Let's have a look through all these albums I've amassed and have yet to even listen to, let alone review. What's this right down here...? Oh yes!
This will do nicely!
Ever since I were a lad and made weekly trips into the city centre (“into town”, as we colloquially knew it) I would always go to the second-hand record shops. These were, for you young 'uns to whom even
buying music in a physical format is a totally alien experience, and seems something the cavemen would have done, shops where people who were hard-pressed for cash would bring albums they no longer wanted or liked, and the shop would give them a paltry sum, then mark up the record considerably from the price they had paid for it. Nevertheless, it was always less than you would expect to pay in the shops for the record new (usually somewhere around a half to a third as cheap, depending on how old/rare/coveted it was, and what condition it was in), and often the kind of albums you could find in these emporiums were not available anywhere else, unless at the fabled super-high “import” price.
One of the shops I used to frequent was called Freebird (yeah, that's why) and I remember on many occasions going in there, flipping through the literally thousands of albums (many of which were the same --- you wouldn't believe how many people wanted to get rid of their copy of Peter Criss's solo debut!) looking for something to buy. This was in the days when money was not tight, and you literally went into town with a walletful of notes, happy to spend anything from £20 to £40 on albums, which would often mean that at the higher end of the scale you might be able to buy enough that your arms would be somewhat aching as you made your way home, weighed down with several bursting bags!
In any event, I always came across, and passed, this album, leaving it in favour of bands I knew, perhaps ones I was slowly building a collection of, but I always had this sneaking desire to know what the music on it was like. I thought the name of the band was cool, the album title cooler, yet somehow I never shelled out what I think was about £2.50 for the album, to satisfy my curiosity if nothing else. Ah, the heady days of youth!
The cutter and the clan --- Runrig --- 1987 (Chrysalis)
Many, many years later, in the course of buying or downloading music online, I came across the album again and I thought, right, I'll have this! Of course, I've now had it on my computer for months and
still have not heard it. The mysteries from my teenage days remain, and I'm no wiser about this album, or this band, now than I was then.
So, it's time at last. Let's fire it up and see what it's like. Oh, take me back to the eighties....!
A Scottish band, formed on the island of Skye in 1973, Runrig began their career as a wedding band, and have always been keen to incorporate their national heritage, and language, into their songs. They in fact wrote what is said to be the only song in Scottish Gaelic to hit the charts, which is included in this album. The album itself is their fifth, and proved to be their breakthrough after they were picked up from their independent label by giant Chrysalis.
From the off it's exceptionally celtic, a kind of fusion of Big Country and the Waterboys, with opening track “Alba” sung in their native language. Alba means Scotland, so they're obviously singing about their own country here, but as I know little Irish and less Scottish Gaelic, I couldn't tell you what the actual lyric is about. There's a rugged quality nevertheless about Donnie Munro's vocals, and the mix of instruments Runrig use certainly stays close to their Scottish roots, with mandolins, accordion and yes, bagpipes. Malcolm Jones and Rory MacDonald do a great job on guitars, while Peter Wishart's keyboards lend the whole thing a very atmospheric air.
Title track, as such, “The cutter” shows Munro's accent as even more Scottish than on the opener, and it's a mid-paced rocker very in the mould of Big Country, with slightly less frenetic guitars. Good organ line keeps the song going, and it's quite anthemic in a restrained sort of way. Runrig are a little different to most bands in that they employ two drummers, or at least two people are tasked with percussion, and this adds a very solid backbeat to the songs. Ian Bayne is one of the drummers, Calum MacDonald, brother of bass player Rory, and a founder member of the band, is the other.
“Hearts of olden glory” has some great pipes on it, though I think they may be oileann rather than bag, but the song is very powerful and almost hymnal, slow and measured with very little percussion, the pipes and keys driving the melody, with some great backing vocals that would put many a Welsh male voice choir to shame. There are female backing vocals in there --- good ones, but they're not credited on the album so I can't tell you who they are. “Pride of the summer” marches along on a parade-style beat, and you can almost hear Rory MacDonald's heart bursting with national pride as he belts out the vocals and cries
”Beat the drum/ Like a heartbeat/ Loudly and strong!” And yes, there are those bagpipes! Oh, how I hate bagpipes, but I have to admit even my heart is stirring at the moment. This is powerful stuff!
