Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan – Ballad of the Broken Seas (2006)

While in the university, I used to have evenings here and there with a couple of my friends where we would play each other some of our favourite records that the others might not have heard about before. Someone brought this album to one of those evenings and I remember being really interested after hearing that Isobel Campbell was in Belle & Sebastian, which I adored at the time. Back then I wasn't yet familiar with the name Mark Lanegan, but later on he has come quite important musical figure to me through his solo career, through Screaming Trees and through Queens of the Stone Age. This collaboration between two amazing singer-songwriters is also really interesting. Their music is mostly Americana folk with some very dark sounds. I like how their voices are completely different, but work together well.



Different songs on this album remind me of different other acts out there. There are strong similarities to Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, to Leonard Cohen, but also to Belle & Sebastian. I really like the cello playing on this album. Isobel Campbell is a great cello player.

I remember when I saw this album at the evening with my friends on vinyl, I just knew from the album cover alone, that I was going to like this album. It's strange how sometimes you definitely can judge an album by its covers. I ended up buying this on a jewel case CD, because it was so much cheaper than the vinyl version, which is bit of a shame, because the album looks so great. It kind of reminds me of Twin Peaks hotel.

The album starts with amazingly dark song Deus Ibi Est. It sounds a lot like some of the Leonard Cohen songs. Lanegan's voice is deep and dark. Black Mountain is almost going to the melody of Scarborough Fair, but it has really menacing cello sounds on the background and the chorus takes the melody to a strange, almost happy tones. The False Husband is like a song from a film noir western film with it's great iron sounding electric guitars. In the chorus it changes to this fairyland folklore piece. The title track Ballad of the Broken Seas is a very traditional style folk song with songwriting and kind of a sea shanty type of wavy melody. Next up there's a version of Hank Williams' great classic Ramblin' Man. (Do You Wanna) Come Walk With Me? is like a classic American folk song from the 1930s. At least I'm reminded of some old Woody Guthrie songs. Saturday's Gone is a great little melancholic ballad. Campbell's vocals work brilliantly in this one. It's Hard to Kill a Bad Thing has some amazing acoustic guitars and soft bongo drumming. Like so many other albums, I think this one also gets a bit boring towards the end. The ending song The Circus Is Leaving Town is quite alright, but the last half of the album can't compare with the first half.

There are some good songs also on the duo's other album, Hawk, but as a whole, it's not quite as good as this one. I feel like, in general, this duo has made some amazing songs, but some of them leave me completely cold. Unfortunately there hasn't been enough good material to fill the whole album, because if the whole album would be made with the same standard as the first couple of songs, it would be one hell of an album.

Listen to the album on Youtube.