WOMAD

My Friend the Chocolate Cake

From Australia

This Australian six-piece were one of the surprise successes of last year's Edinburgh Festival. While many groups profess to sound unique, My Friend the Chocolate Cake can claim the description with unusual accuracy. You're unlikely to find any other band that includes cello, violin, mandolin and double-bass in their line-up, and is as happy with acoustic pop music as they are with Hungarian wedding dances. The band was formed in Melbourne by writer and pianist David Bridie and cellist/singer Helen Mountfort (we defy you to say you've seen a singing cellist before). Their influences range from Irish folk, through maverick performers such as John Cale and Michelle Shocked and on to the darkest edges of pop and rock, Joy Division included. But, like another motley crew of musicians, The Penguin Café Orchestra, they manage to produce a sound that is broad-based yet distinctive, occasionally sonorous but often playful. The band's most recent album, 'Good Luck', was their third in all, but the first to gain a UK release. It was described by The Guardian in a four-star review as "artfully intriguing" - although the reviewer was, like most others, hard-pressed as to how to categorise the music.