This is a theme album based on songs and poems from the trenches and home front, 1914 – 1918. I have to say it is well worth listening to — in fact I think everyone should listen to this album, if only at least once in their lives. It is ironic that as I write this review Remembrance Sunday is getting near; each year, on the nearest Sunday to 11 November here in the U.K. we remember those who died in the two world wars. Chloe & Jason Roweth may not be too well known outside their native Australia, but they deserve to be, for here they have produced a pleasing and poignant work of art.
There are 27 tracks on this album. The songs are interspersed with poems written by soldiers serving in the army, indeed as are many of the songs. Added to this are many of the music hall songs that were popular at the time. The work has been well researched and echoes the thoughts of the soldiers. I understand this is the tenth album Chloe & Jason Roweth appear on, for in Australia they are more widely known as part of the band called Us Not Them. The songs are cleanly recorded, with accompaniment held to a minimum by Jason on guitar and mandolin by Chloe, augmented by a bass.
Each number is very tastefully done, letting the words come through and carry the songs. Some of the songs are poems put to music by more contemporary writers of modern times. A fine example is ‘ANZAC Cove’, the opening track. The words are by Leon Gellert, written whilst serving in Gallipolis (1915) and put to music by Bob Rummery. This pre-empts music hall favourites with adapted words (by the Australian troops?) such as ‘Pack up your Troubles’, ‘Charlie Chaplin’, and ‘A Long Way to Riverina’ (a.k.a ‘Long Way to Tipperary’). These fit in well with other fine Australian traditional songs like ‘The Banks of the Murray’ and ‘Boys of the Dardinelles’.
These and others fit in with the Australian parodies of other popular songs such as ‘Sing Me to Sleep’, and indeed makes the album all the more entertaining. The album holds some plums that I had not heard before. Of these, my favourite is ‘Hic Jacet’. The words came from Australian poet Tom Wilson who fought at Gallipoli. Bob Rummery put these to music. Others songs worthy of an extra mention include ‘Scots of the Riverina’, words by Henry Lawson (1917), music by Ade Monsbourgh, and ‘The Sleeper Cutters Camp’, words by Dan Sheahan (which, when posted to Australia, was banned by the Commonwealth Censor), tune by Denis Kevans. The title track for album ‘The Riderless Horse’ is at track 27, again a poem written in 1920 by John O’Brien and put to music by Denis Kevans. A riderless horse was paraded around towns in Australia in a recruitment drive by the army with the slogan “The Empire needs you! Who will fill the saddle?”
Notwithstanding its theme and its solemn content, it is still a fine album that is beautifully executed, educational, and entertaining. It brings home the true feelings of the ordinary soldiers, and the complete insanity of war. With recent world events and terrorism, it seems the world never learnt anything at all. Perhaps we never will, but we should never forget the misery it caused.
Listen to this album carefully . . .
(Chloe & Jason Roweth, 2004)
