Afro Celt Sound System: Part Two

Call it bonding. Afro Celt Sound System's second album, Release, was born out of grief at the death of keyboard player Jo Bruce. The new disc, Further in Time, grew on the road, criss-crossing the world. Even before the tour was over, they were playing new songs like "North" in concert.

With the new record, they've taken the leap to the big time. But it's also a step forward, moving somewhat away from the sounds they'd established as their own.

"James [McNally] has been working incredibly hard," said band leader Simon Emmerson. "It's his album, really. He's come up with some amazing tunes. There are areas I was interested in, like Celtic reels over the beats - I'm deejaying a lot of that stuff - and I realized with "Colossus" we'd gone beyond stuff like "Whirly 1" and "Whirly 2." It was the next stage, and I didn't think we could take it any further. But James worked all through last summer in the studio. We had 40 basic tracks on the board, and two CDs worth of material. The really exhausting was done by Martin Russell and a new programmer called Mass, who comes from a band called Trench, Mohican Goths playing hardcore with breakbeats before Prodigy. He's a genius."

"I hope we're not going to get defined for "When You're Falling."

One thing that will bring the record plenty of notice is the array of special guests. As well a folk diva Julie Murphy, the musical landscape if populated by ex-Zeppelin singer Robert Plant and Peter Gabriel, also the head of their record label.

"Plant's got a big Celtic heart," observed Emmerson. "He loves passionate music, and he has a very global outlook, and he's still questing. He said he'd do the song as long as it was in a grotty studio with no record company sycophants. All we could say is, "We've got the place for you, it's in a little Third World country called Hackney!" "

The Gabriel cut, "When You're Falling," however, almost runs counter to the flow of the album, slower, with the distinctive voice, sound really more like a Peter Gabriel songs than the Afro Celts.

"It is the odd one out," Emmerson agreed. "We weren't going to put in on, and then the company thought it was a great track. They played it to Peter, who wasn't sure about being on it, and said ‘Don't be disappointed if the answer's no," and then next thing I heard, he done it, and loved it. But it's going to be the odd one out because we don't write three-and-a-half minute pop songs with English lyrics."

However, it is very much the band involved.

"It's got my mandolin, and we're all there on it. If it had fitted in with the rest of the album, it wouldn't be a radio track. We did sit down and try to write a radio track. For me, that was a challenge, to do something nobody expected us to do. And it's not a cop-out - who'd have expected us to do that? I like it, and I think Peter sings it really well. But I know I'm going to be dogged by it for the rest of my life. However, we told the record company we wanted their input to help us go further, and they said "Something that can be played on the radio with an English lyric." At that point I said, "Forget it, that's not what we're about." But we gave it a go, and Iarla sang it, but we needed someone with a more Gabriel-esque voice. I hadn't expected him to sing it".

For Emmerson, Further in Time marked new instrumental directions. He began playing bouzouki, mandolin, and 12-string guitar. And he's let new influences come in.

"I hope we're not going to get defined for "When You're Falling." People will pick up on the track, but fuck it. It does disrupt the flow, but I'm very proud of it. The best bit of the record for me are the last four tracks. Go On Through is the defining moment, and Pina's vocals are great. Onwards is the type of Afro Celts sound I love now - no drum machines, more acoustic. The end of the album has more feminine energy."

Produced by the band, along with Stephen Hague, it's the first chapter of a new book, and one which, perhaps surprisingly, even has Beach Boys influence.

"I kept going on to Stephen Hague about "Surf's Up," " laughed Emmerson, "and the layered vocals, and the a capella bit of "When You're Falling" was a kind of attempt to get that."

But the record also finds them on the verge, something which isn't necessarily a thrill for them.

"We could be hitting the big time, and it's ‘Help! I want to be in a small obscure indie punk band!' "