Reviews
Pacifico
Robin Layne & The Rhythm Makers
The Pacific coast is this congenial album’s common denominator: percussionist, composer and educator Robin Layne is based around Vancouver and...
Reviewed by Mark Sampson in issue: February/March/2025
FOLKMOSIS
Beth Malcolm’s follow-up to her 2023 debut album, Kissed and Cried, presents a delightful musical triptych that takes the listener...
Reviewed by Peter Quinn in issue: February/March/2025
Kananayé
Kanazoe, Clotilde Rullaud, Abdoulaye Traore, Boubacar Djiga & Achille Nacoulma
This album has its origins in a project commissioned for a 2019 festival in Burkina Faso in which French singer...
Reviewed by Nigel Williamson in issue: February/March/2025
Väder
My first hearing of Väder was on Swedish Radio, the sound of a fiddle duo stopping me in my tracks...
Reviewed by Fiona Talkington in issue: February/March/2025
Banbirrngu: The Orchestral Sessions
One of the most beautiful and distinctive voices to ever emerge from Australia, Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu – better known simply...
Reviewed by Seth Jordan in issue: February/March/2025
Ajdad – Ancestors (Echoes of Persia)
Another record from a Western-based Iranian musician with the same familiar themes: mystical song titles, cross-cultural collaboration and, of course,...
Reviewed by Kamyar Salavati in issue: February/March/2025
Idrache (Traces of the Past)
With the members of Tinariwen scattered around southern Algeria while they take refuge from the political unrest in Mali ,...
Reviewed by Nigel Williamson in issue: February/March/2025
Gharbí
This album has a strongly conceptual quality to it. Belmonte imagines himself journeying between Andalucía and Arabia with the purpose...
Reviewed by Tom Spargo in issue: February/March/2025
