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Product Description
Review
When confronted with music as splendid as this, it’s easy to be swept along on a wave of purple prose. “Beautiful”, “haunting”, and “beguiling” are all words that spring easily to mind whilst listening to this astonishing record.
Yet such is the presence and emotional weight created by the voices of Rachel and Becky Unthank, even such effusive descriptions drastically undersell what this remarkable duo achieve via a distinctive brace of (mostly) traditional folk tunes.
Alongside the extraordinary potency of their singing, the nuances and embellishments of the instrumental settings - created by an expanded team that includes strings and horns (as well as regular collaborators Niopha Keegan and producer Adrian McNally) - are decisive and striking.
The spellbinding eight-minute-long Annachie Gordon is a well-known tale of doomed lovers undone by the local gentry. Yet in a remake that owes more to Music for Airports than Cecil Sharp House, it is made viscerally fresh as the heartache seeps slowly across a repeatedly tolling, echo-drenched piano chord.
Their cross-pollination of old and new avoids coming over as novel or awkward, and it’s exactly this inventive approach which has always given The Unthanks their edge.
The sharp slicing strings and the brass undertow on Lucky Gilchrist reimagines Michael Nyman’s staccato-driven scores whilst the arrangement of Lal Waterson’s At First She Starts channels the ornate melancholia of Nick Drake’s Way To Blue with a stately splash of Henry Purcell.
Whilst a smile is raised by the inclusion of knockabout tunes such as the Geordie dialect ditties of Betsy Bell and Where’ve Yer Bin Dick, it’s the profound intensity of bleaker material such as the truly heartbreaking dignity of The Testimony of Patience Kershaw or Ewan MacColl’s Nobody Knew She Was There that stays with the listener longer.
As good as their 2007 Mercury Prize-nominated album, The Bairns, undoubtedly was, Here’s the Tender Coming raises the standard higher still. --Sid Smith
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A beautiful album,
By
This review is from: Here's the Tender Coming (Audio CD)
A beautiful, haunting album. I came across the band only recently (Rachael used to play cello in a band I sometimes played for). I love the way in which they have developed old folk songs and combined them with new tracks such as 'Lucky Gilchrist'. I particularly like the storytelling in 'Annachie Gordon' and the emotion in 'The Testimony of Patience Kershaw'. A stunning album. I will definately be purchasing their other album very soon.
56 of 60 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Safety warning - careful playing this when driving!,
By
This review is from: Here's the Tender Coming (Audio CD)
I made the mistake of playing this for the first time driving to work and, by the end of track three, had tears in my eyes! Not good in fast traffic, but its a joy to listen to none the less.
This is a wonderful collection of songs, some of them actually joyful (Because He Was A Bonny Lad / Where've Yer Bin 'Dick / Betsey Bell and, in darker form, the fragment Not Much Luck In Our House) but most of them sad and profoundly moving in that they deal with life's difficulties and what's needed to address them. But that would go for both the sisters' previous records and doesn't explain why I think this is the best of the three. To date there's always been a sense that the Unthank sisters and their band of musicians might fall into the standard "folk" trap. The one where the musical arrangements becomes stuck in a certain idea of what "real" folk music should sound like - either the idea of "authentic tradition" (which is for me what kills off so much so-called Celtic folk music) or else the "classical" idea (usually involving a lot of fancy piano playing). This new CD demonstrates that they are too canny for that and, together with Andy McNally, have found ways to use something from both approaches to make something that serves they own particular musical vision - witness the use of brass on Sad February and Nobody Knew She Was There. Above all there's a sense of each song getting the particular musical attention it deserves (rather than what a marketing man thinks will sell it) so that, rather than simply respecting the lyrics, they are brought to their full emotional life for a contemporary audience. Anyone who doubts the relevance of this kind of music should listen to carefully to the title track! For that reason I suspect that a lot of people may find this hard going at first listen because it simply doesn't fit their idea of what "folk" should be. Please persist, its a great record.
27 of 30 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Here's the Third Coming,
By
This review is from: Here's the Tender Coming (Audio CD)
I admit I was concerned.
Possibly the greatest musical awakening of my life was down to Rachel Unthank and the Winterset. "The Bairns" was so utterly and triumphantly eye-opening that I was anticipating any new release with equal amounts of excitement and trepidation. It seems there is no need to worry. The creative wellspring of the Unthanks obviously runs pretty deep. They have produced another finely balanced collection of songs which both delight and inspire. Even though they now have more members and instruments contributing to the overall sound these songs still exhibit the sparse beauty of arrangement which I loved so much in "The Bairns". Yet again Becky's voice raises the hairs on the back of my neck with alarming regularity but now this can also be triggered by the occasional introduction of a measured and sometimes superbly dischordant brass section lazily emerging from the rich soundscape and then sinking gently back behind the voices and strings. All 13 tracks exude their own distinct charm mixing the traditional with the slightly more contemporary but none seem out of place. Tunes range between the joyous to the terribly poignant with "The Testimony of Patience Kershaw" and "Nobody Knew She Was There" being particularly affecting. The band has been quoted as saying they didn't want to make another "Bairns" and they certainly haven't. They've created, at bare minimum, an equal, albeit a close relation, one with the same heart and soul intact which was something I foolishly doubted would ever be possible. The more I listen and the further I fall under its spell I'm beginning to think that they have in fact surpassed the impossibly high standard already set. This is a fantastic album, an absolute testament to "The Unthanks" various talents and overall creative genius. "At First She Starts" is shaping up to be the standout track for me so far. I'm also glad, listening to Betsy Bell, to discover that we can still look forward to some more clog-dancing at the live shows.
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