False Lankum

Lankum review – more like an exorcism than a gig

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The Dublin doom-folk favourites crown a momentous year with a magnificent assault on the senses and a set rich in hypnotic tales of woe

Roundhouse, London
By Kitty Empire

The Dublin doom-folk favourites crown a momentous year with a magnificent assault on the senses and a set rich in hypnotic tales of woe

Outside, brightly dressed people head to festive functions. Inside the often dimly lit north London venue, the focus is more on death and suffering.

To be clear, no audience members are physically harmed tonight by Lankum’s mantric take on traditional Irish music – although the Dublin foursome’s often confrontational acoustics are part of their considerable appeal. It’s the songs that tell of murders (multiple) and suicides (at least two), of grief and dread. There are mutinies at sea (the traditional The New York Trader). On land, travails are rife, nowhere more so than on Rocky Road to Dublin. Lives blighted by addiction regularly stud the band’s set list, which mixes originals, covers and avant-garde rearrangements of folk songs. This is their biggest ever show to date – a sold-out 3,000 capacity – the culmination of a year that saw the release of Lankum’s fourth and most assured album, False Lankum. That record made them, briefly, favourites for the Mercury prize (which went to Ezra Collective); it has ended 2023 with high rankings in many albums of the year lists.

Folk music has always been gristly with suffering. Featuring several vocalists who each play several instruments, Lankum have made their name retelling these old tales of woe with compassion and no little anger. For the band – named after the traditional song False Lankum, a variant of Child Ballad No 93, in which terrible things happen to a baby – ancient afflictions remain horrifyingly contemporary.

Take The Wild Rover, their mesmeric set opener, drawn from their 2019 album The Livelong Day. Thought to have its origins in the 17th century, the tune has travelled widely as a drinking song; it’s a chant with Celtic away fans. Sung by the hypnotic Radie Peat, with meaty harmonies from the rest of the band, the Lankum version foregrounds the bitter regret at having wasted on drink the riches that could have bought “10 acres”, a roof and warm clothing.

Ian Lynch on uilleann pipes.
Ian Lynch on uilleann pipes. Photograph: Sonja Horsman/The Observer

Even sadder is Lankum original The Young People, a song introduced as being “about the frailty of human life”. Sung by guitarist Daragh Lynch, it starts with someone “swinging” (from a rope) and reminds us, with close harmonies and a pileup of instruments, that life is very short. There’s time, too, for expressions of solidarity with the Palestinian people tonight. Lynch pointedly asks the guffawing audience how it’s going, us having a new king.

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Watch Lankum performing ‘Go Dig My Grave’ (Mercury Prize 2023)

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Lankum did us all proud with their performance of ‘Go Dig My Grave’ at last night’s Mercury Prize for which their fourth album, False Lankum, was nominated.

by Alex Gallacher

I know many of you were all rooting for Lankum to win last night’s Mercury Prize, who were hotly tipped to win by many. The crown went to London’s Ezra Collective with Where I’m Meant to Be. They are the first jazz artist to pick up the award since its inception in 1992, and their infectious jazz, funk, and Afrobeat has played no small part in helping to put London’s jazz scene on the map, which is currently in incredibly rude health. A huge congrats to them.

Lankum were nominated for their fourth release, False Lankum, released in March 2023. In his review of the album, Thomas Blake described it as challenging, raw, brutally honest and always rewarding, and that’s exactly how it felt last night watching them perform ‘Go Dig My Grave’. We knew they hadn’t won when the announcer used the words ‘uplifting’ to describe the winner before reaching into her envelope, not a phrase you’d use to describe a song that centres around the “emotion of grief – all-consuming, unbearable and absolute.” There’s nothing wrong with that – in the world of folk music, we love it…especially drone-folk.

While folk music has come a long way since I first started Folk Radio, no other band sounds quite like Lankum, and it was an exciting moment to see them up there on stage, knowing this would be the first time many may have heard them. It was an incredible live performance – seriously out there – Well done Lankum, you did us all proud!

The song ‘Go Dig My Grave’ was discovered by Lankum’s Radie Peat, who learned the particular version on the album from the singing of Jean Ritchie, who recorded it in 1963 on the album Jean Ritchie and Doc Watson at Folk City. It is a member of a family of songs which seem to be largely made up of what are known as ‘floating verses’, originally composed as stanzas of various ballads, some of which date back to the 17th century.

“Our interpretation of the traditional song Go Dig My Grave is one that centres around the emotion of grief – all-consuming, unbearable and absolute. A visceral physical reaction to something that the body and mind are almost incapable of processing. The second part of the song is inspired by the Irish tradition of keening (from the Irish caoineadh) – a traditional form of lament for the deceased. Regarded by some as opening up ‘perilous channels of communication with the dead’, the practice came under severe censure from the catholic church in Ireland from the 17th century on.”

Here’s the performance for those of you who may have missed it:

Source: Watch Lankum performing ‘Go Dig My Grave’ (Mercury Prize 2023)