sea' by Philip Butler will win him many friends and get him loads of work - one to watch out for methinks!
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