Ichabod's Crane

Ichabod's Crane is Charity Carleton, a Brisbane based singer-songwriter who has been playing her brand of acoustic folk in local bars over the past few months.
Her first CD 'A Live Bird' was recorded over a year ago but has only recently become available to the public. Carleton says the recording process was testing, but enjoys the raw quality that resulted from her sessions.
"The recording venue was an upstairs room, at the back of a dance hall, in Albion, under fairly grueling conditions - intense heat, combined with unforeseen noise from dogs, airplanes, tin roofs blowing in the wind," Carleton says. "The room was chosen partially due to minimal cost, but also due to it creating this quite beautiful, resonating sound with acoustic music and despite the setbacks, I think this comes across in quite a few tracks.
"Performance-wise, some songs came off beautifully and others, not as well as expected. However, there seems to be a raw, unrefined, quality to nearly all the tracks which, for me, adds to their appeal." Carleton draws influence from artists driven by using music as expression as opposed to making music for the sake of it.
Musically, I guess I am most influenced by other artists who seem to be driven by something other than a desire to play music," she says. "Some kind of expression of themselves just seems to emerge in this musical form, and there appears to be something other than the music really happening.
"Lyrically I am influenced by attempts to convey thoughts, feelings and sensations which I find generally difficult to convey; so they seem to be communicated by pieces of language, which subtley meander around the notion, until somehow you can see an outline of it, even though the thing itself is still invisible.
"I guess stuff like how you felt when you were a kid, or the ludicrousness of social order, or what you think will happen when you dies, as well as lots of crazy self-obsessed psychoanalysis."
Ichabod's Crane plays the Tongue & Groove Saturday April 21.


TIME OFF. Brisbane.
ISSUE #1319 WEDNESDAY APR 18 to APR 24 2007 - Time Off - April 2007 - Six Pack

‘The Devil and the Deity’
Ichabod's Crane
(Independent)
Beautiful. Think Cold Rock ice cream. We start with a spoonful (or scoop) of Angus & Julia. Then we add a mysterious flavour of the acoustic genius of the Cowboy Junkies. We then smash them together with exotic sprinkles of wispy, spooky Edie Brickell-esque vocals and then serve up the delicious velveteen result in a huge purple cone made from the spirit of Tim Burton movies. Blissfully haunting.

SuicideDJ#4

Scene - Issue #740 23.4.08
SCENE Magazine - Brisbane - Australia - SCENE Magazine - April 2008 - CD Reviews

Ichabod's Crane made quite a mark with their debut EP in late 2007, backing up a stunning little record with consistent touring and a stack of highly regarded performances.

Now the band is preparing to jump back on stage for a gig at Rics that'll be marked by both new material and some fresh live flourishes.
"Yeah, it should be good because it's the first time we've actually played with the drummer, cello and myself all together live," explains the band's leader, Charity Carleton. "So that should be really interesting.
" There's a couple of keyboard-led songs, which are bothe taken from new material and there's probably going to be a song with a banjo instead of the guitar, plus other bits and pieces. Our cellist, Sophie (Adamus), is doing a circuit of atmospheric sounds with a looping pedal and uses the cello to make some interesting noise, so it's kind of great the way she layers that stuff up."
Ric's small space means it can be an awkward venues to perform in, but Charity explains it's an environment the band enjoys.
"Yeah, it can be good. It's tricky because it's a small space and gets crowded easily, but we're doing the Cheeseboard slot on Saturday (arvo) and I think that will proabbly be the perfect time for us to play because it won't be super crowded. We're not hard rock and puck and that kind of think and it';; be a nice, mellow way to start the Saturday off."
Since the band started playing live togheter, the've garnered a reputation as being highly adept performers. Chariyt explains it's an aspect of their work that's certainly changed over time. "At the start it's so new that you're just trying to get through your set without getting too distracted," she laughs. "You certainly become more relaxed but every sho's so different as well" it depends on the place and the crowd and how you are feeling and even how you're feeling in those last five minutes right before you start your set. It always seems to be different."
And the new material is perhaps the first sign of a fresh EP being in the works.
"Hopefully, yeah. I'm just getting the tracks together we're most happy with and aiming to do that in the next few months. (Sophie) is going overseas in November, so if we can get all the tracking done before then that'd be good. But we'll see!"

Matt Shea

'Ichabod's Crane play RIc's afternoon slot - 4.45pm- Saturday July 25'

SCENE MAGAZINE
ISSUE 803 - July 15 2009
- SCENE Magazine - Street Press - Brisbane - July 09 - Matt Shea

WHEN YOU SEE ICHABOD'S CRANE PLAY NEXT, YOU'LL UNDOUBTEDLY NOTICE THE ADDITION TO FOUNDING MEMBER CHARITY CARLETON'S USUALLY STRIPPED BACK SOUND. SHE TELLS DAN CONDON ABOUT THE NEW LINE UP.

Cellist Sophie Adamus and drummer Melinda Laidlaw are the new additions to the live Ichabod's Crane line-up.

" I began playing a few shows with Sophie last year and we both really liked the effect of blending the cello with the Ichabod's Crane material, " Charity Carleton says. "Sophie's had a really busy past 12 months though, having toured and played with Deep Blue Youth Orchestra, Tara Simmons, The Bloody McKennas and others, as well as holding Community Music Workshops in the Solomon Islands and finishing her Bachelor of Music, so it's only been recently that a window has opened for her to wotk with Ichabod's Crane again. Min was carefully cornered and recruited - as well as can be done online - after her drumkit was repeatedly eyed off when dropping by to visit friends at her share house."

Fans can expect a new release from Ichabod's Crane hopefully early next year.

" The new material seems to be coming together the way a lot of my songs do - in bits and pieces and hovering moments of excitement," Carleton reveals. "There are songs for which lyrics were scribbled down three years ago and have had music easily added to them in an afternoon and there are others which have been evolving over the past six to eight months, yet somehow are still feeling relevant and fresh."

People can see this new material when Ichabod's Crane return the to the live stage this weekend; Carleton gives us the heads-up as to what we can expect to hear.

" A warm, nourishing, concoction of sounds, some new songs with piano and glockenspiel, songs which feel cosy and have depth and draw you in , like that space between being asleep and being fully awake."

WHO: Ichabod's Crane
WHERE & WHEN: Ric's Saturday Jul 25 - Time Off - Brisbane - street press - ISSUE 1434 - wed 22 july '09