Decade: The Best of Lau 2007-2017

How can one possibly put together a compilation of the most exciting, musically adventurous trio in British folk without leaving out some of their classic recordings? Well, this is a brave attempt, partly curated by the band themselves, and with the exception of one track (an exhilarating 14-minute version of ‘The Lang Set’, recorded in 2011, four years after it first appeared on their debut album), it follows a strict chronological order. It starts with tracks from their first release Lightweights & Gentlemen in 2007, and ends with two songs from their fourth and latest offering The Bell That Never Rang, two years ago. Lau's Orcadian singer and guitarist Kris Drever dominated at this year's BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards (winning Folk Singer of the Year and Best Original Track) so it's perhaps to be expected that the set starts not with a trademark freewheeling instrumental, but with a song – his gently exquisite treatment of ‘Unquiet Grave’. Then come the instrumentals, ‘Hinba’ and ‘Gallowhill’ as a reminder of the remarkable, tight interplay between Drever's guitar with Martin Green's accordion and Aidan O'Rourke's fiddle, and their thrilling ability to improvise. Later tracks provide a reminder of how electronica entered the Lau mix on the Race the Loser album in 2012. Magnificent stuff.