Marc Carroll - Stone Beads & Silver
Irish Songwriter Marc Carroll previews his 4th solo album, ‘Stone Beads & Silver’ with a single ‘The Fool Disguised In Beggars Clothes’ on 21st January.
Mark makes a rare UK appearance with an intimate at The Enterprise, Haverstock Hill NW3 on Thursday 31st January. The album ‘Stone Beads & Silver’ is released 28th January.
Recorded in Los Angeles and Woodstock during the summer of 2012, Carroll drafted in a host of high ranking musicians to play on ‘Stone Beads & Silver’, and for the first time hired a defacto producer - Grammy Award winner Chris Testa (Jimmy Eat World, Band Of Horses, Dixie Chicks) to work alongside him on the sessions. "I liked Chris when I met him and I think we worked well together. I thought it would be interesting to let someone else in on the act. "
Filling the ranks of Marc’s studio band are amongst the best working in American music today, including Bo Koster (My Morning Jacket), Nelson Bragg & Probyn Gregory (Brian Wilson), McKenzie Smith (Midlake) as well as legendary former Bob Dylan sideman and Levon Helm band leader, Larry Campbell - the album marks another turning point in Carroll’s long and varied career.
Several strands are woven into the fabric of the music. Folk and country influences and instrumentation can be found on tracks like the mesmerising, haunting, album opener, 'Muskingum River'.
Other songs evoke the space and distance of the deserts and coasts of California. 'Sat Neath Her Window' could almost be a traditional folk song.
Lyrically astute as ever, songs like 'The Fool Disguised in Beggars Clothes' reveal a poised sense of poetry and observation, while '(It Was) Lust Not Love' once again demonstrates his ability to fire off a 3 minute pop song with ease.
With good reason he has been declared as 'One of the finest songwriters putting pen to paper.'
Moving from continent to continent since the age of 15, Carroll now 41, resides in Los Angeles.