Mike Davies

Paper Hearts and Broken Arrows is lush and raw, personal and narrative, all seasoned with Rod Picott’s matured voice. He says it might be the best album he’s made. I think he may be right.

On Cristina Vane’s ‘Make Myself Me Again’, she delves deeper into her Delta blues influences, delivering a top class blues album that places her up there with some of the best.

The Often Herd, an Anglo-American UK-based four-piece, deliver an assured debut with ‘Where The Big Lamp Shines’, a melting pot of psychedelia, folk-rock, bluegrass and jazz.

On his latest release, Steve Earle doffs the cap to the cowboy troubadour Jerry Jeff Walker who passed away in 2020 and shines a light on his great songs.

Understudy, Boo Hewerdine’s tenth solo album, finds him in a reflective mood. Despite the title, he consistently proves, as he does here, that he’s second to no one.

Oklahoma indie-folk twin sisters Jo and Sophia Babb mark their Companion debut with ‘Second Day Of Spring’, a sincere, weighted and original offering.

The soft and gentle musical arrangements of Grant-Lee Phillips’ ‘All That You Can Dream’ may catch you off guard as these are arguably some of the most potent songs he’s written. Lyrically this is very much the iron fist in the velvet glove.

Life’s What You Make It is another intoxicating covers collection, curated by Lush founder Mark Constantine, featuring some well-known folk names, that again reminds us that music is only limited by the imagination you bring to it.

About Time, Hannah White’s follow-up to her highly acclaimed Nordic Connections, finds her positively luminous as she delivers ten self-penned songs that speak to her musical influences and life experience.

Jess Jocoy cuts to the heart of universally recognisable emotions, doubts, fears and hopes as she calls on the listener to stare despair in the face and refuse to be its victim.

Lady Mondegreen is not so radical as to alienate the purists but sufficiently filtered through a contemporary folk lens to attract audiences wanting fresh readings. Fellow Pynins have made a fine contribution to the canon that respects the heritage while ploughing new furrows.

Heidi Talbot’s ‘Sing It For A Lifetime’ may have been born of hurt, pain and confusion, but there’s a strength within its musical veins. This may be the best work of Talbot’s career to date.