Runrig certainly know how to punch the air and stomp in pride, but they can bring it down several notches too, as the tender “Worker for the wind” demonstrates ably, with a crying guitar and low keyboards and mandolin all backing Munro's touching, bittersweet and tragic vocal. It's quite a stirring song, elegant and restrained but passionate and powerful, the more for the paucity of instrumentation used, the very merest of touches on hi-hats and tom-toms, then “Rocket to the moon” kicks everything back into high gear, with some stunning mandolin (!) from Malcolm Jones, powerful drumbeats, Munro's vocal a little fainter and echoey here, almost as if he's standing a little way from the mike. He comes properly forward for the strong chorus though.
And the vocals remain strong for “The only rose”, with some nice slide guitar and pipes painting a really impressive backdrop to what is the second ballad on the album, busier than the other slow song, with lots of instruments contributing to the overall sound, but no less powerful, showing that Runrig can handle ballads two completely different ways and still come up with two gems. Really nice guitar solo to take the song to its fade, then we're into “Protect and survive”, mid-paced with a lot of the Waterboys, mandolin again adding its own flavour courtesy of Jones, and nice pipes there too. Very traditional sounding, with the electric guitar getting in plenty of licks too, and Wishart's organ adding its own sense of colour to the sound.
“Our earth was once green” opens with strong guitar and drums, keyboards laying down a fluid melody as the song rocks along nicely with what seems to be a fairly powerful eco-message, in case you didn't get that from the title. Closer “An ubhal as airde” (pronounced “on uv-il oss ard-ya”) translates as “the highest apple” and is cleverly positioned, so that the album both opens and ends on a native-langauge song.
Backed by swelling organ (ooer!) and gentle guitar, Munro sings in his native Scottish Gaelic about what I have no idea, but it was certainly a coup for Runrig that they managed to get this first released as a single, then into the top twenty! I would have to assume that it got there on the basis of being a novelty record, by which I intend no slight to Runrig, but rather like Clannad's “Harry's game” --- which admittedly got into the charts off the back of that TV series --- you can't really see people having danced around to this at the local disco! Aided by great and stirring backing vocals that sound like an actual choir, the song is certainly emotional and pulls at the heartstrings, and if anyone was ever in doubt that Donnie Munro can sing, here is your answer, as he hardly even needs the musical backing, carrying the song virtually on his powerful, emotive voice and helped by the choir, who remain uncredited.
So, after thirty-odd years of waiting, has it been worth it? What's the verdict? Well, while I would not call this a “Meh” record in any way, it hasn't blown me away either. It's certainly good, and the musicianship is first-rate, but maybe it's that I'm coming to Runrig too late, as it seems others have tackled this sort of thing before. Or possibly after. It's different to the usual fare, certainly, and a worthy effort. Had I bought the album back in those sunny days of my youth, what would I have thought? Would it have been worth the price? Well, hard to say, as back then I was a lot more naïve and considerably more ignorant about, and insular in, music tastes, so perhaps I would not have liked it.
Do I like it now? Yeah, it's good. Do I feel a sense of why didn't I listen to this before? Is it thirty years wasted, when I could have been listening to the rest of Runrig's catalogue? Nah, it's not that good. Well, it is. But it's not fantastic, it's not a revelation and I wouldn't feel cheated, not having listened to their music up to now. I
am, though, glad I listened to it, finally, if only to quiet that youthful inner voice inside me that just won't shut up....
TRACKLISTING
1. Alba
2. The Cutter
3. Hearts of olden glory
4. Pride of the summer
5. Worker for the wind
6. Rocket to the moon
7. The only rose
8. Protect and survive
9. Our Earth was once green
10. An ubhal as airde