Albums

Deservedly likened to All Things Must Pass in its scope and ambition, Brilliant Light is assuredly Danny & The Champions of the World’s masterpiece, an aural aurora borealis that will illuminate your musical life. 

Good Morning Sky sees Katie Spencer off to a flying start. Her debut mini-album has shades of John Martyn and also offers a broader palette which suggests an artist that is willing to explore.

Braids is an album of memory and homage, tooled and re-tooled like a worn keepsake, and Japanese-British singer-songwriter Eiks is an inventive creator who relishes nostalgia and excels in the preservation of life’s tiniest moments.

John Murry’s ‘A Short History of Decay’ is a gripping album, sonically adventurous, by an iconoclastic artist who made a career out of transforming tragedy and hardship into stark beauty.

Sarah Jane Scouten is another sterling example of the top grade Americana coming out of Canada as she ably demonstrates on her latest album When The Bloom Falls From The Rose.

With an already solid reputation established on the UK folk festival circuit, Tilly Moses’ new album ‘Alight & Adrift’ should firmly plant her feet on the ladder to the genres upper rungs.

Hannah Aldridge returns with ‘Gold Rush’, a strong second album that is unquestionably one of the best Americana albums of the year,  she’s struck the mother lode.

If there is such a thing as classic American songwriting, you wouldn’t necessarily expect it to be embodied on the debut album of a singer of Armenian descent, born in Syria. Bedouine’s album is, for want of a better word, classic.

With Nashville Sound, both Jason Isbell and his band are sounding both loose and hugely assured. From roots-rock to alt-country and the politically charged he delivers a broad musical horizon.

Jim Causley’s ‘I Am The Song: Children’s Poems By Charles Causley’ is a little gem of an album. It seems staggering that these poems weren’t songs in the first place, and very satisfying that they are now. Car journeys with the kids just got much, much better…

For her latest, Kathryn Williams pairs up with author Laura Barnett with a collection of songs based on her second novel, Greatest Hits. The diversity across the album is anchored by her smoky tones and the quality of her and Barnett’s lyrics.

In terms of longevity, musical and cultural interest, Brothers Briggs goes way beyond that of its intended one-off Birthday gift. We need more of this kind of adventurous and keenly understanding music-making.