By Peter De Vries
The Gertrudes have come all the way from Kingston, Ontario to tell us one thing: Hoedown!
One listen to “Freight Train,” an excellent track off their debut album Dawn Time Riot, should be all it takes to make you want to start you own personal barn dance and dog fight, as singer Amanda Balsys belts out tales of a drifter paying his dues in her countrified drawl over a musical steamroller of banjo, fiddle, guitars and seemingly countless other instruments.
Actually, that’s only one aspect of this exciting new band. Sonically, they come off like a unique blend of many like-minded folk artists. Imagining the folk sensibilities of bands like Fleet Foxes or The Decemberists combined with the occasional epic sweep of Bruce Peninsula might offer a vague idea, but The Gertrudes really are their own unique beast.
On the first half of the album, The Gertrudes show not only an impressive natural chemistry, but also an affinity for a wide range of different song structures and musical eclecticism. The album opens with the steady, stompy beats and melody “Wind from the South” before effortless morphing into the gorgeous acoustic number “Blackbird and the Cedar.” From there, momentum gathers on the fantastic duet “Slot Machines,” and climaxes with the album’s glorious sprawling anthem centrepiece, the aforementioned “Sailor.”
It’s in the second half that *Dawn Time Riot* begins to stumble a little. The Gertrudes attempt to carry the epic feel of “Sailor” onwards with the more languid, slow-burning “You Don’t Mind,” but the track doesn’t quite come together because of uncharacteristically off-key harmonies and reverb that drones on aimlessly towards the seven-minute mark.
A bigger problem is the gratingly precious penultimate track “The Gertrudes” that the band seems to have named after itself. Not only is this an obnoxious self-absorbed idea on its own, but the children’s vocals really make the urge to kill rise. Thankfully, the soaring “Ronnie Hawkins” makes this stumble less noticeable, and closing track “Catfish John” recaptures much of the mid-album’s nautically inspired epic feel.
Dawn Time Riot is well worth the time of anyone pining for a new seafaring folk-inspired set of songs, but let’s hope The Gertrudes leave the kids at home next time.
The Gertrudes play the Foggy Goggle on Friday, Oct. 22 as part of the Halifax Pop Explosion.
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