Battleangel

Battlefield Band is back with a brand new studio album featuring a clear emigration theme.

Temple Records - Emigrants and emigration are making the headlines all over the world. The problems and benefits are highlighted in the press, the TV, radio and discussed in pubs, over the dining table, and in dubiously reasoned political debate, as politicians search for the populist vote. The path of emigration is a well-trodden one in the history of the Celtic nations, so it is no surprise that many songs and compositions have been inspired by the subject. Battlefield Band have touched on the subject on past albums. On this album, as they were rehearsing and recording, the theme of ‘displacement of people’ sort of took over.

Battlefield Band have not tried to come up with any answers; just music and song, contemporary and traditional that show how the issue of ‘Immigration’ has always been as relevant as it is today.

Nevertheless, many songs, like much the material from Battlefield Band, have a political side to it and are highly socially conscious. From Woody Guthrie’s Plane Wreck At Los Gatos to the traditional The Emigrant (Paddy’s Lamentation). The album is a grand festival of (somewhat depressing) ballads, laments and poignant protests of injustice as well as a very apt praise of another one of the sons of Scotland.

Another political figure is also celebrated in the same set: one a little closer to home in geographical and historical interest. ‘Mr. Galloway Goes To Washington’ is another Katz reel that honours George Galloway’s vocal defeat of the Senate Sub-Committee and their accusations towards his dealings in oil.