IN THE seven years since he last popped a musical head above the parapet (in alter-ego form with the solo Lord Cut-Glass album), Alun Woodward has programmed some remarkable boundary-pushing events at Platform in Easterhouse. Now the former guitarist-singer of The Delgados returns with an album that’s impossible to stick in any “ambient” pigeonhole.
Music From Battle Mountain, released tomorrow, is the soundtrack to David Street’s documentary about cyclist Graeme Obree and, as befits its maverick subject, it has many facets. Opening track Black Box moves through an epic landscape as a subtle drone changes chords and a fractured organ melody breaks the air: imagine Albinoni’s Adagio For Strings played by Jimmy Smith. Later, inter-looped guitars give way to the aquatic textures of glittering, bubbling synthesisers, while I Was The King features a tune that sparkles with jewellery-box prettiness.
The film itself has screenings in Glasgow (May 1), Edinburgh (2), Bo’ness (12), Falkirk (13), Stirling (14), Dundee (15), Aberdeen (16) and Inverness (17) with Obree taking questions.
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