Troubadour, noun: a poet who writes verse to music.” So goes one definition in my dictionary. So what has that got to do with anything? Several years ago, just after the release of the exceptional ‘Lillie F65’, I saw an interview featuring the long established members of Saint Vitus where they were asked how they earned their respective livings away from the band. Mark Adams said he was a landlord who managed a few properties, whilst Dave Chandler admitted to working in the back room of a head shop as he had issues with customers. Wino’s near perfect two word answer was the profound “professional troubadour”, and alongside fellow musical poet Conny Ochs, they have released the simply excellent ‘Freedom Conspiracy.’ Whilst the PR that came with my review copy claimed that this was their second full length collaboration, right opposite me as I type are their previous two CDs, the equally superb ‘Heavy Kingdom’ and ‘Labour of Love – Latitudes’, and with this third album, the pair have just continued to improve, delivering a predominantly acoustic masterpiece.
The album starts with the simple plucked refrain of ‘Drain’, a dark number of trying to survive dark times, the line about how the narrator couldn’t run from “the spark and spoon” perhaps being an allusion to Wino’s constant substance battle, a losing skirmish of which saw him miss the last shows of a recent Saint Vitus tour. With a voice redolent of all the battles it’s been through, Wino weaves his magic, the lighter, higher harmonising of Conny Ochs on the chorus adding a note of hope to the darkness. ‘Sound of Blue’ continues with the tone of battling despair and darkness without surrender, defiance shining through the lyrics supported by a pair of expertly played guitars and a simple tambourine, again Conny Ochs lending harmonies to the chorus to lend a counterpoint of lightness to Wino’s snarl.
Even deeper depths are plumbed in ‘Crystal Madonna’, the subject of the tale living rough after a prison term, wandering in a drug haze, sounding to all the world like the best of downbeat country music distilled into a single track. This is not the bible bashing flag waving country of Garth Brooks, but the stripped back bleakness of Johnny Cash at his most world weary. Whilst the themes of substance abuse, oppression, and depression will be familiar to those who know Wino through his work with Saint Vitus, The Obsessed and so many other bands, the simple style of no more than two acoustic guitars and the minimal of percussion lets the lyrics shine through, lending an otherworldly ethereal quality to the album.
‘Freedom Conspiracy’ is far from a Wino project, Conny Ochs being an equal, and sometimes opposite partner. On ‘Shards’ his voice, far lighter, adds a lilting tone to the track. Yes, he sings of burning dreams against a stark musical background, but he is working to put those shards of a broken life back together, and in the darkness he is able to see “the sky is beautiful.” It is almost as if the two musicians are two sides of a personality that fights on despite all that the world throws at it: one side carries on regardless out of resignation and powered by spite; the other, equally battered by fortune, still sees glimmers of beauty amongst the dirt.
Each track is crafted with the beautiful bleakness of a dust-bowl prairie, and it is impossible to pick any single stand out track, on the simple grounds that each is so good. Title track ‘Freedom Conspiracy’ has Wino showing lyrical signs of optimism, albeit for the next generation rather than himself, perhaps buoyed up by Conny Ochs’ spirit, although by ‘Invisible Bullets’ even he intones “the peaceful world is over” and how he doesn’t care about “nothing anymore”. The album closes with ‘The Great Destroyer’, a number that could be a metaphor for everything from what Wino called “that bitch Katrina”, to the crushing effects of depression, to the grim reaper itself. Somehow, even in this despair, a small sparkle of light remains as they profess that their love for the unnamed recipient of a letter will not go away.
Sometimes reviewing albums for Ave Noctum can be a chore, sometimes a pleasure, but with ‘Freedom Conspiracy’, it has been a privilege. No, it’s not metal, albeit that is what one of the performers is best known for, and if a tag had to be put on it, American folk or even Country would be the closest appropriate label. What it is, however, is excellent, and more than in keeping with Ave Noctum’s dedication to “Atmospheric Music.”
(9/10 Spenny)
http://www.facebook.com/ScottWeinrich
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Conny-Ochs/112536815501097
27/03/2015 at 11:20 am
Awesome review Spenny. I can see you are at one with this album – Wino does that to people. And you nailed the tone. Can’t wait to mull over it myself. 😀
29/03/2015 at 6:24 pm
Cheers sir, it is a fantastic album. I await getting the CD I ordered to add to the collection.
13/11/2016 at 3:22 pm
I couldn’t agree more with your review and John’s comments. My son discovered this fantastic duo’s latest gem and I find myself listening to it over and over. Medicine for my soul given the current state of world affairs and devisions we are experiencing in the US.