Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Ewen’s solo project Catalan! takes us on a journey
IN a world restricted by “green lists”, of places you can and cannot visit, trust Catalan! to take us on a journey to wherever you want. Roussillon Serenade, the debut single from Ewen Freirs’ solo project, conjures images of quaffing big reds in sun-scorched south western France (the Catalan part, funnily enough), of salt marshes and gallic cowboys. But that’s before you listen to it. The opening bars of delicately picked guitars, repeated like a mantra, hark back to 80s Zimbabwe and the Bhundu Boys, arguably the then flowering country’s great musical export.
Then the drums kick in and Ewen’s slightly detached, slightly shouty vocals take centre stage and take us somewhere else. “Cabin crew prepare to land, customers prepare to stand,” the former Axis Of bassists says. “Beckett writes in Roussillon, Facebook, Twitter, Amazon.”
It’s a surreal, fun confection of literary nods and pop culture, anger and bemusement. It nods to David Byrne, perhaps, The Clash and even
That Petrol Emotion. There’s also something of Clinic in Ewen’s delivery, and that’s a good thing too, and we can’t help but think of Jello Biafra’s exquisite monologue on We’ve Got A Bigger Problem Now
“Saracaens and Roman walls, Moorish raids on shopping malls,” he continues, a North Antrim twang just perceptible in the cynicism. “Take it all, take it all, release us from cholesterol - but by God leave our ethanol.”
It’s an affecting mix of the earnest and the absurd but it comes from the heart. You can tell Ewen, who devised the Catalan! project while taking a much-needed rest in France after years of incessant touring and recording with Axis Of, is obsessed by music. He lasted a day or two before he was back in his portable studio, working out guitar lines and getting down ideas. Good thing too. Roussillon Serenade, from the the forthcoming album Veritas, is out now on the Bolder label and available from the usual online spots…