Folk
Album review: Justin Townes Earle – Absent Fathers
‘Wish I could say I know you/’cause lord, I Wanna Understand/Need you to now there’s nothing I want more in this world as a man.’ If you kick off you latest album with those words, and then call it Absent Fathers, then you are pretty clearly laying out your agenda. Justin Townes Earle is the …
New music: First Aid Kit “Master Pretender”
First Aid Kit make music which sounds like it belongs in the latest cool indie film of the moment. All bouncy backing, soaring strings and vocals which are both endearingly plaintive and beautifully whimsical. Against the somewhat overpopulated marketplace of pop folk, First Aid Kit manage to stand out for a number of reasons: firstly, they …
Track: C Duncan – Say
Last time we heard from C Duncan, it was when our interest was peeked when we heard his track ‘For’. Now the Glasgow song-songwriter is back with a new single, ‘Say’ taken from his forthcoming debut album, due out this Summer. As with its predecessor, it was lovingly recorded at home by C Duncan, who …
Track: Stornaway – The Road You Didn’t Take
Oxford indie folk band Stornoway are back with a third, as yet untitled album, due out on April 13th. Searching for new ideas and with the lyrical cupboard (that is, his notebook) bare, songwriter and frontman Dr. Brian Briggsford took his family and upped sticks for the Gower Pennisula in Wales, perhaps (and I’m relying …
Album Review: Sumner – Sumner
Two years ago, there or there abouts Kristina Sarkisova arrived in London, via Moscow and Valencia with one suitcase and a guitar. Her intention, beyond seeing out the little money she had for a couple of months, was to give the ‘music thing’ a try. If she didn’t get a sign that it was worth …
From an old record box: Patrick Park – Honest Skrew
The old record box has thrown out some lovely surprises in this month’s bumper crop: a reunion with a clinical pop masterpiece in Roxette’s ‘It Must Have Been Love’, the indie rock rush of The Wedding Present’s ‘2, 3, Go’, and an R.E.M. 12” of high quality (‘Orange Crush’). But there have also been some …
Live Review: Laura James & The Lyres, Captives On The Carousel & Genevieve Carver, The Shakespeare, Sheffield – 9.11.14
It’s not often I end up being so completely captivated by a whole evening but this was one of those rare events where each performance captured the entirety of my attention. A gig headlined by Laura James this may have been, but add to that performances from folk group Captives On The Carousel and poet Genevieve Carver …
News: The Handsome Family – UK & Ireland Tour 2015
What a year this has been for Rennie and Brett Sparks. Before Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson starred in one of the most exciting and talked-about TV series of recent memory (all-time ? of course not, that’s still Buffy), The Handsome Family were strong, personal favourites for plenty of people; but now they’re household names. …
Album Review : Language of Shapes :: Mother Mountain
Language of Shapes inhabit a musical world all their own. Not that they don’t allow certain musical influences to seep into that world and show themselves now and then, but for the most part LoS score their wonderful little universe all their own. Their self-titled debut from 2012 showed a band brimming and bursting with …
See: José González releases video for ‘Every Age’ / announces 2015 tour dates
Here’s the basics. Its José González’s first solo album in Seven Years, its called Vestiges & Claws and its out via Peacefrog records on 16th February. From it he’s releasing a single ‘Every Ege’, which comes out on November 30th and features a video thats a unique collaboration between José and directors Simon Morris & Chris Higham. …