Monolith Cocktail Blog

Exchange recommendations from our Italian penpals at Kalporz
Authored By Matteo Maioli 

Continuing our successful collaboration with the leading Italian music publication Kalporz , the Monolith Cocktail shares reviews, interviews and other bits from our respective sites each month. Keep an eye out for future ‘synergy’ between our two great houses as we exchange posts during 2023 and beyond. This month, from the site’s This Rocks column, Matteo Maioli sells us on the music of the Scottish artist Dot Allison.

Dot Allison “Consciousology”
(Sonic Cathedral, 2023)

An established cliché in music in recent years is that great records are never released in the summer: well 2023 contradicts the matter wonderfully, from PJ Harvey to the Clientele (without forgetting the new Albarn… pardon Blur) to reach the artist whose least spoken of all but which once discovered never leaves you for life: Dot Allison from Edinburgh . “Consciousology” is her sixth album and comes out on Sonic Cathedral; produced with Fiona Cruickshank it includes collaborations from Andy Bell (Ride, Oasis), Hannah Peel and Zoë Bestel as well as the London Contemporary Orchestra who manage to give the songs a timeless charm.

As told by Sonic Cathedral’s Nat Cramp, “Dot’s voice has been a constant in our lives for the 30 years since One Dove’s “Morning Dove White” was released and we have always dreamed of working with her. We first met back in the early days of the label and she played for us a couple of times, including the legendary Lee Hazlewood tribute night at The Social. The self-effacing title “Consciousology” belies the seriousness of what lies within, and it’s impossible to not be completely consumed by the sheer beauty and intimacy of it all“. The sounds of Tim Buckley of “Starsailor” combined with Joni Mitchell and Van Morrison of “Astral Weeks” can give an idea of ​​the source at the base of a raging and at the same time calm river that flows into the trip-hop and visionary electronics of Andrew Weatherall – a great friend and mentor of Allison -, already from the opener “Shyness Of Crowns”.

The strength of the collection emerges as much in Dot’s elegant and profound writing as in the work on her voice that sounds like the breath of nature; on “Moon Flowers” she whispers words of love transporting us to another dimension: “You reign, you influence the rain/In heaven and beyond you/There is a sunlight around you/You illuminate everything I do“, while with “Weeping Roses”, she returns to the fragile lesson of “Room 7 1/2” (Arthoused, 2009) punctuated by acoustics and piano, “ Bleeding roses they’re all you ever grew for me/I see blood in the spray, on the petals/Now , it’s so plain to see/Do you feel it too, tell me do you feel it too “. The launch piece “Unchanged” thrives on a soul-rock crescendo that explodes in a refrain worthy of Verve and Spiritualized.

Where in “Bleached By The Sun” she makes us miss the Air of “Talkie Walkie”, in the transcendent “Double Rainbow” she invents a cosmic manifesto that wouldn’t sound out of place in Rob Mazurek’s latest release with the Exploding Star Orchestra . And if I haven’t convinced you yet, the sweetness of “Milk And Honey” will take care of making you fly away from the wear and tear and problems of the modern era, starting like this: “I’d walk 10,000 suns/To have you next to me/Bridges I ‘d burn/To give you the rest of me/Lilac-coloured stars that glisten, beckoning/Galaxies of tumbling suns, are blessing me “.

Folks? backstory? Chamber-pop? I do not know. All this and also none of it. Simply: Dot Allison.