DES DUIVELS OORKUSSEN

‘Des Duivels Oorkussen’ is a pleasant enough debut from Dutch prog folk band Chimera. Not to be mistaken with at least a dozen other bands by the same name including former Fleetwood Mac guitarist Bob Weston’s early seventies group Chimera, these guys appear to have been mostly the husband/wife team of Bas and Marry Verkade along with three other guys who would never be heard from again: bassist Ruvo Schotting, violinist Kees Mook and multi-instrumentalist Koos Leezer.

The lyrics are Dutch I presume, certainly some sort of Scandinavian tongue that sounds awfully warm and inviting on the tongue of young Marry Verkade, and the music is so heavily folk-leaning that I hesitate to even call it progressive or even contemporary folk. This stuff is firmly rooted in older Dutch traditional folk, with variations on violin and flute-driven reels abounding throughout and a couple of more laid-back pastoral pieces, the most eloquent of which is easily the instrumental “St Vitusdans” which features every instrument in the band’s repertoire including an Indian organ, violin, flute, whistles, recorder, dulcimer, mandolin and of course a couple of guitars.

Another track (“De Droghen Haring”) hints at the slightly more rocking and modern pose the band would strike for their second and final release ‘Obstakel’ a year later, but beyond that most of the album is quite well-played but rather pedestrian folk. The band offers up something of a magnum opus with the 9-minute plus “De Loteling”, reminding me for some reason a whole lot of the British contemporary folk act Faraway Folk despite the cultural and language differences. Mostly the interplay of Marry Verkade’s tempered soprano and the various male singers on the song I suppose, sort of a non-harmonizing trio/quartet much like what Faraway did for several years.

Not much else to say about this record. It hasn’t ever been released on CD to my knowledge, although I know Bas and Marry Verkade reformed the band as a trio with their eldest son a few years ago and expressed some interest in reissuing their back catalog. The three of them don’t appear to have been active in some time now, so I don’t expect anyone will re-release this of ‘Obstakel’ any time soon.

I have nothing against this album and actually kind of enjoy the interaction between Marry Verkade and the traditional instruments; but much like groups such as Dulcimer, Horden Raikes and Heron this is quite good folk music but not so much progressive. I’ll have to go with two stars but only based on a prog-folk scale; would be three easily if I were only judging the folk quality of the music.

peace