Tag Archives: The Dolmen

Monthly Marker March 2020: Priscilla Hernandez

Time for a new Monthly Marker and some special news!

Priscilla Herandez

It’s a new month, so once again, time for a new Monthly Marker!

(And for some special Monthly Marker news! Read to the end!)

In this month of spring, we want to celebrate the returning of vibrant life to the earth, so we went looking for a song that really reflects that feeling. And boy, did we find that in Priscilla Hernandez – Yidneth! Not only does the title of the song we chose, The Waking Of Spring, immediately conjure images of blooming flowers and singing birds, the music and lyrics will transport you to Mother Nature’s reawakening lap. Though this song was released as a single, we strongly recommend you check out her albums as well. The music is beautiful and amazing, but the artwork of the albums is out of this world!

You can find Priscilla Hernandez here:

And now for that special news!

Read more

The Dolmen create their own world

Taloch Jameson
The Dolmen create their own world and take the audience on a musical adventure. Three weeks ago, on Friday 24th, the audience of P60 in Amstelveen got carried away into this magical world. Before this one-and-a-half-hour concert of the Dolmen, The Royal Spuds made an entrance for this world.

Tonight I’m Staying In, the opening song of The Royal Spuds. They might be the only one to stay in, because P60 is filled with people. Bare feet, swirly skirts and long hair with dreadlocks; that is a rough sketch of the audience. The Spuds are here to party and after the third song, the venue is quite steamy. It’s unclear whether that’s the audience or if there are any hidden smoke machines… The curtain falls and it’s time for the Dolmen.

The Royal Spuds   Micky Silver and Robin Janssens

The curtain rises and before we can see the band, we hear the first notes of Nuada. Band leader Taloch Jameson looks like he is having the time of his life. He is dancing and jumping around the stage, which has a contagious effect on the audience. Drummer Chris Jones is taking all of his energy out on the drums, dreadlocks flying around his face.

Taloch Jameson Kayleigh Marchant

It’s time for Crimson Tears and that is clearly an audience favourite. Guitarist Josh Elliot is playing a solo and all three band members are dancing and jumping around. The rock number shifts seamlessly into an acoustic song. Josh’s guitar is accompanied by the raw voice of Taloch. Then we hear the drums. Soft at first, but slowly becoming louder and louder until the entire audience is swinging along. And just like that, the drums stop and it’s guitar only. But not for long, the bass and drums follow up quickly. They are taking the audience on a rhythmic journey, getting ready for the drop. People are living in the moment. They are in their own world. The band and the audience become one with the moment. You can hear the love with which the music is made, and you can see it, too. The Dolmen’s songs leave the audience in a trance. They are not here to dance, but to experience the music.

Kayleigh Marchant with in the the background members of The Dolmen

Towards the end, the party music comes along; Dead Cats Don’t Meow, Rebel Fairy Fling. A few conga lines swing through the concert hall and The Royal Spuds are dancing in the back. Tim Elfring, singer and percussionist at Pyrolysis, is invited by Taloch on stage. It’s the last song and he is dancing, singing and even drumming. The audience is desperate for more and an hour and a half of the Dolmen seems like no time at all. A few people continue dancing after the show is over. The trance of the Dolmen is far from over.

The Dolmen with Tim Elfring

The Magic of the Dolmen, an interview

Taloch Jameson, Chris Jones, Kayleigh Marchant and Josh Elliott on the couch during the interview Left to right: Taloch Jameson, Josh Elliot, Chris Jones, Kayleigh Marchant  

The Dolmen are known for their spiritual music. In the last weekend of January, they took us on a magical trip during their two concerts in the Netherlands. In this interview we are joining their trip to see what is behind their music.

 
What drives you to make music?
Taloch: “On a personal level, we don’t know why we do it, other than we love doing it. The thing is, being a musician is like being a drug addict.”
The band laughs.
Kayleigh: “Eh, not quite…”
Taloch: “We never got any money… Can’t get a job…”
Chris: “That’s it, because we’re all unemployable… We all smell sweaty.”
Kayleigh: “Speak for yourself! I smell fresh.”
Chris: “We don’t only do the music, we do all sorts of stuff. It’s just to give people something that they can enjoy.”
 
