The Latest
Kentucky-based singer-songwriter Joan Shelley shares her gentle yet profound new single and video, “Here In The High and Low,” a beautiful prelude to her seventh album, Real Warmth, out this Friday. The track is a masterful collaboration with producer Ben Whitely and features backing vocals from Shelley’s three-year-old daughter. The video, directed by Cyrus Moussavi and Brittany Nugent, explores growth and time through the eyes of a young seedling.
claire rousay shares her latest single, “somewhat burdensome”, a masterclass in textural sound design, weaving together shimmering piano and guitar melodies with ambient drones and intimate field recordings. Watch the accompanying visual piece she constructed that mirrors the album’s focus on recordings captured at dusk.
The key ingredient of “A Danger to Ourselves” is depth. It is an album of unfathomable musical depths, but perhaps more importantly, it is an album about depth of feeling, the abyss from which desire springs like a liquid flame. Lucrecia Dalt gives herself over completely to exploring this depth, and the singular work of art that emerges is as detailed and as unexpected as any treasure.
His ability to slip unseen from folky pastoralism to improvised experimentation puts Glenn Kimpton at the forefront of the current group of British acoustic guitarists taking their inspiration from foundational American exponents like Robbie Basho and John Fahey. He is in good company with those names, and he doesn’t seem out of place. Small Show is assured and highly rewarding.
Following the release of “Remembered in Exile,” a collection of newly crafted arrangements of traditional Scottish songs pulled from the pioneering work of folklorist Helen Creighton (1899-1989), Màiri Morrison, Alasdair Roberts and Pete Johnston have announced a UK tour in October. To celebrate, watch an all-new acoustic version of “The Bonny House of Airlie”.
The latest in the Ceremonial Counties tape series from Folklore Tapes covers Bedfordshire, tackled by Radiophoric Labs, a hauntological project of unknown provenance who does a compelling job of creating an atmosphere of dreary, post-apocalyptic dread; and Greater London falls to Wooden Tape, the alias of Tim Maycox, a Liverpool art teacher whose focus is the commuter town of Surbiton. They present two very different sides of the hauntological coin.
Our latest weekly brew playlist features Mishra & Deepa Nair Rasiya, Sourdurent, Francis Bebey, Michael Hurley, Natalie Wildgoose, Mari Kalkun, Peter Bellamy, Martin Carthy, Broadside Hacks, Red River Dialect, Joan Shelley, Spencer Cullum, Flora Hibberd, Lael Neale, Natalie Jane Hill, Niamh Regan, Andrew Tuttle, William Ryan Fritch and James Jackson Toth.
We rewind to January 2013 and a special Simple Folk Radio show that was hosted by James Yorkston. The show was recorded in his home on the east coast of Scotland, from where he shared some of his favourite folk tunes. These included tracks from Rita Farrell, Willie Clancy, Mick O’Brien and Caoimhín O’Raghallaigh, HMS Ginafore, Nic Jones, Anne Briggs, Jean Ritchie, Dick Gaughan, Bess Cronin, Elle Osborne and more.
As with past compilations in this celebrated series, Imaginational Anthem vol. XIV : Ireland is a wonderfully diverse, quietly exciting set of songs. Cian Nugent, Caoimhe Hopkinson, NC Lawlor, Aonghus McEvoy, Junior Brother, Sean Carpio, David Murphy, Brenda Jenkinson, Damian O’Neil, Mark McKowski & Jerome McGlynn all make valuable contributions to a set that is a testament to the versatility of the guitar and an absolute pleasure to listen to.
We chat to Junior Brother, whose songs are known for veering between the intensely personal and the hotly political. On his third album, The End, the Dublin-based songwriter’s ragged and uncompromising delivery reaches new heights of unexpected beauty, strangeness and relevance. Throughout the interview, his answers to our questions were considered and wide-ranging.
Big Thief’s Double Infinity was always going to be different. While it’s leaner than their last, its sonic range is wider. It is an album dedicated to corporeal impermanence, and to its flipside: love and its constant presence. It goes without saying that it’s big on ideas. It’s also big on melodic innovation and collaborative spirit. And most importantly, it’s a record with a gigantic heart.