Pulled by the Stars

‘Clash Vooar’ is Manx for Big Groove, and the band’s second album includes a batch of sturdy grooves, along with influences that range from local folk themes through to R&B and jazz. With a line-up including bass, keys, trumpet and flute, the band match catchy, controlled riffs against the cool and impressive vocals of the Manx Gaelic singer-songwriter Aalin Clague, whose lyrics are a mixture of morality tales and local folk stories. The opening ‘S’Ihiams Eh’ sets the mood with a throbbing riff from bass and keys veering into bursts of jazz-rock as Clague adds sometimes half-spoken vocals in a quietly angry story of greed with lyrics that translate as ‘it’s mine…Our house is bigger than your house because we’re more important than you.’ Elsewhere, she shows off her clear, high vocals with minimal backing at the start of ‘Crosh Vollan’, and joins the band at the end of a rousing and jazzy R&B workout on ‘Manannan’, a track named after a sea god who is asked to ‘bless us and our boats.’ The mood changes again with the gently haunting ‘Tehi Tegi’, where Aalin’s voice is matched against trumpet and yet another sturdy riff, while on the finale ‘Traen ni hOie’ there’s gently urgent backing for a night-time contemplation of the cosmos.