Danny Neill

For me, ‘Union’ is the album where this incarnation of Son Volt have finally found their true voice and most authentic sound. This is the most musically rewarding album they have ever delivered.

June Tabor launched her solo career with ‘Airs And Graces’, a record that remains one of the most essential folk music records of the 1970s and beyond. This Topic Records Deluxe CD re-issue features perfect sound and an abundance of treasures found within.

His delicious caressing of the lyrics reminds me of Mike Scott at his most incisive; I can also hear the soulfulness of Ray LaMontagne at times too. Sean Taylor has recorded an album on a par with the strongest work by either of those high-ranking acts and has also written one of the premier topical song albums of our time.

Maintaining the tradition of wrapping their lives into the process of getting their art out into the marketplace, Jacken Elswyth’s end product is a wholly credible, hypnotic and fascinating piece of work. Time to dig out your old tape player perhaps?

On Icarus Girl, Siobhan McCrudden offers a fine set of songs and an assuredness to her delivery. Keep an eye on her journey, this singer songwriter has real potential.

Danny Neill takes an in-depth look Bob Dylan’s lavish 6-CD deluxe box set More Blood, More Tracks and offers his alternative version of ‘Blood On The Tracks’, picked from multiple takes and bountiful selections available across this wonderful box set.

Supported by the likes of Eliza Carthy, Martin Simpson & Sam Carter, Steve Turner returns with his eighth solo album ‘Late Cut’. This is music that exists in a timeless realm, as is the case with all great music recorded with love, mastery and sincerity. An album of immense distinction.

Chris Wood is one of the few song writers on the circuit today who can artfully present the lives and situations of the world around us. And do it so beautifully. He does indeed give us the medicine we need to carry on to the next day.

‘Anthems to the Wind’ is a strong and irresistible album that finds Merry Hell on top form – at that brilliant moment in a band’s evolution where everyone’s on the same wavelength and the ideas are just tumbling out.

Recorded in what many believe to be the glory days of analogue, ‘Stereo Death Breakdown’ remains a fantastic piece of rootsy audio pleasure. A good-time, feel-good snapshot of a fertile period in music history.

Fair Lady London marks the latest chapter in the journey of two of the UK’s brightest stars. Trevor Moss & Hannah-Lou’s songs are of a standard that any major label indie band ticking off the production reference points by committee could not get close to.

Richard Thompson’s Cambridge gig leans heavily on the high tempo rockers with only a couple of pauses for some, typically breathtaking, solo acoustic interludes…It really is time we were all standing up in appreciation of Richard Thompson.