Sweet Billy Pilgrim - There Will It End

Sweet Billy Pilgrim - There Will It End
Twice Born Men
2009, Samadhisound


'The music of Sweet Billy Pilgrim is first and foremost, staggeringly beautiful. But it's a shy beauty a lingering ambience and a distant clicking in the night, church windows built from littered glass, love songs that look to the day when even the children are forgotten. Strangers tell you their heartbreaks. Fountain's toss back their coins. And just when you start to feel skeptical, in shambles singer Tim Elsenburg shaggy and dour, wringing joy from his melodies with a bashful croak and a glorious croon.

Sweet Billy Pilgrim are exemplars of English atmospheric art-pop, and it's natural that they would release their second album, Twice Born Men, on David Sylvian's Samadhisound label. Even compared to a Radiohead or an Elbow, Sweet Billy Pilgrim achieve a sublime balance between their hooks and their moods, their ambitions and their humility.

They also have a sense of humour. Elsenburg is still smacking himself for telling an interviewer that Twice Born Men, is a love album but "not in a Barry White way." It's a fair description. Twice Born Men, is a kind of concept album, in the loosest sense, says Elsenburg. It starts at the end of the heart's little journey and then works its way back to the beginning, which is actually the end anyway.

In the years since their 2005 debut, We Just Did What Happened And No One Came, they've remixed Sylvian, Steve Jansen, and Steve Adey, toured to international acclaim, including a celebrated appearance at the Punkt Festival and currently working with fellow British artist Adem on a commission for the BBC. The trio of Elsenburg, Anthony Bishop (bass, banjo), and Alistair Hamer (drums) strikes a balance between the loops and textures wrung from laptops, and the sharp tones of a banjo'. [http://www.samadhisound.com/news/]

More info:
http://www.sweetbillypilgrim.com/
http://www.myspace.com/sweetbillypilgrim
Anthony Bishop's MySpace:
http://www.myspace.com/ant_bishop
Tim Elsenburg's MySpace:
http://www.myspace.com/williampilgrim
Alistair Hamer's MySpace:
http://www.myspace.com/mrgorsky
A magnificent John Dworkin's review:
http://www.blurt-online.com/features/view/387/

Download a free MP3 of the new album
from the official site:
http://www.sweetbillypilgrim.com/listen/


Buy Sweet Billy Pilgrim CDs at http://www.samadhisound.com

(Video Memento's Words: 'Call Me Ishmael'; Audio: There Will It End, Sweet Billy Pilgrim, 2009; Freccia -that's me- played with shadows, fogs and black water)

---all images and sounds are copyrighted by their respective copyright owners. Many thanks to the gentle Tim Elsenburg ---

Category:

Music

Tags:

• sweet
• billy
• pilgrim
• there will it end
• twice
• born
• men
• samadhisound
• tim
• elsenburg
• anthony
• bishop
• alistair
• hamer

[thedwork]

yup. terrific recording. and it's basically this good all the way through. my review will be up at blurt-online within a few days or so.

thanks for posting this...

[bulucette]

The SBP are talented, for sure.

It'll be a real pleasure reading your review.(please, tell me when)

Best.

cri

[thedwork]

my review is up...

[bulucette]

Well done!

A magnificent review

[tatchenko]

this clip is one of the best i´ve ever seen. just a question: do the images belong to Men of Aran by Flaherty?

[tatchenko]

I´m stupid... it´s mobydick

[mrhulot101]

sure makes me want to see moby dick again

[07kyal]

the eternal, mark 2

[xjaycazx]

What a band, Can't wait to see them in Manchester, I imagine it will be a bit more 'intimate' than some of their gigs will be in 2010, judging by how massive they should be by then.

[thedwork]

thanks.