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Tickled Pink - Tickled Pink
Talking Elephant Records

The recently reissued album from one of Britain ’s foremost ceilidh bands opens with an introduction that sounds uncannily like The Firm’s novelty song ‘Star Trekkin.’ Whether the band would take this as a compliment is difficult to decipher, as Tickled Pink insist on using sound effects throughout the entire album; sound effects that appear to have come from the automatic button on Argos’ most inexpensive electronic keyboard. I imagine the band have the ceilidh regulars not just stamping their feet in time with the music.

Tickled Pink have stated they wished not to be ‘just another Folk Rock band,’ and, admittedly, it is this stark contrast of genres and use of electronica that prevents them from being so. Second track, ‘The King’, sees latter day Fairport Convention vocals on top of melodeon and drums, which would be fairly normal for a number of bands on the scene, but their synthesised embellishments and rap, making the song seem more like an eighties Eurovision entry than a potential festival favourite, can only make the listener take notice – or their ceilidh participants freeze mid swing.

Two standards, ‘Tam Lin’ and ‘ Cape Horn ’, are completely unrecognisable in their Tickled Pink guise, but both are instantly likeable. The former is taken to a frantic speed in comparison to its most famous performance, although the sampled vocal is simply embarrassing and would have any offspring of a band member cringing at their parent’s attempt at being hip.

Tickled Pink must make a fantastic live band. And a live performance means that it would be less likely that the band would use these dated-sounding sound effects which spoil an energetic album.

Sophie Parkes