Thomas Blake

TRÚ are no ordinary folk band, and No Fixed Abode no ordinary album. Their music is dusted with a hint of magic and while it has all the energy befitting a first offering, it bears the stamp of quality usually reserved for seasoned artists.

Broken Mirror shares kinship with such great albums of the past that its greatest feat might be how it manages to sound so modern… a testament not only to Holley’s fiercely relevant songs but to White’s impressive showing as a composer… deep, complex & formidable, and intensely rewarding.

While TEYR’s energetic and wildly entertaining delivery is still there on Estren, the added lyrical depth and musical variety, the moral bite and sensitivity to the world’s problems elevate them to the very top tier of today’s folk music.

Mirry skirts the edges of hauntology – there is the definite sense of a lost arcadia, a nostalgia for a past that never existed, or perhaps only existed in Mirry’s own almost hermetic world. Mirabel Lomer’s unique talent is finally given its due.

…somewhere at the heart of these new songs is the realisation that the world has caught up with their pessimistic vision of it. There is a new confidence on show here. It feels like the time is finally right for Arab Strap.

Featuring a host of artists from Second Language, Drifts & Flurries is a sonically varied but thematically coherent album which at every turn is ambitious and surprising, always in tune with the wintry landscape but also with the interior landscapes of the human mind, which can be just as cold and just as beautiful.

Cedars is a beguiling and quietly astonishing piece of work, where Stuart Hyatt’s overarching vision finds its perfect counterweight in an immensely talented and varied array of musicians.

The Magpie Arc’s EP3 is a fitting way to cap a set of EPs whose very existence seems to celebrate the lasting power of musical collaboration at a time when it feels most at threat. It’s just as accomplished as its predecessors, and even more full of musical surprises.

That combination of closeness and mystery – a thread that runs through all of his records – is one of the reasons Yorkston is amongst the very best songwriters of his generation; The Wide, Wide River is yet another career highlight.

Frankie Armstrong’s all-encompassing, compassionate worldview has served her well for over half a century, and Cats Of Coven Lawn is one of her strongest statements yet. It is also a brilliant testament to the essential nature of artistic expression.

Thomas Blake shares his Top 10 Albums of 2020 featuring Bill Callahan, Shirley Collins, Burd Ellen, The Silver Field, Herman Dune, Stella Sommer, Stick in the Wheel, Cunning Folk, Brigid Mae Power & The Rheingans Sisters.

While EP2 owes more to American Roots than EP1, when the musicians are as good as this, the influences matter less than the intimacy of the playing. This is a group of musicians playing the music that they love, and doing it better than just about anyone else.