Aoife Nessa Frances
Land Of No Junction
(Basin Rock)
★★★★

TWO years in the making, Land Of No Junction is the impressive debut album from 28-year old Irish singer-songwriter Aoife Nessa Frances.

Taking its broad psychedelic folk sound and ambience from California circa 1970, the songs unspool unhurriedly, with Frances’s impressionistic words and striking vocals conjuring up a brooding, unsettled and emotional inner world.

Written just before Ireland’s abortion referendum in 2018, Less Is More and single Blow Up are both apparently about “being a woman and finding strength in a forever changing world.”

With its unsettling strings and Frances singing: “I’m about to lose my mind,” the latter owes a lot to Tomorrow Never Knows by The Beatles, while Libra mimics The Bryds’ more far-out moments.

An ambitious record with echoes of Titanic Rising by Weyes Blood and Gene Clark’s 1974 masterpiece No Other.

Terry Allen and The Panhandle Mystery Band
Just Like Moby Dick
(Paradise of Bachelors)
★★★★

THOUGH the title and cover suggest a concept album, Kansas-born Terry Allen’s first record of original material since 2013 is actually a wide-ranging suite of country rock songs with little to connect them except the 76-year old’s exceptional songwriting talents.

He is joined by lots of friends – Dylan sideman Charlie Sexton co-produces, Joe Ely and Dave Alvin take co-writing credits and Shannon McNally sings lead vocals on a couple of tracks (check out the gorgeous All These Blues Go Walkin’ By).

There are songs about the magician Houdini, vampires, the “duck-and-cover” nuclear fears of the 1950s and US wars: “Iraq, Afghanistan/Just like Vietnam,” he sings on Bad Kiss.

With Allen’s voice in fine fettle, Just Like Moby Dick is a fierce, funny and high-spirited set from an artist still at the top of his game.

Jonathan Wilson
Dixie Blur
(Bella Union)
★★★★

HAVING moved to Los Angeles 15 years ago, Jonathan Wilson has made a name for himself as a top-class songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer (Father John Misty, Dawes), expertly mining a West Coast rock sound.

For his new album, the North Carolina native returned to the south, recording in Nashville with an all-star band including fiddler Mark O’Connor and Wilco’s Pat Sansone on co-producing duties.

The geographical shift has done wonders, with a gorgeous country influence running through the immaculately produced songs.

A flute graces opener Just For Love, while the ending of In Heaven Making Love brilliantly echoes Meat Loaf’s Paradise by the Dashboard Light.

Full of the kind of melodic, heartfelt Americana Ryan Adams – even before his downfall – would die to write, it’s very much a classic-sounding record, with a terrific energy and fizz to the music.