Bit'er banjo guvnor?

While i was busy being angry on the weekend my little friend Stef was busy being bitter. She has just found herself on the wrong end of a nasty little break-up (with a potentially gay DJ) and she was looking for a bit of music to help her wallow.

She came to the right guy. if there's one thing i do well, it's bitter.

I do a good angry obviously, but i do a better bitter.

Finding Stef something new was pretty easy, i seem to have an ear for these things, and anyway, any song that opens with the line "It's empty in the valley of your heart" instantly earns a place in mine.

And so begins "The Cave" by Mumford & Sons. It's the latest single from their very splendid debut album "Sigh No More" of last year.

Mumford & Sons aren't as the name suggests a 1960's removals company or even painter and decorators. They are in fact the latest London band to fly the flag of the "Indie Folk" movement out of the UK. And they are doing it proud.

Now there are people who will tell you that there's no place for banjos in popular music. These people are communists, liars and sheep botherers (and possibly DJs). ''The Cave" is a fine example of everything good about the liberal use of the banjo. Get a load of the way it kicks in with the bass for the start of the second verse. Is there another song around at the moment that punctuates a song with the banjo quite so well? Well then.

But banjos aren't bitter, they are quite nice actually. What we're here for is a biting lyric, and Mrs Mumfords little boy doesn't disappoint.

"So make your siren's call,
And sing all you want,
I will not hear what you have to say.

Cause I need freedom now,
And I need to know how,
To live my life as it's meant to be."

If that's not the sound of a scorned lover i don't know what is.

But i do. And it is.

davey.