Danny Neill

For anyone already aboard the Sun Ra mothership, Kingdom of Discipline, the latest release from the man and his Arkestra on Dead Currencies, is going to fast become a key missing piece to the overall puzzle as well as a favoured edition from the catalogue.

Past sounds have never sounded so thoroughly born of the present as they do on Jerron Paxton’s raw and wonderful ‘Things Done Changed’…a finely crafted album for today made oh so skilfully with the tools of yesterday.

Jake Blount & Mali Obomsawin’s Symbiont is a magical fusion of natural beauty, fragility, turbulence and ever-evolving motion. It is awe-inspiring, a ball of chance and wonder, much like the planet Earth.

Danny Neill shares his highlights of Cambridge Folk Festival 2024, featuring notable performances by Leyla McCalla – a set that was tingling with magic, Fantastic Negrito, Konyikeh, Katherine Priddy, Lizzie No, Peggy Seeger, Oysterband, Rioghnach Connolly and more.

Americana often conjures up words like psychedelic or cosmic, but the form rarely offers such a way-out hue as experienced here; Wes Tirey Sings Selected Works Of Billy The Kid is a true one-off. 

How in-sync this star-studded collaboration is with the spirit of Sun Ra; Kronos Quartet & Friends Meet Sun Ra succeeds in playing like a transmission from the stars, a deep space echo and chime…lay back and wait for lift off; what bliss.

The Decemberists set the bar very high with ‘As It Ever Was, So It Will Be Again’, a record packed with highlights, a fully-loaded taste of their essence, pulling in every colour and thread they have touched upon in a long and varied two-decade career.

With ‘Days of Shaking,’ M G Boulter takes a deep dive into the darkest corners and the toughest dreams and nightmares that visit during those nocturnal hours. Aiming high, he has taken time to create a full-length work that demands and rewards deep immersion.

Ship to Shore finds Richard Thompson enjoying the most vital of late golden periods, producing work to stand favourably alongside any from his previous fifty years.

Lemoncello is one of those records that has a binding sound all the way whilst boasting an incredible range of tones, moods, and textures within each individual song…an ethereal, harmonious, ever-shifting sheen of a topcoat gliding across a tense, grinding underbelly of distortion and vibration.

We catch up with Richard Thompson and mull over all things RT, including former band mates, surprising career break diversions, the writing process, guitar playing stamina, family and of course, the brand new album Ship to Shore.

With ‘Willson Williams,’ one might be tempted to conclude that Kathryn Williams and Dan Willson are bringing out the best in each other. Despite the melancholy that both typically lean into, there is a feeling of dual purpose and fun resonating through all these tracks.