You are quite spiritual. Does that show in your music?
Kayleigh: “I hope so. Otherwise, we’re doing something really, really wrong.”
Taloch: “There is a very simple message in our spirituality. It’s a universal spirituality, which is not bound by the constraints of religion. The individual is always encouraged to follow their own way of spirituality. I live by a five fork mantra: every person is born equal. Every person deserves opportunity. Wisdom will come naturally. No woman, no man, can call themselves free unless they have freedom of choice. It means that everybody is always left in control. You have to take responsibility yourself. This mantra can be said in one word: love. Love for life, love for the planet, love for humankind. And that is our spirituality. We don’t preach it, we sing it. We live it. You can’t tell any of us what to think or what to do, because we’re beyond that. We live through that mantra. Hopefully, that’s what people get from our music.”

“Part of being human is to also have an essence of spirituality”

Do you think the world needs more spirituality?
Taloch: “Every person is spiritual at some point in their life, even if they don’t feel it right now. There will be one point in your life, maybe a few points or maybe an everlasting point in your life, where you will feel spiritual. Where things around you will make a big difference. And you will come to hear that innate voice that echoes down, soon. That is why the human race has always built shrines and stone circles or they go on and build different monuments.”
Chris laughs: “The Shard.”
Taloch: “Part of being human is to also have an essence of spirituality.”
Does your music help with that?
Taloch: “I wouldn’t say that it helps with it. People help themselves to find their own way to it. We play music and our music just happens to tune that way. This is our contribution. Whether it helps someone, is down to the person’s personal take on it. Our music is not to help, it’s just what we do.”
Kayleigh: “We’re sharing our spirituality through our music in the hope that it will make a difference to people; someone will take something positive from it and carry it on from there. We’re not saying that we do do it, but we hope that we do.”
Chris: “We put our own spirituality in it, which a lot of people who listen to us experience or find that in common with us. That five fork mantra goes into all of our music and performances. Some people relate to that, which is great.”

“We stand on the shoulders of our ancestors”

Taloch: “You know, wouldn’t it be just beautiful if the human race could just see the greater love of what it needs to exist and to survive. Countries could learn to sell their differences and learn to actually come together. That is the greater love of life. If enough people could actually grasp this… People can still be proud of their cultures. We stand on the shoulders of our ancestors. We’ve come down through hundreds of thousands of years of evolution to reach where we are. Let’s hope that we continue to evolve and we will reach that point where we can. Where we can settle our differences without dropping a few missiles. War is not good for anyone. Isolation is not good for any country or person.”
This year is the 30th birthday of the Dolmen. Are you going to celebrate it?
Taloch: “We are.”
Josh: “We usually drink, to be fair. It’s a special occasion.”
Taloch: “We haven’t worked out exactly what we are doing yet, but it is a special year for us. The Dolmen was put together to play gigs at campfires. I didn’t want to ruin this atmosphere of a beautiful time out in the country or out in the woods where we would play instruments. We still do it now. In the UK we still have our own gatherings, festivals and other events.”

!!! The great big THE DOLMEN P60 give-away !!!

The Dolmen

The festive days are behind us, and for most of us those are also expensive days. But at CeltCast we believe that the party should never stop, so together with The Dolmen and P60 we have some goodies for you to win!

Comment on this post (- the original one on the CeltCast page -) and tag a friend that you would like to take to the concert of The Dolmen | P60 Amstelveen (supported by The Royal Spuds) on the 24th of January. We are giving away two times two tickets, so you have double the chance to win and take your friend out, for free!

But that’s not all! Each winner will also receive a bonus! To go with these tickets one of the lucky winners will also receive a T-shirt of their choice and an promo CD from The Dolmen’s early days. The other lucky winner will have their pick of a free CD (the vintage CD excluded) and will also receive some stickers!

So quickly jump into the comment section and let us know who you want to bring to Amstelveen by tagging them, and feel free to let your friends know of this give-away by sharing this post. Good luck to you all!

The winner will be drawn at random and announced on the 16th of January here on the CeltCast Facebook page. You have until 18:00 CET on that day to enter in the competition.

Hello music lovers!

After a Castlefest Winter Edition weekend with a lot live music, we have much more music for you!

Today I present you: six albums of the CeltCast Fantasy Award longlist “Best Album 2019” and eight older (or digital) ones. Music from a lot of different countries and with a broad range of styles!

