She may well have been shortlisted three times for the Mercury Music Prize, nominated for a BRIT Award, and critically admired for her first three albums, all in less than a decade, but Anna Calvi has never quite registered on my radar. This, coupled with the fact that the TV show that she scores both Season 5 and 6 of here is a show that I have never watched a minute of, makes it an ideal record to be reviewed with my first listen.
This is her first foray into scores, and it’s quite the behemoth of a show she’s chosen, one of the BBC jewels in the crown of the last few years.
For the first half of the album, which makes up the soundtrack for the fifth series from back in 2019, Calvi wrote and performed almost everything herself including vocals, guitar, violin, piano, percussion and harmonium.
Its opener ‘You’re Not God’ sets the tone for the whole of the record, its brooding guitar and heavy, breathy vocal (a common theme all the way through) create a murky, danger-laden feel, which doesn’t relent throughout.
The sense of a dangerous atmosphere is palpable, especially on the instrumental tracks and on the others there’s an unease that really suits Calvi’s icy vocal.
The energy levels pick up on the short, passionate ‘Black Tuesday’, where the wailing guitar is the focal point, which is followed by the haunting piano on ‘I Don’t Like The Life’, the brevity of each track really allowing her to showcase the breadth of her undoubted talent.
Those who have watched the series will probably be able to pinpoint each scene that the track was from, I can only imagine what horror ‘The Execution’ was soundtracking and her ferocious vocal performance on ‘There Ain’t No Grave’ does nothing to quell the feel of murderous intent.
She says of the first part of the album:
“Composing for Peaky Blinders was about atmosphere and space. There’s so much nuance when it comes to scoring to picture. It’s more about what you leave out than what you leave in. I had to let find ways of bringing out the emotion, I had to really inhabit the show.”
Such was the success of her first series, she was invited back on board to work on the show’s final season.
Talking about the process for that and how it differed, Calvi says: “For Season 6 I wanted to bring more musicians on board for a fresh take, and I decided to bring in Nick Launay to work with me, as he had produced my last album.”
There’s no great sea change on Season 6, it pretty much in mood and feel picks up where season 5 left off with the disparate drummer beats of ‘Miquelon’. As impossible as it feels though, the record gets even darker and filthier with longer, more conventional tracks such as ‘Ain’t No Grave’ and her cover of the original theme tune ‘Red Right Hand.’
At times it can feel like an overwhelming record, with no pictures to contextualise the music it can feel like an aural assault, no more so than on the fitting closing track ‘Tommy’s Final Requiem.’
Anna also said: “This whole experience was so wonderful and so intense. I’m so proud of my scores for Peaky Blinders.”
And so she should be. A powerful, unnerving record.
