The Urban Folk Quartet are the 'reel' deal

There’s folk music – and then there’s Urban Folk music...

Among a fiddle-plucking, banjo-strumming tidal wave of decent acoustic bands, the Urban Folk Quartet stand alone – pulsing with energy and drawing in influences from... well, everywhere: Ireland, the Balkans, the Appalachians and even India and Africa.

It’s folk for those who already love roots music and those who didn’t think they did – combining, as it does, elements of jazz, Americana, Afrobeat, funk, rock and dance music, and with good times guaranteed wherever they pitch up.

“We are four musicians almost literally sweating our guts out to share a positive experience with everyone in the room,” says percussionist Tom Chapman.
“Our music is largely based around Celtic jigs and reels and traditional songs. But from there on in we include any, and every, influence we have. So, a tune might have the structure and intensity of a toe-tapping Irish tune you might hear in a pub in Dublin, with an underlying groove inspired by African drumming."

He goes on: "We never just stick different types of music together hoping they’ll stick, though.

“It always comes from two core things: music we’re genuinely passionate about, and the process of finding interesting and exciting ways that our influences can really work together to create something new.”

UFQ came together seven years ago as a supergroup of established musicians: Tom (who has previously leant his talents to The Old Dance School, Conservatoire Folk Ensemble and Cerys Matthews); Galician fiddle player Paloma Trigás (The Chieftains, Sharon Shannon, Altan, Carlos Nuñez); guitar, fiddle and mandolin player Joe Broughton (The Albion Band, Conservatoire Folk Ensemble); and oud player Frank Moon – replaced two years ago by claw hammer banjo maestro Dan Walsh (Seth Lakeman Band, The Levellers, Walsh and Pound).

Together they have released three studio albums, including last year’s Exit – named by many commentators as one of the best listens of 2015.
So what is it that has got so many people excited? Tom insists its the power of their live performances.

“We put a lot of energy into our shows and hope that, even if you don’t know anything at all about the technicalities of music, you’ll get swept along on the journey with us,” he says.

The band have also released a pair of live albums; with a sixth – UFQ III – being recorded during their show at Oxford’s Old Fire Station tonight.

For UFQ, playing Oxford is a bit like coming home.
“Oxfordshire is a real hub of exciting folk music of all types,” says Tom. “Playing Fairport’s Cropredy Convention was an absolute honour and a hugely memorable moment for the band.

“We’ve had a blast every time we’ve been to Towersey Festival or played in Banbury or Oxford.

“Joe alone has a 20-year history of playing with The Albion Band, Fairport Convention, Bellowhead, Feast Of Fiddles and many other associated acts that have a strong connection with the area. So we know and love the Oxfordshire folkies and are hoping to catch up with some old friends for a great night at the wonderful Old Fire Station."

The show gives them a chance to try some fresh material with a few surprises.

Tom shares a few secrets: “We’ve got a new song called Long Time Traveller which is an old American folk song,” he says. “It’s got a lovely little Chicago-Irish style tune of Paloma’s in the middle and we’ve based it round an interlocking guitar and banjo riff with quite minimal percussion, which is a new approach.

“There are more vocal numbers in the show than before, and we’ve also got a new piece based around a mournful melody of Paloma’s and Dan’s Whiplash Reel, drawing heavily on influences from Indian classical music. And there’s more to come!”

While regulars here, the band’s roots are in Birmingham, which is where they take their name.

“For us Urban refers to the experience of living and working in the country’s second biggest city, where you can go out any night of the week and find high, and low, culture of every description,” Tom says.

“We’re folk musicians, applying the folk process, and to us that means we end up with a higher proportion of rock, funk, classical, Afrobeat and other influences in our music, because we genuinely love and respect that as much as we do the best trad music. It’s what fills our ears, in our time and place. I don’t think we’d be able to make honest music if we had to affect rusticity or pastoral, faux-rurality!”

The band escape to our genuine rurality this summer for the Towersey Festival. Before then they have the trifling matter of supporting Joss Stone at London’s Roundhouse, in May for a Barnardo's fundraiser.

“Joss first heard us at Green Man festival and introduced herself afterwards,” says Tom. “She stayed in touch, has come to see us on tour and invited Joe and Paloma to play on her last record. We played at a private party she was holding and she got up and sung with us, which was a very special moment. And boy, can she sing!

“She’s really very lovely and it’s an honour to be appearing at her only UK headline gig this year."
At least they are certain to arrive at the venue with their luggage intact, unlike on their ill-fated trip to the Baltics. “We played in Estonia in midwinter a couple of years ago,” Tom says uncomfortably. “But Paloma and Joe’s suitcases didn’t make it on to the flight after a change at Amsterdam.

“The temperature was well into the minuses when we arrived and our driver’s beard had icicles hanging off it. Any smugness I had, in my many layers, while Joe and Paloma borrowed clothes from very kind locals, was soon wiped away when my ancient, worn-out Doc Marten’s caused me to fall over on the icy streets four times during the day before the gig.

“I made it on to stage, ego and body pretty bruised and we had a great gig. As we exited the venue I slipped so spectacularly that I took a local journalist with me, via an accidental punch to her face.

"Horrified, I was relieved and amazed when she jumped up unfazed, swept me off the floor and acted as a human crutch to get me to the after party where jazz students were performing Frank Zappa covers. I’ll never forget that night!”

Urban Folk Quartet play the Old Fire Station Oxford tomorrow. Tickets from oldfirestation.org.uk

Urban Folk Quartet play the Old Fire Station Oxford tonight (Friday). Tickets from oldfirestation.org.uk