Lux Harmonium: new vinyl single “Soap and Silk / Peggy Come Home” with album on CD “After the Tower”
Peggy Come Home/ Soap and Silk. Artwork by Hannah Megee.
Limited 300 edition (White & Splatter) in clear 7” vinyl with FREE album CD.
“Following on from VAN239, this is the second 7” from Lux Harmonium to be released on Static Caravan. Whereas the lead track on that single placed Luke Jones’s intricate guitar playing in enchanting isolation, these songs are instead largely vocal-led, though not without his beguiling, folk-centric melodies too”.
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Reviews for single and album
Six Days From Tomorrow: Best Albums of 2013 December 2013
Ranked as number 5 out of the top 50 albums of 2013 – with an excellent and in-depth review.
No Word: Best Folk Albums December 2013
Listed in the Best Folk Albums of 2013 and ranked as 19th out of 20.
Si Forster – 6dft.net August 2013
“I do seem to be lucky with blind buys, as I can’t recall forking out good money and getting a duffer in return. If only this mystical ability would extend to lottery numbers. I do tend to find that I’m swayed in no small part by things that go out of their way to intrigue and occasionally confuse, as if there’s anything to add to the suspense of not knowing what something’s going to sound like, it’s not knowing exactly what’s going on in the first place. Piccadilly Records has this on their website, describing it both as a 7″ single that comes with a whole accompanying album on CD or a CD album that comes with a free 7″. After several playthroughs, I am none the wiser (the label’s catalogue number is the same for both), but it’s clear from the contents of both that it doesn’t really matter…” Read more»
Tom Blake on Folk Radio August 2013
“There is a dreamlike feel to the whole record. Rather like the recent David A. Jaycock album (another Static Caravan release) the slightly off-kilter fairground simplicity of the melodies and the opacity of the lyrics are influenced by a very English, Victoriana-inflected form of psychedelia. The Mill Pond, for example, is almost like a pre-Raphaelite painting set to music, or a scene from an Arthur Machen story. Stars is sprawling but intimate, incorporating a complex three and a half minute guitar intro.
Static Caravan’s back catalogue is increasingly excellent, and these new recordings by Lux Harmonium are a welcome addition. At times sincere, at times slightly sinister, they recall the golden age of British psych-folk without ever losing their modern focus and precision…” Read more»
@Carovan Studios August 2013
“For those feeling tetchy out there. Share something better than bitter words. “LUX HARMONIUM – PEGGY COME HOME” http://vimeo.com/52971880″. Read more»
Chris McGranaghan, ‘Those Old Records’ August 2013
Beautiful pastoral acid folk sounds from Lux Harmonium on Static Caravan. Read more»
Denis, Autres Directions August 2013
“Une nouvelle fois, chez Static Caravan, l’artisanat tutoie l’art. Lux Harmonium est d’un autre temps. De l’époque pré-numérique. D’un temps, où les artistes prenaient le temps de déployer un morceau sur la longueur, de délier les phrases et les mélodies. Ainsi, l’Anglais transgresse les normes en vigueur aujourd’hui en dotant ses chansons d’une introduction, en alternant quelques couplets lumineux et un refrain avant de laisser enfin les doigts courir sur le manche de la guitare. Les chansons de Lux Harmonium commencent ainsi dans le terreau fertile d’un folk pastoral d’obédience classique (si tant est que John Fahey soit enfin reconnu à sa juste valeur et que Robert Wyatt ne soit jamais oublié) avant que le discret jeune homme n’emmène la mélodie ailleurs…” Read more»
Static Caravan July 2013
“Opening track ‘Soap and Silk’ carries with it the bitter-sweetness of a thousand vivid memories that just can’t be suppressed, and is wrapped in the kind of breezy melody which would get packed tents at summer festivals swaying in unison. On the flip, ‘Peggy Come Home’, finger-picked guitar underscores a tale of loss and place, with Jones’s light vocal especially evocative, while subtle drones in the background introduce electronic flourishes to the otherwise sparse arrangement. These two folk-pop nuggets are beautiful and timeless, though equally you could be forgiven for thinking they might have emerged on a piece of long-forgotten Island Records-stamped wax from 1970. There’s a real sense that this could easily be the soundtrack to a Ken Russell flick; not so much masturbating nuns as rural naked wrestling”… Read more»
Lux Harmonium: The Bones You Break/Camel Bones
(7″ vinyl, Static Caravan)
Reviews for The Bones You Break/Camel Bones
Byron Coley in Wire – December 2011
The solo project of Devon’s Luke Jones, Lux Harmonium’s single is a very nice poke in the folk eye. One side is an instrumental that reminds me equally of Glenn Jones and John Renbourn. The other side has vocals and harmonium, giving it a feel almost more similar to Alan Ashworth Jones. And while the production feels contemporary, the music itself has a most pleasant untimeliness.
