Folk Radio UK Music Reviews

Folk Music Reviews covering the latest album releases from the UK and Beyond: Traditional and Contemporary Folk Music to Celtic and Roots. All our reviews are written by a team of freelance writers who are passionate about folk music.

Thumbnail image for Doug Tielli – Swan Sky Sea Squirrel

Doug Tielli – Swan Sky Sea Squirrel

by Alex 11 April 2012 Folk Music Reviews

During an interview about Doug Tielli‘s solo debut album ‘Swan Sky Sea Squirrel‘ Doug explained that there was no reason for him to make a record as there was no one waiting for it anywhere. Rather than worry about self-imposed timescales Doug took up retreat on Toronto Island in an old school portable. The buildings [...]

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Thumbnail image for The Duplets – Leverage

The Duplets – Leverage

by Alex 10 April 2012 Folk Music Reviews

The Duplets are Gillian Fleetwood and Fraya Thomsen, both of whom hail from the Highlands of Scotland. They both sing and play harp and on their latest offering titled ‘Leverage‘ they were given the opportunity of playing two Briggs harps (Henry Briggs was a famous English harp maker based in Glasgow). The album features instrumental [...]

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Quickbeam - Seven Hundred Birds (review) + Exclusive Session

Quickbeam – Seven Hundred Birds (review) + Exclusive Session

by Alex 10 April 2012 Folk Music Reviews

Quickbeam are a six piece acoustic/atmospheric band based in Glasgow Scotland. They were formed in 2009 by Monika Gromek, she was later joined by Andrew Thomson after discovering a mutual kinship and love for sparse arranagements. The band has since grown to six members. My first introduction to their music was their debut music video [...]

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Live Review: Get The Blessing @ Ronnie Scott’s

Live Review: Get The Blessing @ Ronnie Scott’s

by Matthew Ellis 4 April 2012 Live Reviews

Jazz-rock quartet Get The Blessing is a heterogenous beast at the best of times. Bassist and leader Jim Barr hails from Portishead while trumpeter Pete Judge and saxophonist Jake McMurchie are both National Youth Orchestra alumni. Tonight, with Goldfrapp’s Daisy Palmer replacing Clive Deamer on drums, they were more chimerical than ever. But the band [...]

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Thumbnail image for Introducing: Scott Rudd

Introducing: Scott Rudd

by Alex 3 April 2012 Introducing

Scott Rudd is currently based in New York City where he is working on a series of lo-fi 4-track cassette demos. There is a rawness and exposed fragility to his music that is mirrored in his photography work. His images are stark, real and often overshadowed by poverty and despair. It is this type of [...]

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Thumbnail image for Introducing: Trampled by Turtles

Introducing: Trampled by Turtles

by Alex 3 April 2012 Introducing

Trampled by Turtles grew out of a desire to play acoustic and roots music, a break for the band members from playing the rock music they had became accustomed to playing in their individual bands. Those first sessions made a big impact, big enough for each band memeber to decide this wasn’t going to be [...]

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Album Review: Will Stratton – Post Empire

Will Stratton – Post Empire

by Selina Ream 2 April 2012 Folk Music Reviews

American singer songwriter Will Stratton says that his albums are ‘most comprehensible in fall or early winter’. Perhaps it’s because we’re across the pond, but Post Empire feels entirely suited for Summer. It has the sound of the mid-west, with adept and agile fingerstyle guitar that places itself in the middle of a dusty desert [...]

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Album Review: Hannah Cohen - Child Bride

Hannah Cohen – Child Bride

by Matthew Ellis 2 April 2012 Folk Music Reviews

Two narratives will dominate discussion of Hannah Cohen’s Child Bride. The first situates her within a lineage of female singer-songwriters. The second recounts Cohen’s past life as a model before explaining the album’s emergence from a dizzyingly fashionable New York scene comprising artists like Ryan McGinley and Terry Richardson as well as a stable of [...]

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RM Hubbert - Thirteen Lost & Found

RM Hubbert – Thirteen Lost & Found

by David Price 30 March 2012 Folk Music Reviews

Thirteen Lost & Found is the second album by ex El Hombre Trajeado guitarist RM Hubbert (also known as ‘Hubby’). It’s produced by Franz Ferdinand’s Alex Kapranos and features collaborations with a baker’s dozen of friends and assorted Scottish musical royalty, including Arab Strap’s Aidan Moffat and The Delgados’ Emma Pollock; Kapranos himself guests on [...]

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The Magic Lantern: new track + Introducing: The Beguilers

The Magic Lantern (new track) + Introducing: The Beguilers

by Alex 29 March 2012 Folk Music News

Back in January (article here) we mentioned that The Magic Lantern had been busy writing and rehearsing for a new album. You can now lisen to a demo recording of their new song ‘Hercules’ below: Vocals – Jamie Doe Piano, percussion, cello – Fred Thomas Clarinet – Dave Shulman Their seasonal residency at The Green [...]

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Steffen Basho-Junghans - IS

Steffen Basho-Junghans – IS

by Harry Wheeler 29 March 2012 Folk Music Reviews

‘IS’ opens with an epic eighteen-minute six string slide piece entitled ‘When The Plains are Singing’. You can imagine flying over a wide open landscape with cold blue mountains, sweeping down over wild fields of long grass dancing around in the wind, until finally coming back to the imposing natural towers of the mountains. Steffen [...]

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Cold Specks - Debut Album & New Single (listen now)

Cold Specks – Debut Album & New Single (listen now)

by Alex 28 March 2012 Introducing

Cold Specks is the moniker of the young female Canadian singer Al Spx, despite having an incredibly unique and soulful voice that has been compared to Mahalia Jackson and Sister Rosetta Tharpeshe she didn’t get the hype in Toronto that she’s now getting in the UK. It wasn’t until she moved to London about a [...]

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Introducing: M.N Hopwood

Introducing: M.N Hopwood

by Alex 27 March 2012 Introducing

In 2011 M.N Hopwood wrote his debut album ‘And to this Last’ (due for release in September 2012) capturing moments of beauty on recordings made in an old saxon church, situated in the foothills of the Sussex Downs. The church was used as an instrument and the space encompassed the songs giving them life and [...]

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Thumbnail image for Introducing: Caroline Smith and The Good Night Sleeps

Introducing: Caroline Smith and The Good Night Sleeps

by Alex 26 March 2012 Introducing

Caroline Smith began her solo music career back in 2006 at the age of 18. She managed to get a residency at Minneapolis’ 400 Bar, a venue which had featured the likes of Elliott Smith, Conor Oberst, and local artist, Mason Jennings, who also had a residency there. In 2007 she befriended the members of [...]

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Laish - Obituaries EP & Tour

Laish – Obituaries EP

by Alex 21 March 2012 Folk Music Reviews

Laish have released their Obituaries EP which also signals a new development in the band’s direction. Whilst the title track ‘Obituaries‘ is a contemplative song dealing with a coomon theme throughout of obsession with death and legacy it showcases a much bigger and dynamic sound. Songwriter for Laish, Daniel Green: “I have begun to loosen [...]

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To What Strange Place : The Music of The Ottoman-American Diaspora, 1916 - 1929

To What Strange Place : The Music of The Ottoman-American Diaspora, 1916 – 1929

by Harry Wheeler 20 March 2012 Folk Music Reviews

‘To What Strange Place’ is a compilation conceived by Ian Nagoski, much like the music compilations of Harry Smith‘s multi-volume Anthology of American Folk Music, Nagoski’s obsession and extensive research is a gift to the world.

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