Old songs, new styles: the young bands raiding the British folk canon

Purists beware – Erland and the Carnival, Ian King and Trembling Bells are among a new wave of bands unafraid to reclaim traditional folk songs for their own musical endsSomewhere between singing folk ballads as an Orkney-dwelling teenager and forming a band with the former guitarist of the Verve, Erland Cooper had an epiphany. "I realised that there are no rules when it comes to traditional songs," he says. "So I raped, pillaged and plundered them for my own gain. It's bound to annoy the...

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