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Me Lost Me – RPG (Upset The Rhythm) – Me Lost Me are led by Newcastle-upon-Tyne based artist Jayne Dent, they have a new album, RPG is out via the respected Upset The Rhythm label on 7th July, this is their fourth outing as a collective, seems they transitioned from an ambitious solo project in 2017, Jayne now regularly collaborating with acclaimed North-East jazz musicians Faye MacCalman and John Pope.

And so, continuing with our long long (very long) established policy of only giving time and space to things we feel positive about and not cluttering up our pages with the millions of generic heard it all before so called alternative indie bands or generic heavy metal bands or not very engaging art shows (of which there have been many in recent times), Me Lost Me are a mellow delight, an almost a folk flavoured thing, a touch of jazz, some ambient experimentation 9actuallu,they’re a very folk flavoured thing) , never as easy as that to put this delightful album in a pigeonhole though. There’s some beautiful detail here, and, rather importantly,. plenty of space for it all to breath as they take all the time the album needs, in a most gorgeously rewarding way, to let the stories unfold. 

Stories are the key here, there’s a delight both in the gentle experimenting and with the actual songs as well as the art of storytelling, and these are very much songs, stories, beguiling pieces, that and the experiments that are within the detail of the songs. Atmospheric electronics that never take over, gentle organic warmth, I assume these are “real” instruments, the strings and wind that add so much depth. Everything sounds and feels very (very) real, beautifully so.  Things are very now or maybe everything is timeless?  Aesthetics of the past, hauntological, notions of retrofuturism, a time loop? A calling back to those oral traditions and then you hear a line about something that puts the whole thing firmly in the right here right now if not somewhere ahead of us.  Actually nothing feels old or retro here, and yes I know that is a contradiction and this is gloriously rooted in old(e) folk tradition. it feels fresh though, it feels as now as say something that someone like Gazelle Twin or maybe PJ Harvey would do. 

It all rather positive, pastoral, hopeful, we might not know where England or indeed the world is heading, we might resent those Tories and those who fall for everything they get fed, the speculation here feels hopeful though. Displaced maybe, scattered, a joy all the same, song titles like The Oldest Trees Hold The Earth give you more than a pointer but then again maybe they don’t? The oldest Trees is a treat of a piece, a song co-written in a place called Aarhus in Denmark with fellow Newcastle folk musician (also with Danish heritage) Ditte Elly. The pair wordlessly passed a sheet of paper between each other to write the lyrics, inspired by Højbjerg and Mosegård, the woods they were sitting in. “How long should I wait/Before the moss grows?/On my skin, on my outstretched arms,” the lyrics are sung in a round, the close harmonies delicate and detailed, the woods are alive, the Captain’s Table? 

What we actually have here is a beautiful album, every single gloriously peaceful minute of it, an album to get lost in, an album to find hope in, delight, spirit, warmth, an album that could easily slip past in all the noise of modern life, in all the worry, all the feeling of  things not being quite right. This is an album that you need to fully engage in, you need the whole thing, not a track here and a taste there, you really need to wait and spend proper time with the whole thing, the whole body of work, you need to let it slowly reveal itself over the full length of the whole thing, and not just a track on Spotify or a video on You Tube, an album “straddling time towards the archaic and timeless traditions of folktales, and towards the possible and potential futures of pastoral Britain and the world at large”

Do like the way each play reveals more, have we head this bit before? Do these pebbles eventually change to sand? When will the moss grow? Something precious, time changing everything, something to play in gardens, to play until morning and Mirie It Is While Summer I Last and checking in again, checking out. Collide is experimentally rewarding, the whole album is – never difficult though. never a tough listen, very much of this Real World and full of things you need to take lots and lots of time to slowly quietly thoughtfully unwrap. Highly recommended. (sw)  

Links: Me Lost Me / Upset The Rhythm  / Bandcamp

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‘Eye Witness’ is taken from Me Lost Me‘s forthcoming album ‘RPG’, out July 7th through Upset The Rhythm.

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“Festive Day is a song about being overcome by intense sensory experiences, of nature, the elements and desire. It’s inspired by spending a midsummer festival in Denmark, when the huge bonfires lit along the coast stayed alight through torrential rain and dense sea fog, which left a massive sensory impression on me. It’s about the coming together of all these elemental forces, feeling connected to this seasonal ritual, and connecting it to the English folk traditions around the same time of year, explored in May carols and similar songs, which often celebrate desire, lust and love alongside celebrations of nature and the land. The music video is an overload of artifacts, it’s fast paced and intense in terms of the editing but I wanted to contrast the emotional intensity of the song by framing it almost as an archive or museum of the future, that is documenting folk traditions and trying to reconstruct them and understand them, but missing that vital emotional component. I worked with folk musician and dancer Mark Insley, who choreographed a dance in the Cotswold Morris tradition, to be featured as part of the music video, and made handkerchiefs in the Morris style featuring elemental symbols”.