Albums

Birdvox are a kind of supergroup, and on ‘Shamming the Drama’ the quartet may, at any given time, backtrack into traditional Scottish folk, sidestep into pulsing disco beats, and lean into glitchy, blissful electronica. Their debt to traditional music gives their sound a unique edge, but of all the many elements that make Birdvox sound like no other band, that sense of community might be one of the most important.

Jarrett Gilgore and Anthony Pirog’s “Between The Earth and Where” is a fine tributary to this great river of human achievement, compelling in its subtle warmth and discreet lyricism. Pirog’s guitar forms finely latticed patterns for Gilgore’s sensuous blowing; dreamy saxophone flutters and spirals at the edge of consciousness. Two empathetic and exploratory young men playing a delicate, nocturnal blues.

Falmouth’s Blind Yeo follow Cornwall’s tradition of wonky inventiveness on “The Lemoine Point,” which surges with baked, euphoric Krautrock riffs and pantheistic ancient worship. Founded by singer/guitarist Will Greenham, the loose collective is based out of The Cornish Bank, the Falmouth venue Greenham co-founded. Blind Yeo are doing more than most to keep Cornwall weird.

On his second album, “Mudlark Ballads”, Dublin singer Macdara Yeates unearths little-known relics of the city’s musical history, his arrangements more confident and varied than on 2024’s “Traditional Singing from Dublin”. His ability to capture the mood of a song is second to none; they are valuable treasures in his hands. 

Le Ren’s “Don’t Be Funny Without Me” is a phenomenally powerful album. The arrangements expand beyond the spareness of her earlier releases, with fiddle, drums and layered harmonies; this is one you will return to again and again.

Emma Lucia and Ship Says Om (Jenny Gillespie Mason) talk us through “Djuphjärtad,” their collaborative four-song EP blending Nordic-rooted folk melodies with ambient experimental textures. Using nature-based field recordings, synths, and organic instrumentation, the Bay Area musicians move between intimate songs of romantic anticipation and elemental sound meditations.

Baby Dee’s “Child of Joy” is her first album in 11 years, reworking songs from her catalogue for accordion. Where piano and harp once carried them, the accordion makes them preciously intimate and impossibly vast. Dee is the great chronicler of everyday miracles, written in alphabets of light — the eye of a poet, the hands of a carpenter.

Nick Jonah Davis’s “Rose Delta Rising,” recorded at Black Bay Studio in the Outer Hebrides, pairs electric guitar with Neal Heppleston’s bass, Joe Danks’ drums and Richard Birkin’s strings. This is a very elegant and accomplished set that feels like a distillation of Nick’s work over the years. Musically adventurous, impeccably recorded and performed, it is his best expression yet. Includes the premiere of the “Spoonbill” video.

Patrick ‘Paahto’ Cummins and John Francis Flynn’s debut as Paahto & The Bull, “The 123”, is a guitar duet recording rooted in the Irish traditional canon. No banjo, no fiddle, no percussion — just a fresh, wood-sounding warmth and accomplished playing across ten tracks. A tremendous debut that oozes confidence. This music is in very safe hands.

Laura Veirs’ “Temple Songs” is a set of songs that are personal and immediate, crafted alone in a backyard studio with two microphones and a laptop. Veirs embraces wabi-sabi, welcoming imperfection and the environment seeping into takes. At 29 minutes and 11 songs, so many multitudes are contained within — a recording that chooses truth over gloss.

“Porchlight” is Two Runner’s first album with Paige Anderson as sole frontperson. Its twelve songs encompass transition, loss and journeys both literal and personal. Quality story songs are matched by the beautiful yearning of more intimate numbers — a fine record from a performer with burgeoning talent and an even more promising future.

“Donn Dubh” is a challenging and exhilarating reimagining of Scots Gaelic traditions by two fearless musical cosmonauts at the top of their game. Arun Sood and Angeline Morrison’s collaborative debut calls to mind Eno and Byrne’s “My Life in the Bush of Ghosts” — samples, distortion and elegiac piano channelling folk’s ancient past while forecasting its glittering future.