• Music

    Various Artists – Canary Records: Hellenic Hinterlands: Independent Greek-American 78rpm Discs from Baltimore, Boston, and Cleveland ca. 1953-57

    September 15, 2024 - By 

    From the Canary Records Bandcamp site: “When middle-class Americans in the 1950s found that they could get access to a tape recorder and a microphone, it then became possible for them to make recordings that they could pay to have pressed into discs. One didn’t need to go to dedicated recording studios, most of which had been for decades in the cosmopolitan centers – first New York, then Chicago, then the temporary make-shift, studios set up in hotel rooms Georgia, Texas, Tennessee and Virginia, or the independent studios in Grafton WI, Richmond IN, Los Angeles, etc. It was part of…

  • Music

    Gaelynn Lea – All the Roads that Lead Us Home

    September 2, 2024 - By 

    This album is an absolutely sublime combination of folk music and classical, with Gaelynn Lea’s violin sounding like a full orchestra.  From the release website: “‘All the Roads that Lead Us Home’ is a focused, vibrant piece of music by a person who is able to take a solitary instrument and make it sound like a full string arrangement, who can fill a full-length LP with mostly just those sounds and communicate fluently her heart and soul with only a few tools.” – Tony Bennett, Duluth News Tribune”

  • Music

    Various Artists – Was Ist Das?: Ballads Of Seduction, Fertility And Ritual Slaughter

    August 19, 2024 - By 

    This is a rather novel concept.  The compilation featured here, courtesy of Was Ist Das?, is, as the Guardian states, “… a fittingly weird 50th anniversary tribute to The Wicker Man’s startling soundtrack. Magpahi’s synth-drizzled Maypole, Dean McPhee’s Sunset and Meg Baird’s Willow’s Song are particularly gorgeous.”  Each track stands well on its own, but generally fits the ethos of the legendary film as well.

  • Music

    Real Live Tigers – Denatured

    August 18, 2024 - By 

    Described as, “Letters read aloud over AM radio, quiet guitar through motel room walls, loud electric guitar in summer basements, gravel parking lots in the rain, train sounds,” there was no way I wasn’t going to pay attention to this release. Real Live Tigers is a project started by Tony Presley.  His voice reminds me, ever so slightly, of Stuart A. Staples of Tindersticks, but with a more lo-fi, folksy feel to it.

  • Music

    Romowe Rikoito – UKA

    March 24, 2024 - By 

    This is the latest from Prussian/Russian neofolk band Romowe Rikoito.  The music is heavy, based on the neofolk paradigm, of course, but what sets this apart is the reconstructed Old Prussian lyrics, something the band is passionate about transmitting.

  • Music

    The Henry Girls – A Time To Grow

    February 9, 2024 - By 

    More wonderful news from friends!  CPL-Music will be releasing a folk album of Irish Americana by The Henry Girls.  From the label’s press release: “The three McLaughlin sisters, Karen, Lorna, and Joleen, once again prove on their seventh studio album “A Time To Grow” that they belong to the leading folk ensembles of the Emerald Isle with heavenly, multi-part harmony vocals and their fresh, modern approach. The musicians aren’t fond of sticking to old conventions: they have a lot of fun crossing genre boundaries, charmingly flirting with pop, bluegrass, and Americana sounds, all while keeping a keen eye on the…

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    Linnea Hjertén – Nio Systrar

    January 29, 2024 - By 

    From Linnea Hjertén’s Bandcamp site: “Born from the synthesis of Swedish folk melodies and ritual ambient, Linnea Hjertén’s debut album “Nio systrar” (‘Nine sisters’) is a wordless invocation of primordial energy – a psychoacoustic gateway to altered states of consciousness. Each of the nine tracks brings us deeper into the cycle of spiritual death and rebirth, stripping away the old to make way for the new. With a musical maturity far beyond her years, Hjertén channels the ethereal beauty of Dead Can Dance, the spellbinding chants of Kari Rueslåtten, and the minimalist Nordic atmosphere of Forndom. […] With an expansive…

  • Music - Youtube

    Trio Mandili – Psalm 50

    January 5, 2024 - By 

    There will be no reviews either today or tomorrow as Orthodox Christians observe Christmas Eve and the Nativity on what was always the Ecumenical Church Calendar until the devising of the modern Gregorian Calendar, so for those who hold to the Councils, today is December 24.  We wish you a Merry Christmas (again), and leave you with today’s selection, a hymn of wailing by Saint King David by the Georgian folk group, Trio Mandili.  Be well.

  • Music

    Enda Reilly – A Dublin Farewell

    December 31, 2023 - By 

    2023 was a magnificent year for music releases, but a harsh one for those whom we lost.  The latest major artist we lost was The Pogues’ frontman, Shane MacGowan, who died on November 30th.  Folk singer Enda Reilly participated in a procession through Dublin in Shane’s honor and was moved to set a poem he penned to music.  I have a feeling that Shane would have enjoyed it. That closes 2023, dear friends.  We begin again tomorrow.  Happy New Year!