It’s an odd thing, the live album. If you like a band enough to buy one you’ve probably heard most of the songs before, maybe you even own them, and with better recording quality at that. It’s usually hard for…
Category: Records
Album | Soap&Skin – Narrow
It’s hard to believe that Anja Plaschg, aka Soap&Skin, is only 21. With second full-length album, Narrow, the Viennese Plaschg tackles such weighty issues as loss and grief in a classical-goth style that takes a certain level of courageousness. Nor…
Album | Michael Kiwanuka – Home Again
Debut albums always represent the end of a long journey for any artist. Hopefully the beginning of one too, but definitely an ending – a point at which they have realised a long held dream and compiled that defining first…
Album | Gabriel & The Hounds – Kiss Full of Teeth
New bands signing to Communion tend to make us sit up and take notice. Not only because they’re almost always really good, but also because they usually serve up something full of the folky flavours we love so much. Gabriel…
Album | Tess – Magpie
Kent singer-songwriter Tess has managed to create an album which is both instantly likeable and a bit of a grower. Magpie is distinguised by well-crafted, honest songwriting while the vocal delivery is perfectly understated. Opener ‘Big Room’ has dark lyrics…
Album | Gretchen Peters – Hello Cruel World
This is Gretchen Peters’ first appearance on FFS, and she’s most decidedly at the country end of our folk spectrum (if you remember Faith Hill, she wrote a song for her in the 90s). She’s lived in Nashville since the…
Singles Round-up | Liz Green, Ajimal, Sweet Lights, Tom Williams & The Boat, Maia, Athena
Liz Green – Bad Medicine ‘Bad Medicine’ is taken from Liz Green’s debut album O, Devotion! and it is quite frankly brilliant. It’s also pretty difficult to describe, the closest I can get being that it is a bit like…
Album: We Are Augustines – Rise Ye Sunken Ships
All the brawn of We Are Augustines’ instrumentation could easily mask the emotional clout that Rise Ye Sunken Ships contains. The opening gambit of a four-to-the-floor drum beat and the ensuing anthemic guitar chord progression in ‘Chapel Song’ immediately defines…
Album | Straylings – Entertainment on Foreign Grounds
The Straylings’s debut effort comes in the form of the compelling Entertainment on Foreign Grounds and it certainly leaves a lasting impression on the listener. Gaining praise from such people as Steve Lamacq, the band are definitely under a lot…
Album | Bowerbirds – The Clearing
On their charming new album The Clearing, the Bowerbirds stick to the formula that gained them acclaim on their previous records, Upper Air and Hymns for a Dark Horse. On first listen it appears to be a tribute to their…