Lauren MacColl: Landskein
…lovingly assembled and arranged by Lauren MacColl with an insight rooted in her connections to the Highland landscape, people and culture. Assembled, arranged and then played with a breath-taking blend of precision and emotion.
As someone who has spent a lot of his life working in mountains, seeing exactly these patterns, discovering a word for them feels as though I’ve joined a community of kindred souls. And that feeling is reinforced each time I listen to the wonderfully atmospheric music of Lauren’s album. I may live hundreds of miles away from the mountain landscapes that Lauren experiences daily, but I now have a very rapid route back to them. However, you won’t have to be enthralled by Scottish mountains to appreciate this wonderfully evocative music. Plug in a landscape of your choice, relax and enjoy.
Liraz: Zan
By the time you reach album closer Lalei, your spirit will be welcome of this meandering sound-poem, an eerie, affecting landscape of sparse riffs and bass drones.
That such a cohesive record was created via digital collaboration is fascinating. Zan is a great and worthy achievement, undertaken by musicians who were quite literally taking a risk. Perhaps this passion, tension and determination accounts for the emotional impact of the results.
Martin Simpson: Home Recordings
After two albums in Trails and Tribulations and Rooted that saw Martin Simpson add more to his sound after the spare and economical Vagrant Stanzas, circumstances all but dictated his next move and the resulting solo project is a warm and generous selection of songs both old and new and instrumentals that quietly and calmly comment on and celebrate the beauty of life at a time when many need reminding. Although of course impeccably performed with a huge amount of skill and musical prowess, there is still something pure and beautiful about this music that finely balances it and sets it apart from any other Martin Simpson album I can think of. A wonderful achievement and gratefully received.
Matt McGinn: Lessons of War
County Down has known its share of troubles over the years and Matt McGinn has seen it first hand. Lessons of War, McGinn’s new album, explores how war has affected not just the people of Northern Ireland, but people all over the world affected by conflict. The idea began with the thought of recording one song about the futility of war. One thing led to another and over the past three years, one song led to a full-length album, a documentary and collaborations with a vast array of musicians.
Whether it’s a full choir or just a man and his guitar, the passion of Lessons of War cannot be denied. Matt McGinn’s collection of songs deserves to be heard again and again, until we finally learn the lesson and begin to find new ways to resolve the problems that confront us.
Merry Hell: Emergency Lullabies
As the title suggests, this plague year has had no small part to play in the genesis of Emergency Lullabies, even if the songs, or many of them, germinated during a band break in the Jura mountains, moving then back to their Wigan base to add flesh to the bones. Rudely interrupted by the March lockdown, this gave the challenge of the individual band members laying down tracks apart, it then being the job of band supremo, Kettle brother John, guitarist and producer, to knit them all together into a vivid technicolour coat of ragged wonder.
A terrific listen for a lockdown winter night, dreaming of a return to outside summer music, hopefully, next year. Make sure Merry Hell are playing where you go; I will be.
Modern Studies: The Weight Of The Sun
There’s a sense of subtlety and grace to The Weight Of The Sun that only comes from a band that is confident in their ability to find the power in the music. And rather than bludgeoning the listener, Modern Studies deploys notes sparingly so as not to overplay their hand. Like any true musicians, Modern Studies knows the power in the music doesn’t just come from the notes they play, but even more importantly, from the ones they don’t play. The Weight Of The Sun is all the better for it.
Nels Andrews: Pigeon & the Crow (EU/UK release)
Recorded at Lord Huron’s Whispering Pines studio in Los Angeles, the whole of Pigeon and the Crow is chockablock with the kind of absorbing lyricism above, related in Andrews’ warm vocal tone and set in a Celtic-seasoned sonic framework. Produced by Irish flautist Nuala Kennedy (Will Oldham / Oliver Schroer / Kris Drever), the album’s tempo never breaks sweat above a stroll, staying steadfastly on course within its pretty, gentle folk-rock landscape.
When you can call upon talent such as Anaïs Mitchell, Anthony Da Costa and A.J. Roach (who co-wrote two songs) simply to provide backing vocals here and there, you’re onto a winner and, in its field of literary folk music, a winner Pigeon and the Crow certainly is.
Niamh Regan: Hemet
It’s impossible not to fall a little bit in love with Hemet. Beautifully listenable and rich in some rather gorgeous melodies and emotive arrangements, it is an adept and utterly mesmerizing debut. Niamh Regan’s deliciously languid voice is one to watch; warm and vulnerable in equal measures. Combined with her talent as a songwriter, Hemet presents the artist as a force to be reckoned with. A heartfelt, timeless, and captivating release.
Nick Jonah Davis: When the Sun Came
For multi-instrumentalist Nick Jonah Davis‘s fourth album of solo guitar exploration, he self-recorded the material at the Atlow village church in Derbyshire and mastered it himself at home. These may be small details in the creative process, but when listening, the space and calm that resonates throughout the majority of the songs bring a new feel and energy to Nick’s playing.
…there is not a note wasted and the whole set hangs together beautifully. I’ll agree with Nick and say that When the Sun Came is my favourite of his albums; it is surprising, patient, spacious and quite mesmerising.
Paul Armfield: Domestic
Very much old school, he’s a craftsman and storyteller in the manner of McTell, Scott Walker, Harvey Andrews, his voice smoky and warm, his delivery relaxed, his guitar playing deft but unshowy while Jaques Brel influences hover around his work.
As the title suggests, Domestic is concerned with variations on the theme of home, from four walls to a country or continent, touching on notions of belonging and allegiances, as well as mental states. It was recorded in Stuttgart in collaboration Giulio Cantore on guitars and cavaquinho, drummer Johann Polzer and producer Max Braun on bass.
…this is a majestic, timeless album, domestic bliss if you will.