I'm quit possibly Frog and Henry's biggest fan. Their albums are a revelation, perfectly tuned to my sensibilities. Their sound is unlike any other band on earth right now, and I don't mean that the way "genre bending" groups are talked about. They have a style that while it would nestle in unnoticed among the popular records of the 20s and 30s is purely theirs and being so unique I find difficulty in describing. The closest comparison I can make is if Gene Austin had tried to produce the same records but with Morton's Red Hot Peppers as his studio band. Or maybe Al Bowlly with a hotter Ray Noble's Orchestra.
It is sweet popular music, but jazz spontaneity pulses behind it. Every 78 RPM record collector has secret favorites with a similar feeling to what these mostly millennial musicians create so effortlessly. At times they seems to anticipate a sound that hasn't arrived yet. It is those foreshadowing echoes I enjoy in 78s that Frog and Henry capture so well. Not an easy thing to do from 90 years on.
Before you run off to YouTube I recommend instead you head to Bandcamp, to preview and hopefully buy the albums. Many of their live sets show them to be a vibrant young trad jazz band hoping around the streets and festivals of Europe. It is at the end of those tours they hole up with a vintage reel to reel recorder and early microphones and get down to the business of creating thes
