When a novelist hits a wall, the standard advice is to go for a walk or perhaps clean the kitchen. David Lambert, a Cardiff-born polymath took a far more radical detour. Stuck while penning a story about love and identity in post-war Cardiff, he downed tools and embarked on an intensive reading marathon: fourteen novels in fourteen weeks. Using the iconic cut-up method championed by the likes of David Bowie and William S. Burroughs, Lambert sliced through over a million words to find the soul of his own unfinished book. The result isn't a manuscript, but ‘… all her geese are swans’, a strikingly original 14-track odyssey under the moniker Wenallt Star.
This is 21st-century storytelling that refuses to be pigeonholed. Collaborating with a rotating cast of musicians including Sean South, Dave King and Liz Lenten, Lambert has crafted a record where his spoken text isn't just laid over a backing track; it is woven into the very fabric of the sound. The diversity is staggering. You’ll find the laid-back, bohemian energy of Harlem Renaissance-inspired ‘hopeless things … the stars’ sitting comfortably alongside the spiky, abrasive punk aesthetics of ‘Restlessness’.
There is a genuine cinematic breadth here. ‘the potion and the poison’ plunges the listener into a nine-minute electronic trance that feels like a neon-lit stroll through Tiger Bay, while ‘ALL GONE / THAT TIME / THOSE PEOPLE - PAWB WEDI MYND / YR AMSER HYNNW / Y BOBL HYNNY channels a crisp, 1980s synth-pop vibe reminiscent of The Human League. One of the most arresting moments is ‘SHE (The far-off interest of tears)’, a track so atmospheric it practically alters your heart rate, blending haunting saxophone with choral whispers that pull you into the darkest recesses of the mind.
While the record is undeniably an intellectual feat, it remains remarkably accessible. The use of the Welsh language and Lambert’s own regional lilt grounds these abstract "cut-up" texts in a tangible sense of place. At times, the instrumentation is so lush and decadent—particularly on the groovy, string-laden title track—that it almost distracts from the prose, but the longer compositions provide the necessary breathing space for the weight of the words to land.
It is a vulnerable, intimate, and often infectious exploration of what it means to be human. Wenallt Star has turned a writer’s block into a sonic triumph. You can stream the new album above, and for more, be sure to join Wenallt Star on TikTok, Instagram and Facebook
