The Hedge Schools is the rather brilliant blast-from-history-class name under which two ex-members of Dublin band Ten Speed Racer are now recording. However, singer Patrick Barrett and guitarist Joe Chester are pedalling a much slower gear this time out.
For the most part, this is a fairly mellow, dreamy collection of songs. Their ambience is almost surprising, given the dark conditions under which they were initially conceived. In 2001, Barrett suffered a near fatal brain aneurism and spent months in recovery. Although it’s taken seven years to record them, these are basically his songs from a hospital bed.
Apparently, a lot of thought went into the production. For artistic and acoustic reasons, they decided to make the record using as much wood as possible and “people in a room hitting things.” Chester even went so far as to locate his very first acoustic guitar for the sessions. Having toyed with the notion of recording in a church, they eventually settled upon the presumably less tranquil Cauldron Studios on Dublin’s Dorset St. (chosen because it featured a full working Hammond and an old grand piano).
How to describe the sound? Well, it’s folk-influenced, but certainly not a folk album. The guitar-washed ‘Sunday Song’ is like a blissed-out My Bloody Valentine, only with decipherable lyrics. Occasionally sad-sounding, Barrett is never mournful. The ghost of Nick Drake occasionally floats through some of his dreamier vocals [‘Don’t Call It A Heart’].
Obviously a deeply personal affair, Never Leave Anywhere is unlikely to trouble the national airwaves or the commercial charts (which probably doesn’t especially bother them). But while The Hedge Schools won’t be for everyone, if you take the time to check them out, you might just learn something.