LAU – Folk Songs
Reveal Records – 11 December 2020 (Ltd CD & Digital)
Fresh from their recent solo releases Where the World is Thin and The Portal, Kris Drever and Martin Green rejoin their fellow LAU bandmate Aidan O’Rourke on accordion alongside guest Inge Thomson on vocals for a very special EP.
Folk Songs comprises five tracks, all traditional tunes delivered with the sensitivity and superb musicianship long associated with the band. As LAU themselves say: “For 15 years now we’ve been writing new music in the language and spirit of traditional song and dance. Our instinct has always been to keep pushing forward, keep testing what elements can be woven around the old idioms to make them new and keep them true. This is our first real foray into the traditional canon proper, and what drives us is the same as ever. Why the old songs now? Because 2020. Old stories feel important. Like all performers everywhere, we’ve been forced off the road, and now felt the moment to reflect and reground. We’ve inhabited rather than written these five songs, and their emotional fire has swept us away.”
Recorded remotely in the musician’s homes in Edinburgh, Pathhead and Glasgow over the Autumn of 2020 Folk Songs is a genuine lockdown project and a handsome, and very welcome, one it is too.
The Banks of Red Roses is an inspired and spooky version of the murder ballad, possibly the most well-known version covered by June Tabor. O’Rourke’s fiddle and Green’s production provide a poignant backdrop made especially menacing by Drever’s evocatively disturbing whistle in the final act.
Polly on the Shore, inspired by Robyn Hitchcock’s cover from his 1995 album You & Oblivion, is filtered through experimental and highly effective arrangements. LAU play with the tradition with ease, never losing the thrust of the tune itself, but equally never feeling trapped by it.
The Cruel Brother is given a sprightly makeover of the Child Ballad with effective haunting accompanying vocals by Thomson whilst Ca’ The Ewes re-interprets the Isabel Pagan poem, originally collected by Robert Burns. It is probably the most traditionally performed track on the EP focusing solely on the band’s instruments with minimal extraneous production. The song, an old favourite of The Corries, but also covered by Steeleye Span on their 1992 album Tonight’s the Night is an intimate and tender little track.
Final track The Witch of the Westmorelands is a beautiful cover of the Archie Fisher song, first recorded on his 1976 album The Man With a Rhyme. Here LAU layer the tune with some evocative echo and accompaniment to create a truly poignant track. A memory of the past with a confident nod to the future.
Throughout Folk Songs the love of tradition comes lucidly to the fore, however, LAU are accomplished and self-assured enough to play with the tracks and make them their own. If this is a direction LAU are considering for future projects, then Folk Songs promises many delights to come. It is an entrancing and memorable interpretation of a fine collection of classic folk songs. Running at just under thirty minutes the EP may be relatively short, but it is a perfect selection of a rich and beguiling set of tunes.
Ltd CD via https://laumusic.bigcartel.com/
Digital Only via Bandcamp: https://lau-music.bandcamp.com/album/folk-songs
You can hear LAU perfomring Polly on the Shore on our latest show: Lost in Transmission No. 64
Photo Credit: Genevieve Stevenson