Albums

Devarrow says his mission is “to make music that feels really good.” With Heart Shaped Rock, an album that explores themes of love, loss, self-discovery, and social consciousness, I’d say the mission is accomplished.

On Theo, Luke De-Sciscio tackles the reality of parenthood in a remarkable collection of songs that distils the hopes and fears for an unknown future, what it means to be a father and what it means to be alive in the 21st century.

There are so many elements to Naima Bock’s ‘Below a Massive Dark Land’ that it’s a wonder they can all work together, but wonder appears to be a common reaction to Bock’s music. That’s because she takes risks…it confirms her as a major songwriter.

It feels as if the songs on Constant Follower’s ‘The Smile You Send Out Returns To You’ have been nurtured, perhaps subconsciously, over the two decades it took to realise his musical ambitions, resulting in an incredibly moving and distinctive album.

Julian Taylor’s third solo-credited studio release, Pathways, finds him in a reflective mood and ranks him alongside fellow Canadian folk music luminaries Bruce Cockburn, Leonard Cohen, Buffy Sainte-Marie, and Joni Mitchell.

Featuring two quiet stalwarts of the instrumental scene, American fiddle player Mike Gangloff and British fingerstyle guitar ace C Joynes, the music of ‘Tom Winter, Tom Spring’ is fluid and confident, balancing dense intensity with lighter foot-tappers and spacious abstracts. It’s quite a thing.

Jake Blount & Mali Obomsawin’s Symbiont is a magical fusion of natural beauty, fragility, turbulence and ever-evolving motion. It is awe-inspiring, a ball of chance and wonder, much like the planet Earth.

Three Cane Whale always fill their recordings with splendid arrangements and Hibernacula is no exception. Recorded in Bristol’s prized St George’s venue by Rob Harbron, it is their most accomplished work to date and the freest representation of their sound thus far. Wonderful.

Jon Boden & The Remnant Kings’ Parlour Ballads shines a light on an unfairly neglected part of musical history–a collection of beautifully performed, sad and compassionate songs brought to life by one of folk music’s premier performers.

Featuring Julie Fowlis, Ewen Henderson, the late Simon Emmerson, and more, the musicianship across Highlands is consistently first-rate, and every song is a complete delight. It’s many sublime moments more than warrants listening to, in or out of the Lush Spa.

Through OPHELIA, Angeline Morrison conjures a perfect, otherworldly landscape of hauntological folk music…imagine if Broadcast’s Trish Keenan had been kidnapped at birth by the Copper family and raised on a diet of Angela Carter’s fairy tales…

Featuring the VOX Sydney Philharmonia Choir, and recorded in a nineteenth century Gothic church in Sydney, The Undreamt-of Centre is Laurence Pike’s defining achievement, a work that both glorifies the past and haunts the contemporary.