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MUSIC Album reviews

Latest releases from Christina Alden and Alex Patterson, Honey and the Bear and Gnoss

Christina Alden and Alex Patterson
Hunter
christinaaldenandalexpatterson.com
★★★★★

PART of the folk-singing trio Alden, Patterson and Dashwood, this Norwich duo were due a busy concert schedule before the pandemic devastated plans. But they’ve put their creative energies to good use in using lockdown to record this debut album.

Comprising mainly contemporary songs but rooted in the folk tradition, the album reflects their concern for the environment and the relationship between humans and the natural world, starting with the upbeat title track about the bond between a grey wolf and a brown bear.

My Boy tells the true story of an Indonesian lamplighter being washed out to sea while The Greenland Shark is sung from the perspective of the planet’s oldest vertebrae.

New Year Waltz is a tune written to welcome in the new year with hopes of a better one in these present times and, like the album itself, it certainly goes some way to easing lockdown blues.

Honey and the Bear
Journey Through the Roke
honeyandthebear.co.uk
★★★★★

THE 12 tracks on Journey Through the Roke reflect themes of survival as well as seeking inspiration from Suffolk’s past and future on this second album from Lucy and Jon Hart.

There are songs based on true events on the Sussex coast, with 3 Miles Out a narrative of the North Sea Flood of 1953 and Freddie Cooper, inspired by a lifeboat crew rescue in 1996.

Other songs like Buried in Ivy and Unless We Start It reflect environmental concerns, there’s a fine rendition of the traditional Irish number My Lagan Love and Sweet Honey is a song inspired after travels in Cuba.

With a variety of stringed instruments and backing from members of Sam Kelly’s Lost Boys, the album fuses elements of folk, country and Americana to give a fully enjoyable experience.

Gnoss
The Light of the Moon
gnossmusic.com
★★★★

GNOSS are four young folk musicians from Scotland and their second studio album is an impressive collection of original material, comprising seven instrumentals and four songs.

The album has a jaunty feel, reflected in a number of cheerful birthday tunes composed for friends and family, like the opening track Gordon’s and closer That’s Me.

The vocal tracks include Honey Dew, about the temptation of wanting to leave work for liquid refreshment and Sun that Hugs the Ocean, with themes of love and doubt common to many Scottish and Appalachian ballads.

With impressive musical arrangements involving fiddles, mandolin, flutes and whistles occasionally interspersed with impressive vocals, this album is a welcome venture from a group who are clearly going places.

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