On Genius Loci 1: White Peak, The Ciderhouse Rebellion have taken a step further into the unknown, with an album that marries their flawless musicianship with an ever more experimental outlook. The whole album hangs together like a story and is totally captivating.
Karine Polwart and Dave Milligan have crafted an elegantly uncomplicated listen. Dreamy yet thought-provoking at just the right moments, Still As Your Sleeping is an earnest and embracing soundtrack. Thoroughly warm-hearted and beautifully life-affirming. A genuinely gorgeous and magical duet.
Compiled by Lankum’s Ian Lynch, Fire Draw Near is an essential and worthy anthology for anyone with an interest in traditional music and song, it’s also a thoroughly enjoyable, irresistible and inspiring set of songs and tunes.
At the heart of Spiers & Boden’s “Fallow Ground” is the utter joy of two friends making music together. It’s a joyful, exciting, and beautifully produced release and it’s so great to have them back.
Aidan O’Rourke’s Iorram is a truly magical listening experience, one that, for all its outward quietness, is bursting with ideas…Even without the context of the film it accompanies, this masterful document has a vividness that is almost visual in its own right.
Taking turns both tender and turbulent, John Francis Flynn’s “I Would Not Live Always” is bracing, unpredictable and without a doubt one of the most deeply affecting folk debuts of recent years.
Candlepower is an effortlessly crafted, and luxurious, listen. Charming and challenging in equal measures it is a thoroughly beguiling debut from Marina Allen who is also our Artist of the Month.
Adrian Freedman’s “Kindred Souls” is steeped in musical diversity and cultures…like nothing I have heard before. It is an immensely rich and engaging listening experience. One to savour and enjoy multiple times and the delivery of such powerful and therapeutic music is beautifully timed.
Ulster trio TRÚ talk us through their new album ‘No Fixed Abode’, offering a brilliant insight into each of the songs on their new album. It features some great stories and background…including mythology, changelings, faeries and Japanese folklore.
To listen to The Eternal Rocks Beneath is to sink into a reverie. Katherine Priddy puts a contemporary spin on the mythological and with a balletic vocal ability and bent for tender, lush arrangements, this much-anticipated debut is like stumbling upon a diamond mine.
Fishclaw’s latest EP, Feil, is part of their wider Ash project which brings listeners closer to the natural world…it’s like the musical equivalent of shinrin-yoku – forest bathing, even listening to it in the comfort of one’s own home is a transportive, strangely moving experience.
Watch part two of a short film on the making of Ulster trio TRÚ’s debut album ‘No Fixed Abode’. It revolves around the Irish traditional folk song Bonny Portmore and features a lovable character they meet called Joe.
