By Todd Lavoie
Aye, yes, it’s been a stellar year for Scotland, musically speaking, what with floor-me-flat-out releases from the likes of Edwyn Collins, Alasdair Roberts, Malcolm Middleton, Emma Pollock, the Twilight Sad – not to mention the triumphant return of the Jesus and Mary Chain – and, sitting at the tippy-top of this list, the astonishingly prolific folk-pop troubadour from Fife, Kenny Anderson, better known as King Creosote.
Earlier this fall the honey-tenored charmer – in what is most likely his boldest move towards courting a larger audience – unleashed Bombshell (679 Recordings), a ravishing collection of introspective acoustic-pop and rousing indie folk-rock. Simply put, the album is fan-bloody-tastic: warm, glimmering, and deeply soulful, it’s the sort of thing which should appeal to anyone who isn’t afraid of a bit of sweetness and vulnerability coming through their headphones. Not that I’d necessarily compare the guy to Nick Drake or Elliott Smith or Iron and Wine, but I’d reckon a great many fans of those artists would find themselves seriously wooed by the King’s sensitive strummings if they gave him a chance.
In fact, that’s exactly how I got into his stuff: “an Elliott Smith with brighter edges and a Scottish accent,” I’d heard somewhere a few years ago, so needless to say I was intrigued. Then, of course, there was the matter of – and this is a biggie if you’re a die-hard musical dot-connector like me – Creosote being the brother of Gordon Anderson, the former Beta Band member now recording oddball-pop under the name Lone Pigeon. Not that the King Creosote universe overlaps too much with that of the deliriously iconoclastic Betas, mind you. Don’t expect any forays into warped acid-house or ambient-funk here. Still, it’s a relationship worth mentioning, especially since the Lone Pigeon has collaborated with Creosote on a few projects, including Bombshell.