MELIN MELYN
Mill On The Hill: After Dark (Blomonj Ltd)
As those present in Green Man’s Far Out tent last year can readily attest, Melin Melyn’s current live show – structured around the material from debut album Mill On The Hill – is daft, ebullient and irresistibly joyous, its surface whimsicality underpinned by a pro-grassroots music venues message. Which is what makes … After Dark so bemusing. These reworked – or “re-milled” – versions contributed by an array of other artists are almost uniformly dull and drab, draining the blood and sucking the sunshine out of the originals.
Bitw’s smooth Cate Le Bon-like cover of Promised Land and the straight take on Derek by Kate Stables of This Is The Kit are moderate successes, but it’s telling that the highlights are the band’s own offerings: new track Television People and an alternative version of The Pigeon & The Golden Egg that hams up the honky-tonk. Not so much a reimagination as a bad dream, then.
words BEN WOOLHEAD
