{"id":37,"date":"2012-11-19T18:00:00","date_gmt":"2012-11-19T18:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/johnbeckett\/2012\/11\/antlered-crown-and-standing-stone\/"},"modified":"2012-11-19T18:00:00","modified_gmt":"2012-11-19T18:00:00","slug":"antlered-crown-and-standing-stone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/johnbeckett\/2012\/11\/antlered-crown-and-standing-stone.html","title":{"rendered":"Antlered Crown and Standing Stone"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>
<\/a><\/div>\n

If you\u2019re already a fan of Damh the Bard<\/a> you don\u2019t need to read this review. You know you want his new CD, you\u2019re going to enjoy it, just go buy it<\/a>. But if you want an opinion first, read on.<\/p>\n

Antlered Crown and Standing Stone<\/i> is Damh the Bard\u2019s first studio album of new songs in four years. Since The Cauldron Born<\/i> in 2008, Damh has released an album of traditional folk songs and a live album, and his music was the inspiration for The Spirit of Albion<\/a><\/i> movie. What has four years given us? A pretty good album.<\/p>\n

The title track is an anthem to the Horned God, someone Damh feels has been mistreated over the years \u2013 by Christians who misidentified him with Satan and by Pagans who ignored him in favor of the Goddess. Damh has tried to rectify this on previous albums with \u201cPipes of Pan,\u201d \u201cNoon on the Solstice,\u201d and especially with \u201cGreen and Grey.\u201d Those songs were ballads telling stories. \u201cAntlered Crown and Standing Stone\u201d is a worship song for the Horned God. If there was any doubt, Damh settled it in the \u201cmaking of\u201d video<\/a> where he reverently said \u201che\u2019s my man, and I\u2019ll write songs for him till I die.\u201d As far as I know, Damh the Bard has given the world its first Pagan worship song.<\/p>\n

The worshipful tone continues through much of the album. \u201cBrighid\u201d is an anthem to both the Celtic goddess and the Christian saint. \u201cSilent Moon\u201d is the worship of the Moon and the Goddess of the Moon. And \u201cThe Dreaming\u201d is Damh\u2019s beautiful impression of his visit to Australia, complete with a didgeribone playing in the background. <\/p>\n

\u201cSons and Daughters (of Robin Hood)\u201d isn\u2019t exactly a new song. It\u2019s a political song Damh recorded and released last year in response to a proposal by the Conservative UK government to sell off England\u2019s national forests, a proposal that was eventually abandoned. As an American I don\u2019t recognize many of the events the song references, but according to Damh neither do many younger Britons \u2013 educating them is one of his goals for writing it. <\/p>\n

This is a satire in the classic Druid sense of the term. But while it\u2019s a good, intelligent satire it\u2019s missing something: a [rabble] rousing chorus. What we have is \u201cIf you thought that we would do nothing, you\u2019ve misunderstood. For we are the sons and daughters of Robin Hood.\u201d It\u2019s simply too soft and too brief to express the kind of defiance a protest song should inspire. <\/p>\n

Damh\u2019s website says \u201cthe album finishes with an 8 minute epic retelling of the story of Ceridwen and Taliesin.\u201d That concerned me. This tale is very important in OBOD Druidry. I\u2019ve told it many times<\/a> and each person who tells it puts his or her own twist to it. I was afraid this would become an \u201cofficial\u201d version of the story. <\/p>\n

Not to worry. This is a musical version of the story, not a spoken word version. \u201cCeridwen and Taliesin\u201d is the most energetic song on the album, complete with bagpipes and some other instruments I can\u2019t recognize. Damh teams with Kate Fletcher to give the shapeshifting chase scene the give and take it needs. It\u2019s a great way to end the album. <\/p>\n

If I was grading Antlered Crown and Standing Stone<\/i> I\u2019d give it a B+. It\u2019s a very good collection of songs \u2013 there\u2019s not a bad one in the bunch. In fact, this may be Damh\u2019s best overall album yet. The only thing it\u2019s missing is a something really powerful like \u201cThe Cauldron Born\u201d or \u201cSpirit of Albion.\u201d<\/p>\n

Perhaps that\u2019s not a fair criticism \u2013 I\u2019ve learned enough about writing to know these things come as the Awen flows. And it may be that \u201cAntlered Crown and Standing Stone\u201d will grow on me, and I\u2019ll start to associate that music with our worship of Cernunnos and not with the Christian worship it so resembles. <\/p>\n

In the end, these are the first new songs from Damh the Bard in four years, and that makes me happy.<\/p>\n

Antlered Crown and Standing Stone<\/i>
by Damh the Bard
10 songs, 53 minutes 40 seconds
available on Amazon, iTunes, and at paganmusic.co.uk<\/a><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you\u2019re already a fan of Damh the Bard you don\u2019t need to read this review. You know you want his new CD, you\u2019re going to enjoy it, just go buy it. But if you want an opinion first, read on. Antlered Crown and Standing Stone is Damh the Bard\u2019s first studio album of new […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1129,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nAntlered Crown and Standing Stone<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"If you\u2019re already a fan of Damh the Bard you don\u2019t need to read this review. You know you want his new CD, you\u2019re going to enjoy it, just go buy it. 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