Search - Various Artists :: Rogue's Gallery: Pirate Ballads, Sea Songs, and Chanteys

A Success

Ryan Sampson | 12/31/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Very few albums that claim to be new great versions of folk songs ever turn out to be good. For the most part, they tend to overproduce or gloss up songs that were originally meant to be raw and bare. Or they try to rock them up or mix other musical influences in there and lose the orginal feel and intent of the song.

I can happily say that this album is one of the few that really delivers. I have studied irish and american folk music, particularly sea chanties, for many years now. This album really adds some new dimensions to the songs without losing the integrity of the originals. I highly recommend it to folk lovers and just fans of music in general. This album was born out of a disney pirate movie, so I really did not expect it to be very good, but it is brilliant. Well done."

It must have seemed like a good idea at the time

Richard E. Spilman | Jersey City, NJ | 11/25/2009

(1 out of 5 stars)

"It must have seemed like a good idea at the time. Johnny Depp, fresh from playing Captain Jack Sparrow in the highly popular if extremely uneven "Pirates of the Caribbean" movies decided to get his rock star friends together to make a CD of pirate songs and sea chanties. What could be bad?



The answer to the question, "what could be bad?" regarding Rogue's Gallery, the two CD set that resulted, is regrettably - most of it. The entire CD may not be execrable garbage, but the majority of it is.



How could so many talented musicians and singers create such noisome noise? I think most of them just never got the memo. Most don't seem to understand what sea chanties or sea songs are all about. When Nick Cave, the punk rocker, takes the slyly obscene, Fire Down Below, adds punk rock instrumentation, an out of tune chorus and shouts "And all you mother f__ckers, if you lead a life of sin," well, shall we say that the charm is lost? Or when Martha Wainwright sings Lowlands, her voice is fine but is so overwhelmed by the orchestration that the song seems beside the point. (Most sailors did not travel with full orchestras.) Likewise, Bono's version of A Dying Sailor To His Shipmates is 4 minutes,48 seconds long, of which about 3 minutes is Bono moaning along with the orchestra. And on and on it goes.



To be fair, Richard Thompson, Sting and John C. Riley get it more or less right. Their songs feature limited accompaniment, straight-forward singing and robust choruses. I particularly like John C. Riley's "Fathom the Bowl." Nevertheless, these three stalwart singers can't make up for all the rockstar preening and over orchestration."