In a month when forward-thinking folk records are falling from the rafters, this one sounds like nothing else. It feels simultaneously ancient and modern, profound and direct, led by the peculiar, beautiful sound of the smallpipes. Brìghde Chaimbeul, a 20-year-old Gaelic speaker from Skye, was introduced to the pipe family as a child by a Greek neighbour. She led the Highland Military Tattoo at 17, winning the Radio 2 young folk award the same year, and has explored the international reach of her instrument ever since (playing with pipers across eastern Europe, digging into its traditions in Cape Breton and Ireland, unearthing forgotten songs from her own Hebrides and the Highlands).
Such ambition is evident in her appropriately named debut album, The Reeling. Recorded live in a church in the Black Isle Georgian town of Cromarty, the drone of Chaimbeul’s smallpipes whip you in, like the line of a wire (so do the wheezes of a harmonium she found in the church). You’re reminded of Laura Cannell’s midnight-shaded, shuddering violin playing, or the gothic mood of Scandinavian artists such as Anna von Hausswolff. The tunes are both Scottish and Bulgarian: Moma e Moma Rodila sitting with ease next to Tàladh Nan Cearc, underlining a sense of universality and common humanity in the music.
Chaimbeul assembles quite a team around her, too. Lau’s Aidan O’Rourke produces, bringing out the rich textural potential of the breaths and creaks of her sound. Lankum’s Radie Peat joins on concertina, while pioneering 82-year-old singer and piper Rona Lightfoot, who first inspired Chaimbeul to play pipes when she was four, sings canntaireachd (a phonetic singing tradition used to teach pipe tunes) on several tracks. Their effect is both trance-like and immediate, heartfelt and raw, adding to this album’s unforgettable deep atmosphere.
Also out this month
Lau’s fifth album, Midnight and Closedown, confirms the band’s always-curious, brilliant reinvigorations of traditional sound, this time with John Parish (PJ Harvey) producing. The Unthanks continue to experiment ravenously and joyously, their new three-CD trilogy, Lines, coming from three perspectives: Hull fishing worker Lillian Bilocca (voiced by Maxine Peake), Emily Brontë and first world war poets. Eliza Carthy also releases her first solo album, Restitute, made live in her bedroom, to raise finance for her band after they lost funding for a previous project. It features gorgeous soundclips and the record’s story can be found on her website.
