Charles Hutchinson reviews David Ford (From York Press)

Charles Hutchinson reviews David Ford

11:12am Saturday 19th January 2008

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DAVID Ford can command a two-page spread in The Sunday Times but still he lugs his own gear from his van, dresses in busker mode, in stubble, jaunty trilby and washed-out shirt and composes the full, jagged glory of his lacerating opener, State Of The Union, on the hop with the aid of technology propped up on a chair.

Ford's devotees would not have it any other way: he is treasured by an enlightened few that would not swap his fatalistic romanticism for the ubiquitous stadium doom of Coldplay.

His patchwork use of tape-loop, constructing and then destroying a wall of sound with multi-tracked snatches of acoustic guitar, assorted percussion and echoing voices, is a startling start.

Yet nothing startles more than his lyrics with his eye for wry Eastbourne detail. Ford may mock himself in a running joke, introducing everything as a "song about finding joy in the face of adversity", but he nails how love really is, the way it pulls your heart up and down, in Decimate, I'm Alright Now, Cheer Up (You Miserable F***) and Go To Hell.

His rasp is potent, his humour allows him to do a Leonard Cohen cover for more misery, and the trombone, violin and keyboards of Hannah Peel and the mandolin and stand-up drumming of Gary Page give a shifting focus to scuffed songs that straddle country, folk and baroque.

One new composition, his first for two years, is introduced, and good news for Ford followers, it mentions hell again.

• David Ford, Fibbers, York

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