M’ANAM — M’ANAM (2019) — Ireland and Iceland
On Saturday, February 16, 2019, we were asked to make a live stream during the M’ANAM concert in Rotterdam. That was a very special evening and… it was an honor to be there! (You can see these livestreams on our webpage or Facebook page.) The men of ANÚNA , “M’ANAM” have also released this album and it is beautiful! 👨‍👨‍👦‍👦

Nadia Birkenstock – Celtic Harp & Song (2013 and 2019) — Germany
This week we have an older and a new album of Nadia! Of course, the harp is a well-known instrument in the folk scene. Nadia has made another album to dream away with magical harp tunes! 💭

Imbue and Twigs & Twine — The Netherlands
On the 12th of September the CeltCast team went to the Gasthuiskapel (-chapel) in Zaltbommel for the album release party of Imbue (folk, medieval music) and Twigs & Twine (folk pop). Although the bands are certainly not similar, it was a very interesting combination of musical sounds in this beautiful chapel. Both albums are beautiful in their own way! ⛪️

North Sea Gas — Hearth And Homeland (2019) — England
On our way back home after the Fantasy Forest Festival in England Alex and I travelled to Oxford. In a nice pub we met musicians during their Folk Session. After a couple of weeks, we found this amazing album in our mailbox! It’s their 21st album, so… a new collection of Scottish Folk Music! 🎻

EMIAN • PaganFolk Music — Egeria (2019) — Italy
Years ago, we’ve met the members of Emian in person at the lovely festival Celtic Night Geluwe and… they stole our hearts with their music ánd their personalities. I don’t have to say much about this album, because our Cliff de Booy did that already. You can find his review here (November 6th ) (pssst, I LOVE it <3)📜

Bruni — Kynda (2018) — England
The band Bruni released their first album last year. Their own words are: “Across borders, across languages and across the ages”. And, that is wat this album you brings. Keep an eye on this young band! Our own CeltCast Dylan Kerr (and his girlfriend Alana Bennett) are musicians on this album! 💫

Jolin – no physical album yet — Germany
This young lady has just started yet! She has a beautiful voice and we’re curious to what she is going to bring us in the near future. There is no physical album yet, but… we have permission to play a couple of her songs already! You can find Jolin regularly with The Dolmen clan. 😊

Victor Santal — Arpa Celtica (2012) — Spain
Yes, we finally have permission to play this wonderful album on our radio station. Enjoy this magical harp sounds! 🧚‍♀️

Tevenn — Rhuys (2007) — France Years ago, Alex and I were on holiday in Brittany (France), where we bumped into this folk band at our campsite. And, we still like to listen to this album! We hope for new material from this band soon. 🇫🇷

Clannad Irish Band — Past Present (1989) — Ireland
On June 26th, our Cliff de Booy wrote a large review about Clannad, so… if you want to know more about this Irish band, go to: https://celtcast.com/?s=clannad 🇮🇪

Kallidad — Unplugged 2018 (2018) — Australia
At Elfia Arcen we met the Australian band Kallidad (a band with Mexican and flamenco influences). Fantastic energetic music to listen to. When we brought home several albums, we already knew that most of it would not fit in the format of our radio station, but … there is one song on this unplugged album that we can play, yes! 💃🕺

Cuélebre — Anaman (2017) — Spain
This band brings us pagan folk music from Spain. This album Anaman made in 2017 takes you to earlier times, that’s for sure. We are eagerly awaiting new material! 🍃

Very happy that these beautiful CDs have been processed: 📀

M’ANAM — M’ANAM (2019) — Iceland and Ireland
Nadia Birkenstock — Whispering Woods (2019) — Germany
Imbue — Ut solis radium (2019) — The Netherlands
Twigs & Twine — Long Story Short (2019) — The Netherlands
North Sea Gas — Hearth And Homeland (2019) — England
Emian Pagan Folk — Egeria (2019) — Italy
Bruni — Kynda (2018) — England
Jolin — From the Woods (2019) — no physical album yet — Germany
Victor Santal — Arpa Celtica (2012) — Spain
Nadia Birkenstock and Steve Hubback — The Glow Within (2013) — Germany
Tevenn — Rhuys (2007) — France
Clannad — Past Present (1989) — Ireland
Kallidad — Unplugged 2018 (2018) — Australia
Cuelebre — Anaman (2017) — Spain
🎵🎶🎵

https://fantasy-awards.com/

Musical greetings, Ilona CeltCast

Photo of the albums







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