Albums

It’s been nine years since Laura Cantrell released an album and ‘Just Like a Rose’, on which she is joined by a number of special guests, is a glorious affirmation that she’s not lost her magical touch.

Haar might be Lauren MacColl’s most accomplished and rewarding work to date, an ambitious album of painterly beauty, on which the sadness of experience is offset by the constant awareness of the world’s wonders and complexities.  

First issued in 1969, the Malombo Jazz Makers’ unknown third album ‘Down Lucky’s Way’ is reissued on vinyl. The liner notes include an interview with Lucky Ranku, one of the greatest African guitarists of his generation.

Joost Dijkema’s ‘After Thunder Sun’ is an impressive piece of work, an album unafraid to let hooky, full-band songs sit alongside ragas and American-style solo acoustic instrumentals. Joost’s playing is excellent throughout, and the quality of music is also consistently ace, making this a key listen for fans of high-end guitar music. Bravo.

Jeffrey Silverstein is not your traditional cosmic cowboy, and Western Sky Music plays free and loose with conventional theories of country music. This is one album that will not be heading for the musty lower shelves of the record store.

Kicking any second album syndrome fears into touch; Lawside seems certain to figure in year-end best-of lists and launch Roseanne Reid into the wider consciousness of fans on both sides of the Atlantic.

Marvellous and mystifying, the aural landscape of The Far Sound is simply unlike anything ever experienced before, making music that goes in a most unexpected direction, creating a sonic timepiece where worlds meet.

A thoughtful and reflective album, Ben Harper’s ‘Wide Open Light’ has a quiet strength and emotional depth in its minimalism. His past albums have accrued eight Grammy nominations and three wins. This should add to both tallies.

Ben Chasny and Rick Tomlinson “drank delicious beer on sunny afternoons and had fantastic dinners” while recording ‘Waves’… an album in which we feel the warm vibrations of their dreams and visions.  

With ‘In the Air’, Anna St. Louis has crafted a work that reaches beyond the moment, laying out messages that reverberate truth. She is a talent deserving to be heard.

On ‘Land’, an immersive album of depth and subtlety, Liz Hanks helps us understand how a place changes over time. She reads her surroundings like a vast physical palimpsest, peeling away roads and buildings to examine the earthy underbelly, the strata of human activity and natural change.

For their third album, the Astoria, Oregon duo The Hackles are joined by Halli Anderson of River Whyless and Horse Feathers for an album that lives up to its title “What a Beautiful Thing I Have Made”.