Piccadilly Records – Record of the week in Folk, Americana, Country, Blues, R&B (24.10.11)
Vital Weekly (31.10.11)
Not every week, but when it happens, releases by Static Caravan bring that all too necessary enlightenment in the week, since their releases offer something that we don’t hear a lot, yet its never of the mediocre pop music that some try to pass off to the HQ. Static Caravan is our little window to the real world I guess. Luke Jones is the man behind Lux Harmonium and he plays folk music. One great vocal piece, ‘The Bones You Break’, while the other side (a double AA side here) is a lovely little instrumental of it, called ‘Camel Bones’. The vocal piece uses voice, guitar and harmonium and has a great pop sensibility to it. The other side has a great early summer breeze feel to it, like a fresh wind through your hair. A lovely gem, but I expected nothing less from Static Caravan. (FdW)
Norman Records (28.10.11)
Ah, this is lovely. A couple of pretty little pastoral songs from Lux Harmonium. They’ve a slight psychedelic edge to them but essentially this is pretty straight folk-type stuff for those who like a good fingerpicker. On ‘The Bones You Break’ he’s got a backing band and it’s relatively upbeat, while B-side ‘Camel Bones’, disconcertingly at 33rpm while the A is at 45, is a rich and atmospheric Fahey-style plucker that’ll go down well with anyone who appreciates his heady atmospherics. I have to say that I’m more of a fan of his guitar playing than his singing and as a result this side is for me the more satisfying of the two since there’s no backing instruments or vocals cluttering up the sound and it’s superbly recorded with a steely, resonant tone that’s perfectly suited to his style of playing. The one in my hand came with a really cool sticker, too. I’m presuming they all do.
losingtoday.com (19.9.11)
Not officially out for a few weeks Van 239 sees the debut twin set from Luke Harmonium – better known to family and friends as Luke Jones – information is a tad sketchy but it seems that there’s a full length currently simmering on the back burner awaiting release in the near future. Performing as both a solo artist and as a quintet, Lux Harmonium can often be found sourcing sonic textures through the recycling / remodelling or refashioning of old guitar and instrument parts his most favoured to date being his ‘harmonic guitar’, best known for his adept finger picking guitar playing artistry Mr Jones taps loosely into the delta folk blues worlds of a certain Mr Fahey and with the application of a fair amount of magic dust crafts something of a demurring detail that’s clipped with a longing lazy eyed pastoral glow that recalls at various points Alasdair Roberts minus the traditionalist slant, a younger earlier career minded and less haunting sounding David A Jaycock and most notably Loren MazzaCane Connors. Dimpled with an autumnal hue and back dropped by a wheezing harmonium ’the bones you break’ – the chirpier of the featured brace – tenderly touches base with the more genteel moments of Lupen Crooks back catalogue – its lolloping canters, lushly woven warmth filled textures and crooked and creaking motifs are trimmed idyllically to a pastel traced faintness whose collective effect endow it with an acutely breezy albeit sleepy headed cosy glow demeanour. Mind you and in keeping with the typical tradition of these things we must admit to being a tad bit smitten by the flip sides picturesque instrumental offering ’camel bones’ – a free spirited gem whose timeless pastoral pageantry (reminiscent incidentally of Billy Mahonie head boy Gavin Baker’s collaborations with his father as the Baker Boys) is thrust unto what can only best be described as a age old dance with natures freewheeling and unfettered elements seemingly playing tic, tac toe with her land locked fixtures, sound wise very much informed by the much missed Fahey and Rose with the crystal clear clarity afforded to each and every scratch and scrape of the nylon strings appending a sense of the natural and the archaic with Jones’ use of space and drama perfectly pitched by the metering shift in pace from the lull of thoughtful murmurs to the onward rush of the chase – quite captivating if you ask me.