The New Mine

Soon after he’d formed Matthews Southern Comfort, ex-Fairport Convention singer songwriter Iain Matthews enjoyed a million-selling No 1 hit in the UK with his version of Joni Mitchell's ‘Woodstock’. Throughout the five decades since, Matthews has consistently produced some fine and tasteful, albeit too often overlooked, music in a variety of solo and collective guises, including the much-loved Plainsong, before deciding ten years ago that the Matthews Southern Comfort name fitted a new group of musicians from his new home in the Netherlands.

Coincidentally enough, this fourth album with Bart-Jan Baartmans (guitars, bass, and banjo), Bart de Win (pianos, accordion and backing vocals) and Eric de Vries (acoustic guitar and vocals) opens with a Joni Mitchell song, the poignant ‘Ethiopia’ from 1985, but aside from a chugging version of country music luminary Ed Snodderly's ‘Working in the New Mine’, the other ten tracks here are penned by Matthews with various combinations of MSC members, all harking from that sweet spot between British folk-rock and Americana that has long been his classy comfort zone. Even at 73 years of age, Matthews possesses a voice that sounds as sweet as ever, with his ear for angelic harmonies well served by his current comrades.